Hello all,
I'm a long time lurker and usually hang out on the English DDK forum. Ever since Mike (210bhp) and Philip (PMJT) presented me with their cars, I got the bug for an early 911S wayyy bad, so watch this space.
In the meantime, I took over the Carrera 3 register, for that normally aspirated impact bumper Carrera 3 litre. But we are going to expand it into a Turbo 3.o (TurboCarrera) worldwide register.
Porsche 911 Carrera 3.0
I will create a web page for the turbo3 as well, but bear with me.
As for the C3, I have done a lot of work to supply the original road tests and articles to the register starter, Jack Wilson back in 2007 and Colin Fitz, who took over from Jack.
In period, the carrera 3 (never officially imported into the US) was a mighty weapon and a serious contender for the Turbo 3.o (US nomenclature: TurboCarrera).
Here is a an excerpt of the original German road test for the Carrera 3, which I translated into english... it mentions the turbo into the final paragraph....
THE LITTLE DIFFERENCE
It is not only the 20.000 deutschmarks difference in purchase price that differentiate the Turbo from the Carrera. I believe that the purchasers are people with completely different mentalities.
Carrera types are more active drivers who like their car really responding to the input of the accelerator when it is negotiating the bends. That pleasure is heightened if your sportscar is equipped (as was our test car) with the adhesion inducing 50-series tyres. The turbo provides, equipped with similar tyres, a lot less pleasure insofar as going rounds bends is concerned. Its power delivery isn’t gradually: it comes from 4100 rpm down like a sledgehammer. And that requires, above all when accelerating out of bends, considerable concentration; as this is the point where the back often overtakes you. You can help this if you convert yourself to a left-foot brake pedallist. Stay on the gas so that the boost pressure doesn’t diminish and brake with your clutch foot. But such artistry is not obvious in Porsche pilots who spend 65.000 deutschmarks for a leather clad vehicle.
Y.P.
Its domains are motorways, on which you can fully play the trump card of the Turbo’s acceleration. Obviously, it is addictive in city driving when you take traffic- light acceleration for a take-offs, but unfortunately the clutch will let you know that it is markedly decreasing and the outside world experiences, when you subsequently need to brake, nothing but reluctance. On motorways however, the turbo works as a sovereign ruler, overtaking manoeuvres often not even requiring touching the gearlever as its third gear will reach from 100 km/h to 200 km/h.
The passing of the 200km/h boundary is totally effortless and cruising speeds between 200 and 240 km/h are without any problem. Impressive hereby is the general quietness of the car: the engine is less loud than the carrera’s, the directional stability is more stable thanks to it serial equipped rear wing. Where, in fast 200km/h bends, the Carrera tends to go walking unless you remain firmly on the gas, the Turbo is glued to the bend , even if you are forced to let go off the gas.
It doesn’t posses the bad habits of the BMW Turbo which retorted to fishtailing and which could only be stabilised by responding with full acceleration.
In short: A turbo is more a sports car for level-headed people whilst the Carrera attracts more dynamic characters. It would be ideal however, when your garaged housed both a turbo and a Carrera : one for the motorways and one for the A-roads.
Here are the figures for the test for both cars- test in km/h, obviously.
with the C3 and turbo 3.o register, I need area respresentatives. I will take responsibility to translate key pages from English into German/French/Dutch/Spanish and pull in some help for Italian, thus hopefully providing a "true" world register.
Ah, and who the heck am I? Well, I am Belgian Bert, a 37 year old psychotherapist/psychoanalyst, living in Robin Hood country, Nottinghamshire, England. I am a serial Porsche driver since age 21 (but that was a brown 924, admittedly), have a 911 since age 25. Age 30, I bought the love of my life, a carrera 3 targa, which incidentally featured in "Classic Porsche" issue 7, as well as in the December 2012 edition of 911 & Porsche World.
During that marathon Carrera 3 resto, I kept my faith with a 964 Jubileum
then had a turbo 3.3
Sold that, got a 911 SC
and whilst tearing down the mountain with GeorgK (remember him?) a german stopped me and bought my car off me. (Name your price scenario. Well, after a deposit paid I took it home, polished it, drove 600 miles back to Germany to deliver it on Valentines day. A sweet thing)
I run a 924 S as a winter thing - as long as I have ground clearance, I get everywhere
And when needed, hammer it during the 6 hours of mallory park endurance in it
So, in summary, watch out for the worldwide Turbo 3.o register for your turbo carrera lovers: I aim to make it a reference website for current and old articles, road tests, perhaps publicity pictures etc to get some "facts" right about these awesome beast.
My buddy John Glynn blogged about a soon-to-be- published awesome article on a rare Albert blue special order Turbo carrera at "ferdinand",
EASY Porsche Meet San Francisco
with photo's by the one and only boy wonder, Jamie Lipman (check him out- James Lipman +++ Photographer United Kingdom
I hope to have that red 911S one day in my garage, but for now, its glancing lovingly and saving up.
Keep the faith,
Belgian Bert