Porsche 911 Carrera S PDK Coupe

What is it?

Now switching into its seventh generation, this latest version of Porsche’s 48-year old 911 sports car is lighter, faster, less thirsty, more luxuriously finished, better equipped and more sophisticated. That’s impressive, if no less than to be expected of Porsche. What’s more controversial for anyone who enjoys the 911 – and there have been over 700,000 of them over the decades – is a wheelbase stretch that risks reducing its agility, and the substitution of hydraulically powered steering for an electrically assisted system, potentially smothering the steering feel that is so much a part of the 911 legend. The move to electric power steering is one of many modifications designed to improve the 911’s efficiency, a mild downsizing of engine another, the base Carrera now propelled by a 350bhp 3.4 rather than a 345bhp 3.6. The 3.8 litres of the Carrera S tested here remains unchanged, but output rises from 390bhp to 400bhp. Both engines rev higher – and unusually these days, generate peak torque later too – but manage not only to be more economical but faster. The standard manual transmission car now makes 62mph in 4.8sec instead of 4.9sec, this number falling to 4.6sec with the PDK paddle-shift transmission, while its emissions amount to an impressive 194g/km. The PDK-equipped Carrera S needs just 4.3sec for the same sprint, and puts out 212g/km. The manual gets a seven-speed gearbox – a first – the PDK being a twin clutch automatic version of the same gearbox. The PDK transmission also has a coasting facility, the engine occasionally decoupling from the transmission to run at idle speed to save fuel, and both transmissions provide auto stop/start.

The 911’s suspension has been completely reworked. Apart from the longer wheelbase the front track is wider (although the car itself is the same width, barely any longer and slightly lower), the wheels are bigger, the torque-vectoring transmission feeds more power to the rear wheel with greater grip, and there’s a mechanical limited slip differential too. On PDK cars this is electronically controlled, and the inside rear wheel can be braked to heighten its agility. The S also gets electronic dampers and electronically stiffened engine mountings to sharpen its direction-changing abilities.

What’s it like?

Step inside, and you immediately see that the style and quality of the interior has improved. The centre console sits higher to bring the gearlever closer, the infotainment system is better arranged while the 911’s traditional five dial instrument display is neater, more modern and features a dial that can switch between a g-meter and sat-nav guidance. But the biggest difference – and it’s initially a subtle one – is that the dashboard is a much deeper construction, the base of the car’s windscreen sitting further away. That may sound trivial, but it’s one of several aspects that slightly distance the driver from the physical business of driving.

On the other hand, the engine is if anything a little louder, even in the quieter of the switchable exhaust’s two settings, the more vocal of them too noisy for anything but short bursts. Also changed is the engine’s tune, the hollow resonance that has been such a feature of the flat-six having disappeared, although it still sounds excitingly energetic and delivers truly vivid performance. You have to rev it harder to hit the torque peaks – there’s a 4600rpm hint of the eruption to come before the six serves its final climactic blast from 5500rpm to 7500rpm – which means you have to think harder to get the best from the seven-speed manual. But the rewards are more than worth it. The gain of a seventh speed, however, is not.

You need a positive hand on the gearlever to navigate its busy gate, and even with lock-outs to prevent you wrong-slotting, it’s easy to lose your rhythm while getting the right gear. That makes the PDK 911 the smoother of the two, its shifts impressively tremor-free and able to rapidly exploit the engine’s torque. Switch to sport or sport plus and there’s a small but satisfying thump with each ratio change too, the revs blipping brilliantly for downshifts.

Electronics intervene with equal polish in corners, a track session revealing terrifically forgiving handling at the cliff-edge of grip. The Carrera S is clearly capable of drifting with a grace that would have been much harder to muster in earlier versions, though on the open road you’ll rarely break its grip. On the track, we generated a mighty 1.29g’s worth of lateral g-force according to the g-meter, with more to come. You’ll also enjoy a terrific fluency of direction-changing, the sensation of an occasionally bobbing nose that has long been a 911 characteristic, and the precision of highly accurate steering.

But, this 991 is less alive than the 997 that came before. The electric power steering provides excellent consistency of resistance – the best of any EPAS system yet – and in the second of the two cars tried, adequate on-centre feel. But the revised suspension geometry has almost totally eliminated the steering’s writhe and shimmy on back roads, and its rim no longer hums with the resonance of the front wheels rolling over Tarmac either. More than that, the bigger distance between you and the windscreen, as well as the shallower rake of the ‘A’ pillars, makes this 911 feel bigger, less wieldy and harder to see out of on tight-twisting roads. The upshot is a car that feels like it’s swollen by a size, even though it hasn’t. The big-car feel is reinforced by the more pliant ride, too, and less thump over bumps. True, coarse surfaces still produce the roar of road noise and the engine is sometimes more insistent than it ought to be, but you’ll make journey’s end feeling fresher.

Should I give it garage space?

As you’d expect, this new 911 goes, stops and steers better than the last. It drinks less fuel, fires out less CO2, generates terrific grip, handles with greater precision and poise – and provides a more sophisticated cabin environment in which to enjoy the ride. And that wheelbase stretch provides decidedly more tolerable accommodation for kids, too. But these gains have extracted a price. The now technically correct steering geometry has diminished one of this Porsche’s most distinctive dynamic characteristics, because its wheel no longer jigs on back roads. There’s less feel through the rim, its engine sounds less individual and the feeling that it’s bigger makes it less of a back-roads blast. The clumsy seven-speed manual is disappointing too, although the PDK transmission is excellent. So yes, this Porsche is undoubtedly a more accomplished high-performance machine, and an impressively efficient one too. But it’s less of an excitingly visceral machine than 911s past.

Rating

Specifications

Model: Porsche 911 Carrera S PDK Coupe
Price: �83,629
Engine: 3800cc six -cylinder petrol
Power: 400bhp
Torque: 325lb ft
Performance: 0-62mph in 4.3 seconds, 188mph top speed
Fuel economy: 32.5mpg
CO2 emissions: 205g/km
On sale: December 2011

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