Porsche 911 Turbo in a Class of One

Every month, the glossy pages of car magazines sport photographs of the quickest thing to hit the roads since, well, the last time. In their celebration of unbridled speed and handling, reliability simply isn’t a major factor. It should be. A high performance car may be fast, furious and fun, but if bits keep falling off, if it spends more time in dry dock than cruising the highways and byways, the machine in question is nothing more than a four wheeled prima donna with a propensity for bouts of “exhaustion”. And yet automakers continue to build supercars that can't run hard for one day without some kind of extremely expensive tinkering. - Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

There's an old racing expression: "To finish first, first you must finish." Porsche doesn’t just pay homage to the expression, they live it. The German company has dominated nearly every race series in which they’ve competed. More to the point, Porsche’s won the grueling 24-hour race at Le Mans sixteen times. That’s more than Ferrari and Ford put together. This phenomenal mechanical stamina is built into every Porsche road car made.- Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

A while back, I was invited to speak to a local chapter of Porsche owners. I tried to explain the over-engineering that makes Porsche’s road cars so tough. For example, their engines and transmissions are built absurdly strong for their size. You will find more bearing area, big-ends and mains for each liter of displacement in a 911 engine than in any other engine in production today. It’s an obscure technical point, but a telling one; indicating Stuttgart’s commitment to combining mechanical strength, accessible performance and glorious precision. You simply can’t buy a more robust high performance automobile.- Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

There are plenty of independent surveys to back up this assertion. Porsche’s Finnish subcontractors, Valmet Automotive, recently received the Bronze Plant Quality Award from J.D. Power’s Initial Quality Study 2006. The Cayman S was ranked best overall (together with Toyota Lexus LS 430) for having the fewest quality problems in the entire industry. The Cayman S was best in its category "Compact Premium Sporty Cars,” with the Porsche Boxster ranked third. And Porsche was awarded the highest initial quality of all automobile brands. - Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

OK, it is true that the Carrera GT’s carbon fiber clutch is a disaster that transforms a perfectly serviceable (if low slung) daily driver into a San Francisco supercar owner’s worst nightmare. But it’s the exception that proves the rule. The Porsche Turbo is still the single most effective exemplar of the “everyday” supercar. It’s the only ultra-high performance automobile I’d jump into at a moment’s notice and confidently head for the other end of the country– at speed. Or take to the supermarket to pick-up a weekend’s supplies. - Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

Is reliability the ultimate measure of a high performance car? Of course not. Otherwise, the Porsche Turbo would be in a class of one. But reliability is certainly an important safety consideration for anyone who intends on using their exotic as God intended. And it jibes with the age old question: what’s the world’s best car? One that starts.- Don Vorderman - www.thetruthaboutcars.com

Source
Don Vorderman
www.truthaboutcars.com