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 16
years since the birth of the ground-breaking 959, Porsche hasn’t
produced
any supercars. You may argue that the ’97 and ‘98 911 GT1 were
supercars,
but they were actually road-legal race cars designed to satisfy FIA’s
homologation
requirements, hence never the successors to 959. Being a fan of 959, I
was upset. While Ferrari kept rolling out the successors to 288GTO -
F40,
F50 and then Enzo, Porsche CEO Wendelin Wiedeking ignored the supercar
segment completely and even withdrew from sports car racing. Instead,
he
poured money into the Cayenne SUV. I was puzzled. Yes, Mr. Wiedeking is
undoubtedly a great businessman and a saviour to Porsche, but his
business
mind doesn’t understand the core value of Porsche. I am sure Ferry
Porsche
would not have agreed with him if he were still alive.
Ridiculously,
today we can
have the Carrera GT not because Mr. Wiederking woke up, but because of
the past effort by the now-defunct sports car racing team. In the late
90s, the last year before Porsche withdrew from sports car racing, it
developed
a contender for Le Mans. This car had carbon-fiber chassis and was
powered
by a normally aspirated 5.5-litre V10. Unfortunately, the change of Le
Mans regulations and the lack of support from Mr. Wiederking finally
sent
the project to grave. However, Mr. Businessman didn’t want to waste the
money spent into the project, thus he asked his engineers to develop
the
Le Mans car into a road car and showed it in the 2000 Paris motor show.
No promise for production was made until Jan 2002, when Porsche
received
more than 1000 advanced orders and by then it was sure to make money.
After
all, Carrera GT is just another business decision by Mr. Wiederking.
 Each
Carrera GT is priced at £330,000 - 15% dearer than Pagani Zonda
but
25% cheaper than Ferrari Enzo. Considering the Ferrari supercar has a
limited
production run of 349 cars while Zonda is even rarer, the Carrera GT
does
not represent very good value for money - Porsche is likely to build
1500
cars in 3 years, which is a massive number for supercars. And funny, it
is built in neither Weissach nor Zuffenhausen, but the newer Leipzig
plant
where the Cayenne SUV is produced !
Fortunately,
Carrera GT is
not another road-legal race car like 911 GT1. Despite of its racing
root,
Porsche re-engineered it extensively to suit everyday use. One of the
examples
is the chassis: the original Le Mans car had its engine bolted directly
onto the carbon fiber tub (F50's drivers should know how bad the
vibration
is). The Carrera GT mounts its engine and rear suspensions via
hydraulic
mount to a cage-like carbon-fiber subframe in order to isolate noise
and
vibration from the cockpit. This is the world's first carbon-fiber
subframe,
lighter than rival's alloy subframe.
Unlike
Ferrari
and Pagani,
Porsche's new supercar employs a V10 engine. It is not only shorter
than
a V12 (thus benefit weight distribution) but also lighter - 214kg
compares
with Ferrari Enzo's 225kg. However, the most significant advantage to
Carrera
GT is that its V10 is mounted very low in the chassis, thanks to a new
ceramic clutch (PCCC, or Porsche Carbon Ceramic Clutch). The toughness
of ceramic material allows the clutch to be made much smaller in
diameter
yet can handle tremendous of torque. With a small diameter clutch, the
engine crankshaft can be positioned very close to the floor. This lower
the center of gravity considerably.
 The
V10 engine is a development from the racing unit. Main modifications
include
stroking out from 5.5 to 5.7 litres to improve torque output and extra
strengthening to achieve higher reliability. Strangely, the V10 has an
incline angle of 68° instead of the supposedly smoothest 72°.
Its
firing is uneven, alternating between 68 and 76°, but this is
hardly
perceivable. Porsche chose 68° because a decade ago a research by
its
racing department found this is the best compromise between breathing
efficiency
and smoothness.
The 5733cc
unit
is made of
aluminum alloy. Nikasil cylinder liners ensure minimum friction
generated
between bores and pistons. The pistons themselves are made of aluminum
while connecting rods are titanium. This allow the engine to rev freely
to 8400rpm. As for breathing, the cylinder heads have conventional 4
valves
per cylinder. Intake valve timing is continuously variable, but exhaust
timing is fixed and there is no such things like variable intake
manifolds
or exhaust, unlike Ferrari Enzo's V12.
The combustion
chambers run
at a super-high 12.0:1 compression ratio. Moreover, their oversquare
design,
with 98mm bore and 76mm stroke, favours rev and power. At 8,000rpm, the
Porsche V10 delivers 612 horsepower (DIN), which translate to an
impressive
106.8 hp / litre. In contrast, maximum torque of 435 pound-foot is
probably
the lowest figure among supercars, partly due to the small capacity,
partly
due to the oversquare combustion chambers.
Despite
of the
lightness
of the V10, the full carbon-fiber chassis, the ceramic clutch, the
aluminum
double wishbone suspensions, the ceramic brakes and magnesium wheels,
Carrera
GT is not at all lightweight. Porsche claims a kerb weight of 1380kg,
or
15kg above the more powerful Ferrari Enzo. More unfortunately, when
Autocar
tested the car earlier this year, it tipped the scale at 1472kg. As a
result,
the magazine took 3.7 seconds to launch the car from zero to 60mph and
7.4 seconds to 100mph, both are identical to Pagani Zonda thus some way
behind Ferrari Enzo (which took 3.3 sec and 6.6 sec respectively
according
to Road & Track).
As
for
top speed,
Carrera
GT is by no means a challenger to McLaren's record. Its
downforce-enhanced
drag coefficient of 0.396 won't enable it to run much beyond the
claimed
205mph top speed - with a tailwind, Porsche's test driver once recorded
208mph. So, this is neither the fastest car on earth nor the strongest
accelerating one.
However,
it is
definitely
the best handling supercar currently available. No one will doubt the
tuning
technique of Porsche's engineers and test drivers (especially Walter
Rohrl).
Even given a fundamentally flawed design like 911, they could work
miracles,
let alone the beautifully engineered Carrera GT. This car is very wide,
low and has a long wheelbase to enable remarkable stability. Further
helped
by a compact and low-mounted engine and a transverse gearbox, it
achieves
low center of gravity and low polar moment of inertia like no others.
All
technical specifications point to a first class handling. The only
question
is: does it deliver that on road?
On the Road
From styling
point of view
the Carrera GT is rather disappointing - it looks too ordinary, lack of
an exotic appearance that defined supercars. The lines are too soft and
the details are no more aggressive than a 911 GT3. Beside a Pagani it
stands
no chance of winning car lover's heart.
 The
targa-top cockpit is tight fit but ergonomics is excellent, especially
the high-mounted gear knob. The carbon fiber tub is exposed to remind
you
its price tag but the rest of the cabin is not very classy - although
plastics
are better quality than 911 and Boxster, the design is unadventurous.
Again,
it feels plain compare with Pagani Zonda.
Start the
engine,
engage
the clutch and you will probably stall the engine. The ceramic clutch
might
be strong, but it is difficult to engage smoothly, like an ON-OFF
switch,
requiring practice and skill. Once you overcome this obstacle and start
rolling the car, you will fall in love with the V10. Not only makes
exciting
noise, the engine is so free revving and so smooth that it feels more
like
a racing engine, even more so than Lamborghini's V10. The power
delivery
is linear, without the explosiveness of some rivals thus performance is
easily accessible.
Carrera
GT
employs a conventional
6-speed manual gearbox. You shift gears through the oddball wooden gear
knob mounted high on the center console, Civic Type R-style. As the
travel
from steering wheel to gear knob is greatly shortened, shift becomes
quicker
and easier. Moreover, the shift mechanism is short and slick thus is a
pleasure to use.
 As
the engine and transmission are obedient, you will love exploiting the
potential of the chassis, which is remarkably stable and well balanced.
This car is better tied down to ground than Ferrari Enzo - more stable
and more neutral. It also contains its power better - in the Ferrari
you'll
always feel the engine overwhelm the chassis so that the ASR traction
control
intervene frequently; in the Porsche you feel a right balance between
power
and handling. It is therefore capable to corner faster than the
Ferrari.
Walter Rohrl even claims the car can beat Enzo in Nurburgring despite
of
its poorer power to weight ratio. So far the best he did is 7min 36sec.
The Carrera
GT's
chassis
is not free of flaws however: it hates low speed. The first problem is
the steering, which feels numb and slow at low speed, refusing to self
center as well. As speed rises, steering feel and response improves
gradually
and eventually communicates with the driver in a way Ferrari Enzo can
never
dream of. The second problem is low-speed ride, which is fidgety on
B-roads.
Clearly, the chassis setup is optimized for higher speed. This
characteristic
is on the contrary to Pagani Zonda, which feels more lovely in regular
driving than on racing tracks.
Undeniably,
Porsche Carrera
GT is the most driver-oriented supercar currently available. It is not
the fastest, but it encourages you to drive it quicker and then reward
you with better feel and higher precision. What it lacks is an exotic
image
- it looks like a big Boxster rather than an edge-cutting supercar; its
cabin feels ordinary; to many people its V10 is a psychological
disadvantage
against its V12 rivals; to performance seekers it can’t match Ferrari
Enzo;
to car collectors it is too mass producing; to the fans of 959 it is
not
ground-breaking enough. A fine supercar it definitely is, I doubt what
status it will get in automotive history books. Time will tell.
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