Test Drive: Porsche 996 Turbo Cabriolet
Porsche 911 Turbo Cabriolet
Porsche 911 Turbo: So there I was at the Porsche dealership in Denver, pretty upset about my drive of the bland 996 Carrera 4S. I hadn’t reported it, but I’ll detail it later in this review, I also drove the 996 Turbo Coupe with a Tiptronic transmission. Summary: The Transmission ruined the car. Somehow all these cars were Arctic Silver Metallic, which was a very nice looking Silver color for a car, but about as exciting as Silver can be.
The Porsche 911 Turbo Cabriolet was definitely a different beast from the other two cars I will admit. Most notably, there was gobs of acceleration - tons of it. The roadfeel was significantly improved. The communication was also improved with respect to the clutch. The gearbox was still very numb. With the sun setting, I hopped into the driver’s seat - brother in the passenger seat, popped it in gear and crept out of the parking lot. The car had been idling for several minutes already, so the warm-up period was much shorter. The car in general was very composed at regular city street speeds. Immediately I knew I was in a different car than the C4S. The Suspension on the 911 Turbo was much more stiff and communicated the road feel much better. The Turbo also felt lower to the ground, and the low end grunt was much more satisfying, even at part throttle, than its sibling. There was more feeling in the clutch, so I could actually feel it engage and disengage, but I would still say it was like reading braile through leather gloves compared to the clutch in my M3. Action on the clutch was very light, so sitting in traffic with it was not very challenging. Like the Porsche C4S, the gear lever was very light and silky smooth in its action, but still very very numb, and a fairly long throw. After a short time, the engine had warmed up and we were ready to play.
I pulled up to a stop light in the middle of a very long straight section of road. The cool air above, the noticeable LACK of heated seats NOT warming my ass, and the signature burble of the Porsche engine behind me. My left hand on the steering wheel, my right hand on the gear shifter; we sat in silence, just looking straight ahead. The light turned green and I began releasing the clutch while pressing the gas. At first, the car lugged forward almost disappointingly. This was my first aggressive (not balls-out) launch of this car though, so I wasn’t concerned. I mashed the gas pedal and the revs climbed. Somewhere around 2,000 RPM, I could feel the turbos start to spool. And suddenly - just like in the Cayenne Turbo - a tidal wave of acceleration roared over us. 1st gear was gone in the blink of an eye, 2nd gear mashed us into the backs of our seats as the Porsche rocketed past 60 mph - then 70 - then a shift to 3rd - 80 - 90 mph. The grin that was left plastered on our faces meant only one thing: This car is fast as hell.
We spent the next 40 minutes blasting through the gears and reveling in the breakneck acceleration. The whole time, not even a threat of wheelspin because the All Wheel Drive kept the tires firmly planted. Cornering in the car was great as well - again the feedback in the steering and balance was great. The car was very composed on corner entry and exit.
A Note about TipTronic: The 996 Turbo we drove with TipTronic was a bit old (2001), so it’s possible they have made updates since then. The Tiptronic was TERRIBLE. I would call it the TipTragic. Shift times were north of 1/2 a second and there’s no aggressiveness setting. The experience was absolutely awful, so after a very very short run, we returned the car and swapped out for the 6 speed manual.
