Thought for the day: absolute fine life with exceptional German machines. Our @salaontop is driving the @porsche_southafrica 911 Carrera T. The With the 911 Carrera T, Porsche is reviving the puristic concept behind the 911 T of 1968: less weight, shorter transmission ratios from the manual gearbox and rear-wheel drive with mechanical rear differential lock for an enhanced performance and intense driving pleasure. A six-cylinder flat engine with a displacement of three litres and twin turbocharging generates an output of 272 kW and a maximum torque of 450 Nm. This makes the 911 Carrera T capable of sprinting from zero to 100 km/h in 4.5 seconds. The damage? R1,536,000. Full review coming soon. #porsche911CarreraT #porsche #porsche911 #porsche911carrera #911 #carrera #sportscar #germancar #stuttgart #capetown #westerncape #stellenbosch

A post shared by The Car People (@khulekani_on_wheels) on Jul 5, 2018 at 4:16am PDT

By Sala Masindane

Porsche has identified the gaps most super car manufactures have struggled with or are still struggling with, which is making cars for all purists. The return of the 1968 Purist Concept Porsche 911 Carrera T (T for Touring) is an attempt to introduce the Porsche 911 to a bigger purist audience that may not have been able to reach the likes of the 911 GT3 due to many reasons. Does this mean the 911 Carrera T is downscaled Porsche?

Exterior

The 911 Carrera T retains most of the standard 911 Carrera exterior features. It is distinguishable by the front spoiler lip and the side profile Sport Design mirrors that are painted in the Agate Grey Metallic colour. That is not all, the “911 Carrera T” logo and the 20 inch Carrera S wheels in Titanium Grey, complete the side view. When following the 911 Carrera T in safe distance, you would recognise it by the Porsche logo, the “911 Carrera T” model designation and the sports exhaust. A variety of body colours are available as options; these include black, orange, red, the metallic colours white and GT sliver. Not forgetting our personal favourite being yellow.

Interior

On launch we had the opportunity of driving the yellow and red 911 Carrera T. Step inside of either of these or any of the available colours, you will be met by black 4-way adjustable Sport Seats Plus with seat centers in Sport-Tex. As reminder of where you are, the headrests are embroidered with black the “911” logo. Depended on your colour (Racing Yellow, Guards Red and GT Sliver) of choice, the headrests “911” logo, the seatbelts, the opener door fabric loops and seats centres will be in these contrasting colours. The purist concept continues on to the GT sports steering wheel with leather trim and as with other Porsches, the driver can select different driving modes on it. The interior trim on the dash and doors is in black.

On the Road

Driving the 3.0 litre turbocharged flat-6 engine with its typical 911 seating position is truly fun and exhilarating. Let’s not forget the 270kW and 450Nm of torque for good measure. The 911 Carrera T can be paired with a 7-speed manual gearbox or the impressive Porsche Doppelkupplung (PDK), where the manual has a claimed sprint of 4.5 seconds from 0-100km/h and the PDK can reach 100km/h in 4.2 seconds with top speed of over 290km/h. Having driven both the manual and PDK, we found the PDK’s gear changing ratio to be intuitive as always but we feel that unless you are hard core purist, the manual is not for the Sandton traffic but for the open road from Johannesburg to Durban. The seventh gear can feel a bit superfluous when driving the 911 Carrera T though but that is probably since we are used to 6-speeds manuals. Changing down is also another factor with seventh speed, as you might be gearing down and confuse the 3rd for the 5th. However, at freeway speeds we found the seventh gear to be a necessity. The Porsche 911 Carrera T is priced at R1,536,000.