996 vs. 991: What’s the Ultimate Porsche GT3?
Porsche purists love to decry new metal in favor of old. So has the 996 GT3
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MotorTranscript
00:00 (engine revving)
00:02 Hi, I'm Scott Evans here in the hills of Napa, California
00:16 with an incredible opportunity
00:17 because it's the 20th anniversary of the 911 GT3.
00:21 And Porsche has decided to fly
00:22 some of its most important cars all the way from Germany.
00:25 And I'm standing here with two very, very significant ones.
00:28 We have the original, the 1999 GT3
00:31 and the brand new 991 GT3 RS.
00:34 But before we get in the cars and start driving,
00:36 let's learn a little bit about them.
00:38 (upbeat music)
00:40 Let's start with the car that you can't miss,
00:45 the 911 GT3 RS with the VISOC package here.
00:49 What that means is the most extreme 911 GT3
00:52 you can get right now.
00:54 They took the badge off the hood
00:56 and made it this sticker to save weight.
00:58 Obviously you can see it's a carbon fiber hood
00:59 with these NACA ducts and things,
01:01 but look what else we've got here.
01:02 We've got these crazy fender vents
01:04 to let air flow out of there.
01:06 We've got these crazy forged wheels
01:08 that these are the same wheels
01:09 that were on the last generation car
01:10 because they couldn't find a way
01:11 to make them any lighter or better.
01:12 So they had to just go with what they had.
01:14 You got this huge air intake
01:15 to get all that air back into this monster motor
01:18 and your giant carbon fiber wing, fully adjustable.
01:21 Just a couple of tools.
01:22 You can completely change how you set the car up
01:24 for whatever racetrack you're going to.
01:25 So that's the new 911 GT3 RS.
01:28 But let's go back to where it all started.
01:29 The original, the first GT3.
01:32 20 years ago,
01:33 you couldn't actually even get this car in the US.
01:35 These were only sold in Europe
01:36 for the first couple of years
01:37 before they finally saw fit to bring them here.
01:39 So this is a very special car.
01:41 Now, obviously this wing looks like
01:42 it was designed by an artist rather than an engineer,
01:45 but it is still functional
01:46 and can be manually adjusted for setting up at the racetrack.
01:49 Down here, you've got these two part wheels
01:51 that use titanium screws to hold them together.
01:54 Very expensive, but important for saving weight.
01:57 Now, the rest of the car
01:58 doesn't have quite as many design standouts,
02:01 but it does have its calling card that all 996s have,
02:05 the fried egg headlights.
02:06 And they make the car very, very identifiable.
02:09 But enough about the cars, let's get in and drive them.
02:12 This is an incredibly important 911
02:16 in the grand long history of 911s
02:19 because it was the first of the water-cooled 911s.
02:22 Very controversial car for that reason.
02:24 This car is hugely important in Europe,
02:26 both for bringing Porsche back to international racing,
02:30 where it did extremely well,
02:32 but also because this was the first street car
02:34 to ever break eight minutes on the Nürburgring Nordschleife.
02:37 (car engine revving)
02:40 For being 20 years old, still feels very new.
02:44 Now, the steering is much different than we have today.
02:47 There's a more tactile feel to it,
02:49 hydraulically-assisted steering.
02:50 The damping is a good balance between, you know,
02:53 being stiff enough for driving it like a race car,
02:56 but also compliant enough to drive on the road.
02:59 You hear this engine all the time.
03:00 There's no exhaust modes or any of that nonsense.
03:03 It is 100% engine and growl.
03:06 The car is just going to do exactly what you ask it to do.
03:14 If you can still get a 996, forget about how it looks,
03:18 because this is what you do with a 996.
03:24 If the 996 was everything that we traditionally knew
03:27 about how to make a race car and a fast street car,
03:31 this is how the future does it.
03:33 This is how you use supercomputers to make cars
03:37 that much quicker and that much more powerful
03:41 and that much more grip to get you around the track,
03:44 that little teensy bit faster.
03:45 (car engine revving)
03:50 (laughs)
03:52 Now that's music.
03:53 The fundamental nature of the car hasn't changed.
03:56 It's designed to make everything as easy
03:59 and effortless as possible so that you can focus
04:02 on the road and on your driving.
04:04 This GT3 RS engine is really something incredible itself.
04:08 This thing revs to 9,000 RPM.
04:11 That's 1,500 more than that old car did
04:13 and sounds absolutely amazing doing it.
04:16 I mean, it makes 500 horsepower
04:18 from a naturally aspirated six-cylinder engine.
04:21 That is how precise and how high-tech this engine is.
04:25 No turbochargers or anything like that boosting it up.
04:28 This is all mechanical perfection.
04:31 (car engine revving)
04:34 So there we have it, a firsthand look
04:45 at what 20 years of development gets you.
04:48 Another 140 horsepower, a computer-controlled,
04:51 dual-clutch transmission that's lightning quick,
04:53 a 9,000 RPM redline, but what does that all mean?
04:56 More speed.
04:58 That's the Porsche 911 GT3.
05:00 So good that people think you're being paid
05:02 to say nice things about it, even though you're not.
05:04 (upbeat music)
05:07 (upbeat music)
05:09 (upbeat music)