Porsche Targets Short Term Leases To Move 911s

Selling and leasing cars is a complicated business. If you’re a luxury brand like Porsche, chances are good that you lease a lot more vehicles than you sell outright. When it comes to buying a 911, stepping up to the plate with a check that starts at $80k is a tall order. On the other hand, if you break it down into a “digestible” $1,200 per month or so, the cost seems more within reach (at least to some). Leases are good for business, because they also turn over a lot of clean, low mileage used cars, and a $65k, three year old 911 is a lot more attainable for most people. So what do you do when your three year leases decline, reducing the future population of used cars? If you’re Porsche, you find a way to restructure leases for 24 months. Read more

Porsche Builds A More Efficient 911 GT3 R Hybrid

In 2010, Porsche became the first automaker to campaign a hybrid race car in endurance racing events around the world. Their original 911 GT3 R Hybrid saw competition at the 24 Hours of Nürburgring, as well as races in China and in the United States. Lessons learned from these competition outings were used to build a better 911 GT3 R Hybrid race car for 2011. In this case “better” doesn’t mean faster, but it does mean more fuel efficient. Porsche’s goal is to turn the same lap times as last year, but use less gasoline in doing so, and in endurance racing that savings can easily be the difference between winning and losing. Read more

2011 Porsche 911 Carrera GTS: Goldilocks, Your Ride Is Here

It’s been a long time since anyone read fairy tales to me, but here’s what I remember about Goldilocks: she did a B&E on the bear’s place and found most of their stuff not to her liking. Their porridge (whatever the hell that is) was either too hot or too cold and their mattresses too firm or too soft. She finally found porridge that was just right and a comfortable bed, just before the bears came home and ate her. Or something like that, but the point of my story is this: when it comes to the Porsche 911, previous models have either been too cold / soft for my tastes (911, 911 SC, Carrera, Carrera 4) or too hot / firm for my tastes (930, 911 GT3). Porsche’s new-for-2011 Carrera GTS, on the other hand, is just right. Read more

Walter Röhrl Shows How To Loop A Porsche 904

Those lucky bastards from Autoblog: not only do they get invited to the world launch of Porsche’s Cayman R in Mallorca, Spain, but they also get two time World Rally Champion Walter Röhrl to take them on a hot lap in a priceless, irreplaceable Porsche 904. In case you don’t know the car, it was only built in 1964 and 1965, and Porsche cranked out less tan 130 copies. In 1964, Porsche built 106 904s, each with a 2.0 liter flat four engine good for 198 horsepower. By 1965, Porsche had upped the ante and built a few 904s with the flat six from the Porsche 911; these cars were known as the “904/6”. The car in the video is a 1965 904/6, owned by a member of the Porsche family. Since only a handful were ever built, binning this pristine example wouldn’t be a good thing at all. Read more

Would You Buy A Chinese Manufactured Porsche?

Part of the Porsche appeal has always been its made-in-Germany-by-anal-retentive-engineers mystique. One could argue that you could go equally fast for less money in a Chevy Corvette, but it wouldn’t give the precision, feel or prestige of the 911. Part of the whole 911 experience, at least for those who buy new cars, has been paying the 911 price of admission. Is it steep? Of course it is, but the car was built by German craftsmen obsessed with every detail of its construction. If Porsche CEO Matthias Muller has his way, that may not be the case much longer: Porsche is considering an assembly plant in either the U.S. (unlikely) or China (very likely). Read more

Cars With Launch Control: Houston, We Have Lift Off!

[original post date: 02/10/2009] I honestly believe that the new Nissan GT-R has sparked quite an interest and crave for launch control. Many cars way before the Nissan GT-R have had their own system for a launch control either in a SMG transmission in the E46 BMW M3 or the Volkswagen’s early DSG found in the GTI.

The ultimate crave for launch control baffles me but you have to understand that I would take a full manual transmission any day over a, what Jeremy Clarkson calls them, floppy paddle gear box. Even with Nissans woes with grenaded transmissions in the GT-R, launch control is still a big hit. Even Hitler “had to launch it”.

Ever since the introduction of drive-by-wire, auto manufacturers have been toying with new electronics that improve upon the over-all safety of a vehicle. New systems come standard in many vehicles now such as dynamic skid control or also known as vehicle dynamic control or electronic stability control (name varies from each manufacturer). Many of these new systems utilize a combination of computer operated units from the ABS braking, traction control and accelerator control. I am sure if manufacturers thought they could play with these systems and make a car safer then why not develop a precise method for accelerating a vehicle with a computer to make it faster.

It is all a numbers game if you think about it. I am sure many car enthusiasts, including yourself, may have experimented with dropping your clutch at a certain RPM to get the full potential out of a launch from a dead-stop. Even you guys with automatics have almost perfected holding the brake pedal while stomping on the accelerator in preparation for a ‘launch’. What if your car could do this for you? Well, many new exotic and sports cars can but it does take the use of a special transmission or a manual transmission that is controlled by a computer, except in Porsches’ case with their newest launch control system on a full manual transmission.

Where did this idea and technology come from?

If you think about it, F1 cars among other racing cars were already using a type of the technology that we see in today’s cars fitted with dual clutch transmissions and SMG (Sequential Manual Gearbox) units. Racing is where it begins… most times. From the F1 cars now shifting well under 60 milliseconds to the Nissan GT-R’s dual clutch shifting time of around 200 milliseconds, computers have taken cars to a new level of performance where a human just simply cannot match yielding a much higher level of performance.

Cars with Launch Control

Many of the baby boomers know ‘launch control’ to be something only NASA quotes in the control room during a space shuttle launch. Now we can all experience a ‘horizontal’ launch in many of today’s technologically advanced performance vehicles.

So which cars have launch control? Below is a short list that we have compiled of all vehicles with an available launch control. If we missed any please post a comment below and let us know.

Please note: Some of the vehicles included on the list may only have a staging RPM setting which some may call “launch control” but it is not as involved as a fully automated launch control or uses a sequential shifting transmission (paddle shifter) such as in the Nissan GT-R.

• Audi R8
• Audi TT
• BMW M3
• BMW M5
• BMW M6
• Bugatti Veyron
• Chevrolet Corvette/ZR1
• Ferrari 360cs
• Ferrari 599 GTB/GTO
• Ferrari F430/Scuderia
• Ferrari 458 Italia
• Lamborghini Gallardo/LP560
• Lamborghini Murcielago/LP640
• Lexus LFA
• Mercedes Benz McLaren SLR
• Mercedes Benz SL63 AMG
• Mercedes Benz SLS AMG
• Mitsubishi Evo Lancer Evolution/MR
• Nissan GT-R
• Porsche 911/Carrera/S/GT2
• Volkswagen GTI/Golf/Rabbit/R32

Various videos demonstrating launch control below after the jump…

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Playboy Selects “The Hottest Rides Of 2011″, We Offer Our Rebuttal

Let’s keep this simple: if you want to look at gorgeous, semi-naked women or read insightful reporting, go to Playboy.  If you want accurate information on cars and trucks, come to Automotive Addicts.  We don’t do the whole pictures of naked women thing (although we have been known to look at them admiringly), because it’s just not what we do best.  Likewise, when Playboy publishes a list of the “Hottest Rides” of the year, you need to read it with some skepticism.

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Nissan Takes Off The Gloves, Throws Down On Porsche And Audi

Nissan is getting bold with their advertising in the U.K.; so bold, in fact, that Porsche has already threatened litigation for unapproved use of their trademark crest. A billboard sponsored by Nissan, displayed at this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed, featured a 370Z with the Porsche crest, the Audi rings and the BMW roundel. Next to each was chalked up numbers, indicating “kills” by the Nissan. Porsche was none too happy about this, and sent Nissan a cease and desist order in regards to use of the logo. Audi and BMW, meanwhile, just smiled and enjoyed the free advertising.

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