Guest89

Yes, but recall that every air-cooled 911 has a "Mezger" engine with a split-crankcase and direct ties to the racing cars. It's only a comparatively recent change in which the company realized that the standard engine wasn't up to the task of winning endurance races (1998).

Don't get me wrong - I would love it if Porsche built a new, state of the art, lightweight, efficient, middle finger to the accountants motorsport engine and then put something very similar into the GT3. But it doesn't look like they will.

Mike in CA

Ok, but it seems that based on what I'm reading here, they are building that kick-*** motor for the new GT3 and motorsport. Why do you say it doesn't look like they will? Do you think this latest news is BS? Whatever. The speculation and questions will be answered very soon now.....

wanna911

No..........

I can, do not like any of them. Least of all BMW SMG. It was jerky and not smooth at all, would bet money I could beat that in a non afterthought manual unlike the one BMW conceded to put into the M5.

NBTBRV8

Taken from www.aussieexotics.com

Spotted in the Northern Territory in Australia for some hot weather testing:

BG

We'll all find out in March.
Why would they give you this information? What possible reason would they have?
Everyone is trying to find out the specs. on this car but they decided to tell you, just doesn't make sense.
I don't mean any offense it just doesn't make sense to me especially if they were higher up in the organization.

rosenbergendo

Ok it goes down like this. The motorsport heads are all in the paddock and in the corral over the weekend. They either see my 997.2 Gt3 or I just start out chatting with them casually. I dont just roll into "hey does the 991 GT3 have PDK or not?". I have found over the last 10 years the motorsport people at the track tend to be pretty liberal with the info as if they are talking to another racer per say. As one very Senior motorsport person told me "We dont care about the street car per say, we just care that they give us a solid base".

Mvez

Can anyone explain to me the point of offering a manual option in the other 991 models, but not the GT3? No way they go from all manual to all PDk. Sure, initial car will be PDk for performance figures to justify price, and wow the world, and to sell cars to people who cant drive a stick, but there will be a manual option at some point, I don't care what some bigwigs at Daytona say........that is unless their master plan is to get all of us to switch to Carrera S models.....pure genius.

The street car will start to move away from Motorsport more and more, agreed on that point.

Mike in CA

I see 3 possible scenarios:

a: rosenbergendo is making all of this up.
b: the daytona guys were making all of this up.
c: the daytona guys were giving rosenbergendo straight scoop and he's passing it on to us.

Talk about making sense, a and b don't, to me. What would be the point of rosen jerking us around or them jerking him around? Call me crazy, I vote for c.

MT's are still available in tamer 991 models because Porsche is mindful of tradition and customer interest, which is waning, and in most cases has absolutely zero to do with whether someone can drive a MT or not. Many of us have decades of experience driving stick and prefer PDK not just because it's faster and more flexible, but because it's fun. That last part, at least is subjective, but then so is the preference for a MT. We can agree to disagree on which is "best", at least.

Virtually no one uses MT's in motorsport, and Porsche's high end competitors don't have them in their street cars anymore. If the presence of PDK, maybe even exclusively, in the new GT3 is your evidence that the street car is moving away from motorsport, I'd argue exactly the opposite. No one will be building new race cars with manual boxes. The "race bred" street GT3 is simply following the motorsport trend. My $.02.

fc-racer

People and companies leak information all the time. We see it in the stock market before major announcements come out. Sometimes companies (ie, Apple) use intentional leaks to create buzz.

We're only two months away from the launch so it's highly plausible that these folks are in the know, and don't care if a few thousand people on rennlist speculate on the final specification.

Jon70

I hope these are the production wheels. Too bad the rear aero will likely look like the aerokit on the standard 991.

fbirch

Fair enough, as far as the transmission goes. But using an entirely different engine from the one they race represents a bigger divergence between race car and street car than past practice.

If Porsche ultimately starts using the new street car engine in motorsport and develops it in endurance racing, the divergence will be eliminated. Most track-junkie type buyers would just like to see the motorsport development happen first, and that doesn’t seem unreasonable to me.

BTW, as much as I love the Mezger, I don’t see any reason why Porsche can’t use modern tools such as DFI, CFD design SW, faster electronics, etc., to produce an outstanding new motor that beats the Mezger in every respect. In fact, I’m confident it’ll happen eventually, and probably soon. Exposure to the rigors of motorsport will be useful in exposing any weak links in the initial design. Can Porsche hit a home run on the first swing and build a bulletproof motor that holds up to repeated track use and doesn’t need any sorting on track? Maybe; time will tell. But I’d rather not be the early adopter who proves it one way or the other.

CRex

Is it just the picture or is that a horribly mangled FR wheel in the foremost car? I'm not digging this style of rims for one, and they're not standing up to mule duty either

Guest89

The 991 Cup car has a clutch pedal (because it has sequential, NOT PDK) and the Mezger engine. If the GT3 has that setup, then I won't complain.

+1 - Human nature to want to impress someone and gain status as a result of your privileged, secret info.

TRAKCAR

I think that's a strap around the wheel.

Mike in CA

A reasonable POV. The development timeline you describe would be ideal. I'd suggest that the convergence of several factors, including the need to develop a new street GT3 at the same time that the Mezger is becoming less competitive with other manufacturer's more modern and efficient DFI engines is changing the equation. I suppose Porsche could wait a few years to release a new GT3. This would allow their latest, much needed motorsport engine to get sorted and earn it's stripes before it goes in the street car. But that would leave a big hole in their production car offerings which, after all, are what helps pay the racing bills.

So if the rumors are true, we get the new street GT3 engine at about the same time that the motorsport guys get the race version. As you say, time will tell if that is a plus or not.