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Officially, my car is completed. As of Thursday morning Stuttgart time. It is now in validation which takes about a week, then they can book shipping time to get it to me.
Some here already knew I flew to Stuttgart to see my car on the actual production floor last few days. I flew into Stuttgart Wednesday morning on fittingly, flight BA 918.
Porsche picked me up from the airport and sent me to the factory straight away. And a separate driver took Mark Webber, which was sitting next to me, to Weissach.
Once I arrived, a 'Tour Guide' took me to the production floor there it is, just getting off station 9 where they install the rear engine hatch and some other items around the car, and onto station 10 where they install the front bumper, both doors and the front hood. I did a quick walk around the floor again, just to see what's different than my April visit. It's a lot more crowded and the engine assembly line is actually running this time around.
While I was there, I was offered to help build my own car, I can take part in any steps, but since they just installed the hood, they offered me to install the hood badge myself. Also on the table was that I can even video tape the whole process. Which I wasted no time in handing over my iPhone to be used. Not a long process, not very complicated either, and one of the tech was standing next to me just to make sure I didn't screw up. Well I didn't and the whole process took just over a minute. But it's one minute of my life that I will hardly ever forget.
Porsche has arranged a hosted lunch at Christophorus so I left right after it took position at station 11, and it completed station 12 by the end of Wednesday. That leaves station 13 and 14 for the morning of Thursday. Porsche is running at full speed at the factory, 2hrs per stations, 28 hrs total for each car. And they have added a Saturday shift, just so they can try to catch up with the earlier delays.
I have seen pictures, I have seen computer models, I have imagined what my car would look like in real life, but it's really something to see it actually coming to life, to form, right in front of your eyes. I highly suggest those who have ordered a 918 to ask to see your own car on the floor. The Timing will be very tight, I only got about 5 days worth of heads up and I had to scrambled to book flights and rearrange schedules to make the trip. A car will spent 3.5 days on the floor only and I made it on the 3rd day of production, which seems to be the sweet spot as the 2 days prior the car will be kind of in pieces.
Porsche had arranged the manager of sales coordination for North America to be my host for lunch, we had a good chat over lunch, he asked a lot of questions on how I see Porsche is doing, at least in my home market, and told me a lot of things, most of which are 'off the record' so I can't really repeat. Sorry guys. Part of those were responses from my concerns on Porsche's direction and I was told Porsche board actually discussed some of those and either the accountants said no or they deemed not important enough. About the only thing I can reveal would be Porsche is seriously considering opening a official restoration facility in North America, similar to the one at the Porsche Museum. It will be great news for those that owned some significant older Porsche cars.
It was a very short stay at Stuttgart, I flew out Thursday morning. Including my overnight stay over at Heathrow and the over night stay at Stuttgart, I spent a total of 74hrs away from home to spent about 4hrs at the factory. Well worth it I believed but my wife thinks I am crazy though.
While I was there, I was told that all of Europe, Asia and rest of the world's allocation are gone, what's left are the USA allocations, which amounts to around 100 cars or so. A while ago I did a rough calculation on Porsche's number based on the estimated production slot on current orders and came up with around 770 cars sold. At the factory I saw engine #787 just came off the line and 4 more were in various state of completion on the line so that pretty much confirms what I had guessed before.
Also, I was told a Sheik in the middle east had ordered 4 cars, think that's the record, he already got one and just specced his second, with all white leather and white stitching, at a cost of over 100k euro. Porsche had to specially order the white leather and stitching for him. Quite a few customers who had already taken delivery had ordered a 2nd car to be a keeper as they felt like they had already put on a lot of miles on their current car. So in the end if Porsche do indeed sell 918 cars, there will be less than 900 owners worldwide.
Of the 17 cars I saw on the floor, one on each station, and one car which is red with salzberg strips, that was just leaving and heading to the elevator, one more off the side off station 14 which is a PTS orange hue, and one on the side of station 7, which had a problem so they pull it aside and continue to work on it while the car behind take it's spot, 14 of them are with various shades of silver and grey, 2 liquid metal silver, 2 meteor grey metallic and 1 GT silver and the other 8 were rhodium silver. The last 2 are black, one of which is mine.
One last thing of note, during validation, Porsche will do a shake down run for each 918 at the Weissach track as part of the testing. Good to know our cars will be track tested. Literally.
Great write up and I always appreciate your information it's helped me improve my build. Now the real Conundrum do I go back over to help build the car, hmmmm....my wife thinks I'm nuts
I thought she thought you were nuts about 5 cars ago...............
But in all seriousness, what's the cost of airfare and hotel compared to what you will be paying for the car? The real cost is time cost, whether you can spare the time or not.
I thought she thought you were nuts about 5 cars ago...............
But in all seriousness, what's the cost of airfare and hotel compared to what you will be paying for the car? The real cost is time cost, whether you can spare the time or not.
She did and does, she's a gardening nut so she is on the other end of the spectrum with her own addiction. While she does not get it, she understands the sickness.
I do think this freedom on the floor as a car is being built, to assist them may not happen again (On a completely different level of the Corvette program) and it really really is cool.
One last thing of note, during validation, Porsche will do a shake down run for each 918 at the Weissach track as part of the testing. Good to know our cars will be track tested. Literally.
A trivial question perhaps, but I'm curious if the tires are replaced after the track testing.
No tires are not replaced after the track testing, but it is a plus as the track time will scrub the tire clean of the release agent and expose the rubber properly I believe
Location: 40 min South from the 'Ring, 45 min East of Spa
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Well that makes two Canadians with 918's that I know of now. Met a Canadian today at the 'Ring who was not where he intended to be with his 918 just days after a Leipzig delivery.
09-06-2014, 02:24 AM
My 918 or at least a report of it
