Five Things: marvellous mid-engined Porsches
Monday, 6 July 2020
Porsche is the most well-known (and currently only) manufacturer to offer a rear-engined sports car. The 911 is an icon but, as motorsport enthusiasts will know, putting the engine in the middle of the car is ideal for balance and ultimate performance.
The 718 Cayman GT4 is the latest and greatest example of Porsche's mid-engined efforts but far from the first. Here are five of Porsche's best mid-engined cars, excluding racing-only models, of course.
718
The origin of the 718 badge isn't the most recent generation of Cayman/Boxster. It first debuted on the successor to the 550 in 1957 and, like the modern-day equivalent, used a turbocharged flat four to develop 106kW. That might not sound like much but, when moving a vehicle weighing just 570kg, it's plenty.
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The original 718 was built for racing with things like headlights and indicators tacked on for the road-going models. Porsche even entered modified versions of the 718 in Formula 1 in 1961.
Stirling Moss even had a drive in one, contesting the 1961 Targa Florio alongside Graham Hill. They were winning too, until a transmission failure happened on the last lap.
911 GT1
Despite the name, the 911 GT1 was a mid-engined homolgation special. In order to race the GT1 in the endurance racing category with the same name, Porsche had to produce 25 cars for road use, these getting the Straßenversion suffix.
The road-racers use a slightly detuned version of the race car's 3.2-litre twin-turbocharged flat-six, though 400kW and 600Nm is still enough to get the heart going.
Claimed performance figures say the Straßenversion could hit 100kmh from a standstill in 3.9 seconds on its way to a top speed of 308kmh. The first two models off the line featured 993-style headlights while later versions got 996 headlights.
Carrera GT
The follow-up to the GT1 was originally intended to use a mid-mounted turbocharged flat-six for power but Porsche later decided to use a 450kW/590Nm 5.7-litre V10 engine. As you do.
As Porsche anoraks will know, this engine came from a shelved Formula 1 power unit design. Development on the racing variant stalled in 1999, primarily due to the need to work on the Cayenne, a model which would go on to provide much-needed income.
Unlike the GT1, the Carrera GT never ended up raced at Le Mans but the road version sold remains the only V10-powered Porsche to date and one of the most desirable.
918 Spyder
The 918 Spyder landed in 2013 as part of the 'Holy Trinity' of hybrid supercars in the mid-2010s, the other two being the McLaren P1 and the Ferrari LaFerrari.
The 918 received power from a naturally aspirated 4.6-litre V8 mounted behind the cabin, assisted by two electric motors for a total power output of 652kW and a huge 1280Nm of twist.
Claimed performance figures are appropriately stonking, with a 0-100 time of 2.6 seconds before hitting 200kmh in 7.2 seconds.
It's not totally anti-polar bear either; those electric motors are paired with a 6.8kWh battery that can drive the 918 on electric power only for up to 19km.
Boxster/Cayman
Of course, the most well-known mid-engined Porsches for the road are the Cayman/Boxster twins.
First debuting in 1996 in Boxster form, the convertible featured a smaller version of the 996 Carrera's flat six engine, displacing just 2.5 litres before being upped to 2.7 litres in 2000. It took Porsche another six years to introduce the fixed-roof Cayman, probably because it knew it had the potential to out-perform the 911 around a track…
That could also be the reason why the Cayman went nearly a decade without a GT-flavoured make-over, but the current GT4 is the ultimate expression of the mid-engined Cayman and first showed up in 2015.