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Right: Porsche 911s - some serious discretionary income on display at the Porsche 50th-anniversary gathering, Melbourne 14/11/1998. This is just one line in one corner of the ground; the organisers claim that 911 (!) Porsches were present. The concours winner was Brian Tanti's 550 Spyder.
Left: A 1970 Porsche 917K.
This
Le Mans
winning car has a 4.5 litre naturally aspirated, air-cooled,
flat 12-cylinder engine,
delivering 580hp at 8400rpm in a car weighing 800kg.
Porsche 917s won the Le Mans 24-hour race
and also the Sportscar World Title in 1970 and 1971.
At Le Mans they were said to be capable of 230+mph down the Mulsanne Straight,
then chicane-less, the winners covering
4607.8km in 1970 (R.Attwood & H.Herrmann) and
5335.3km in 1971 (H.Marko & G.Van Lennep).
The latter figure has not been bettered (to '98), car regulations
and the circuit having been changed in the meantime,
although a Jaguar XJR came close at 5332.8km in 1988.
- 4wdonline.com/Porsche/Porsche.html
4wdonline.com/4WD.html 1977 Porsche 936/77 Spyder, 2142cc, 6-cyl twin turbo, 540hp at 8000rpm, 700kg |
Porsche 936s (flat-6, turbo-charged) won at Le Mans in 1977 and 1978,
and in 1979 a 935 (911 silhouette) won.
During the 1980s Porsches won 7 years in a row.
The Porsche GT-1 (flat-6, 3196cc, twin turbo-charged) was developed from 1996,
and examples finished 1st and 2nd in 1998,
giving the company its 16th win.
 1987 Porsche 962C, 2649cc, 6-cyl, water-cooled, turbo-charged, 620hp at 8200rpm, 820kg |
Porsche remains a fiercely independent sports-car maker, where so many others have been gobbled up by larger manufacturers. It is currently working on a 4WD SUV with Volkswagen; each firm is likely to produce its own version of the vehicle, due for release after 2000.
Go to the
History,
Porsche (main)
and
Le Mans
page
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Below:
1970 Porsche 908/3 Spyder, 2997cc, 8-cyl, 350hp at 8500rpm, 545kg. 1978 Porsche 935/78 "Moby Dick", 3211cc, turbo-charged, 845hp at 8200rpm, 615Nm at 6500rpm, 1025kg | |
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