2019 Porsche 911 GT3 RS Review
Here in Brisbane, the high-end car community is pretty small and insular. We have a group that does regular track days together, and in that small group of no more than 20 folks (but a lot more cars), we had four Porsche owners all with the latest-generation 911s of different variants. 416,100 (without options) is within reach, and in fact cheaper than the Turbo and Turbo S. So, how does it compare? To find out, we gathered for a drive up Mt Glorious and Nebo in Brisbane and swapped around to feel the difference between the cars. There are so many different variants of a 911 that you have to wonder how anyone at Porsche can even keep track. For now, you can still buy the 鈥榦utgoing鈥?GTS, GT3, GT3 RS and GT2 RS in the 991.2 generation, alongside the new 992 generation. No other car company can get away with this, but Porsche is Porsche and this is why we are here.
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What's Different About It? Rather than wholesale change, the eighth-generation 911 鈥?the 992, as Porsche calls it 鈥?is a product of continual honing. Much of the bodywork, interior and underlying construction is new. But it's hard to tell that from just a glance. Part of the reason is that the 911's size has barely changed. The wheelbase remains 96.5 inches long, and you'd need less than the first inch of a ruler to measure the differences in length and height. Width is a different story. Where previous 911s were differentiated by standard- and wide-body variants, the new 911 only comes in the latter (so far, anyway). Aficionados will likely notice the updated bumpers, including the light bar that runs across the width of the rear. Owing to the constant yet gradual swelling of 911 proportions, the rear wheels have grown to 21 inches in diameter. The fronts remain 20 inches.
Porsche is using more aluminum and less steel in the 911's construction, but overall weight has increased by around 160 pounds. Much of the weight gain comes from the hardware needed to support the future 911 hybrid that will likely be coming out in a few years. The 2020 911 is first available as the rear-wheel-drive Carrera S or all-wheel-drive Carrera 4S 鈥?the S designates the second rung on the 911 ladder. A less expensive non-S Carrera enters production later in 2019. You can expect the usual onslaught of ever-faster GTS, Turbo and GT3 versions to follow after that. Regardless of drive wheels, the 911 Carrera S comes with a twin-turbocharged 3.0-liter flat-six engine that makes 443 horsepower and 390 pound-feet of torque. Those figures represent modest improvements of 23 hp and 22 lb-ft of torque compared to last year. A new eight-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission (PDK in Porsche-speak) comes standard. The addition of an eighth gear permits a wider spread of ratios, improving both acceleration and fuel economy. Gears six through eight are overdrive, and top speed is attained in sixth. A seven-speed manual transmission will be available later this year. True, you can get dramatically more power from less expensive American sports cars. But the 911 has always been a car that somehow punches above its weight class. Porsche claims that, with the automatic and launch control, the new 911 rips from 0 to 60 mph in 3.3 seconds and clears the quarter-mile in 11.7 seconds for rear-drive models. Considering that the previous-generation 911 was quicker than that in our testing, we expect even better numbers when we get our hands on this 911 for a full test.