Porsche 911 Carrera PDK (2008) CAR review

Same-again styling hides some great technical innovations on the facelifted, second-generation 997, Porsche 911. With a new range of direct-injection petrol engines and clever seven-speed dual-clutch gearboxes, the 911 has overnight become one of the world’s cleanest high-performance cars. Once again CAR was first to drive the new 911, so read our first drive road test review here. 

So Porsche bills this as the ‘new’ 911, but since when did some new lights and different bumpers count as a ground-up redesign?

Come on, there’s far more to the second-generation 997 than that. What about the 911's new mirrors, the large air intakes and new alloy wheels? And then there’s the, er, er... Okay, you’re right. Porsche's new 911 is hardly groundbreaking. But haven’t you ever heard of inner beauty?

Go on then, woo me!

Okay. As before, the bread-and-butter range of 911s consists of two cars: the Carrera and Carrera S. The Carrera is still a 3.6, the S a 3.8 (although the actual capacities are slightly different this time), but they’ve been comprehensively re-engineered and are both emboldened with direct injection. Think muscle mixed with miserliness.

The more efficient combustion and higher compression ratios push power from 320bhp to 340bhp on the Carrera and from 350bhp to 375bhp on the S. And the base car’s torque output climbs to 287lb ft while its big brother now churns out 310lb ft of twist action. Impressive figures.

Direct injection? So the new 911s sound like diesels?

Well, they do have that distinctive direct-injection rattle at idle, but you can’t really hear it from inside the car and once underway the new engines sound almost as characterful as the old. But they need far fewer trips to the pumps. Equip the basic Carrera with the new PDK gearbox and it will return 29mpg on the combined cycle and emit just 225g/km of CO2. Those incredible figures makes it massively greener than any rival – the new 911 is even cleaner than a mainstream coupe like Audi’s TT V6.

Click 'Next' to read how the new 911 performs on the road

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