Porsche Product Planning Pipeline, Perchance
Natural Aspiration 11: Sherman’s Lucid Dream Reveals Insights About Forthcoming Porsche Performance Cars
I spent the past weekend at Petit Le Mans, the 10-hour long IMSA season finale held at Road Atlanta. In the days leading up to the event, meteorologists - both professional and amateur - were concerned about how Hurricane Ian might impact the race weekend. Racecast Weather, a handy resource created by professional meteorologists who also happen to be racing fans, had some foreboding commentary earlier in the week (emphasis mine):
I've seen some comparisons on Twitter between this year and to the 2015 race. This weather pattern is nothing like what happened in 2015. That year, Hurricane Joaquin was well off the Atlantic coast, near the Bahamas, and a low pressure trough over the central U.S. was drawing moisture from Joaquin to the northwest. There was a band of tropical moisture that produced heavy rain over Road Atlanta, but it was not directly associated with Joaquin. There was also no impact from wind.
This situation is very different. This is expected to be a major hurricane that makes landfall on the Florida coast, and tracks directly into Georgia. The impacts from this system could be much more significant than 2015, especially in regard to wind.
I have attended every iteration of Petit Le Mans - this was my 25th year. I recall the 2015 race vividly; in brief:
I attended with half-a-dozen or so friends, and we all had Porsche Motorsport VIP Hospitality tickets, which proved invaluable.
We arrived at the track on Thursday afternoon accompanied by a few spits of rain.
The rain intensified to a downpour during that evening’s Night Practice session.
We woke up to more rain on Friday morning; it continued all day.
Saturday morning - race day - was much the same: Rain persisted through the majority of the race, ultimately cutting the competition short a few hours before the 10-hour mark, as visibility diminished and several days of unabated rain overwhelmed the track’s drainage capabilities.
Road Atlanta is a natural terrain road course carved into the rolling Appalachian foothills of Northeast Georgia; the soil is a red clay substance that is nasty, slick, and downright indelible when wet.
While other attendees were stuck outside in the elements, doubtless miserable, my friends and I were quite happy inside the luxe Porsche tent.
We were warm, dry, well-fed courtesy of Porsche’s caterer, and well-lubricated due to the open bar.
Given the prevailing weather conditions, the Very Big Name Porsche executives in attendance were also inside throughout the race; emboldened by the open bar, I struck up a conversation with Dr. Frank-Steffen Walliser, who was at the time Head of Porsche Motorsport for the GT division (i.e., the entirety of Porsche Motorsport, save for the 919 Hybrid program).
Memorably, Porsche won the race overall with a production-based GT car, the 911 RSR, which repeatedly overhauled the faster prototype cars in the challenging conditions.
Naturally, celebrations were in order at the end of the race! While most other VIP guests had given up and gone home, my entourage stayed through to the end.
Walliser and another Porsche executive approached our table just after the race concluded; I expected that they would ask us to leave so that their event and catering team could start packing up the elaborate tent.
On the contrary, they said “You guys are such great fans! We have all this champagne to celebrate our unexpected victory, so please help us drink it!” Which we did.
That is how I came to know Dr. Walliser, who is now in charge of the entire 911 range, as well as the mid-engined Boxster and Cayman platform.
With my 2015 Petit Le Mans experience in mind, my packing list for this year’s event included an umbrella, a pair of boots, and a Barbour jacket. Hurricane Ian spared us entirely, although Southwest Florida fared far worse. My rain gear went unused; I ended up with a sunburn, instead.
Frank - or FSW, as his friends call him - was not at Petit Le Mans this year. His 2019 promotion took him away from the track; moreover, Porsche exited its effort in IMSA’s factory / works GTLM class in 2020. Porsche will, however, return to factory-funded sports car racing in 2023, as they enter IMSA’s all-new, top-tier GTP prototype class - as well as the FIA WEC’s similar Hypercar class - with their latest challenger, the 963.
FSW was recently on hand at Silverstone Circuit for the press launch of the 992 generation 911 GT3 RS. The press embargo for the event breaks in a matter of hours: Midnight Central European Time on October 5th, or 6 PM on October 4th on the East Coast. While I was neither present at the Silverstone launch nor invited to attend, I did have an exceptionally lucid dream last night that made it seem as if I had been at the event.
What did I learn while chatting with FSW and his sidekick - Andreas Preuninger (or AP to those in the know), who is in charge of Porsche’s GT / Motorsport division road car models - during my dream?
SM: Porsche introduced a 4.2 liter version of the naturally-aspirated Motorsport flat-6 in the most recent, and now retired, version of the 911 RSR, which launched in 2019. The motivation for that development was enhanced torque and drivability for the GTLM racer. We haven’t yet seen that 4.2 liter engine in a GT3 or GT3 RS road car. Is it coming? In a 2020 discussion with Australian publication Wheels, Frank implied that larger displacement engines could be an unexpected consequence of more stringent EU7 engine regulations from 2026 (emphasis mine):
"In 2026, the next wave of regulations will come with EU7. This will be the worldwide toughest regulations considering emissions, especially in the spread between real driving emissions and what we see on the test benches," [Frank] says.
"We will see a big change because it means for everybody, new engines and we will see bigger displacements coming back again."
“I expect 20 percent more displacement on average for these EU7 capable engines. A lot of manufacturers will jump from four to six, from six to eight [cylinders]," he explains.
"The regulations are completely counterproductive to CO2 regulations, so this will go up.”
“This new regulation is really difficult to fulfil because we will have different cold start emissions side and bigger catalytic converters. When I'm talking bigger, I'm talking a factor of three to four times more, so there will be a small chemical industrial factory in the car to really control this," he says.
"This means all new engines and especially for the 911 this gets really, really difficult. But we will never give up. Whatever it takes, we will do it. We want to keep six cylinders, for sure, but we will have to overwork it, we will have to make a new engine. That's the fact. Again."
Asked whether that would mean the end of the normally-aspirated engine, as championed in the soul of the 911 range, the GT3, Walliser is downbeat.
"At the moment, we only see a turbo solution. Naturally aspirated, not really,” he laments.
Response: No current plans to use the 4.2 liter Motorsport engine. The existing 4.0 liter road car engine, which develops 525 hp in the 992 generation GT3 RS, will suffice for all iterations of EU6 engine regulations. Porsche will keep the existing flat-6 viable for EU7, beginning in 2026, provided customer demand is sufficient.
SM: Will Porsche electrify a 911 GT model? If so, what would that look like?
Response: Whereas other elements of the Porsche line-up are already (partly) electrified or will soon become so, including the Boxster and Cayman twins, the 911 family will in general retain internal combustion. The introduction of a hybrid 911 will likely begin with a mainstream model with a system that ventures beyond a 48 volt “mild” hybrid implementation. There are also no current plans to fit a 911 silhouette on top of the next-gen Boxster / Cayman EV model.
SM: Porsche has been talking about synthetic, carbon neutral fuels recently. Oliver Blume, who is now CEO of the entire Volkswagen (VW) Group and newly public Porsche, is a proponent of synthetic fuels, whereas his predecessor - Herbert Diess - was laser-focused on EVs. What’s the latest on synthetic fuels?
Response: It’s currently early days for synthetic fuels. There is an identified runway that would bring the cost down significantly from the current level, which is roughly €8 per liter, to €2 per liter. Additional challenges include updating gas station infrastructure. Blending synthetic fuels with conventional fossil fuels is also possible.
SM: What about hydrogen combustion?
Response: No work underway at present.
SM: How much of the lap time enhancement seen on successive generations of GT3 and GT3 RS cars, particularly on the Nürburgring Nordschleife, is attributable to updated tire compounds?
Response: The most significant factor for lap time improvement on the latest car is not tire-driven; rather, it is chassis configuration and track width.
SM: Final question - how does Porsche feel about resto-mod outfits that charge serious money to “reinvent” or “remaster” air-cooled 911s? Porsche offered interesting personalization options on the 991.1 generation 911 R special edition, and the 991.2 generation 911 Speedster was a similar project. What other interesting models might be in the pipeline? What about the lifted 992 generation 911 mule that has been seen lately on the Nordschleife? It appears to have been inspired by the “Safari” 911 craze.
Response: My friends are enthusiastic about what Singer and RUF, in particular, are doing with Porsche’s back catalog. The mule pictured above represents a new, limited-edition “Dakar” 911 that will be based on the 911 GTS.
Although I have it on good authority that dreams are never quite as they seem, bookmark this article to see how strong my crystal ball turns out to be!