What is the 718 GT4 Race car really like? .............

I was with a friend today, who is highly respected racing driver. He has recently been doing some pre-race testing of the above, car for a client before he races later this year.

I mentioned I was genuinely surprised Porsche had decided to flow the 992/911 derived engine that has been deturbo’d and then bored out another 1 litre to put this engine into the 718 GTS for 2020, as well at the GT4/Spyder announced at FoS in July 2019.

He was really rather dismissive after his shake down testing of the GT4. The race engine in his opinion has been heavily detuned and means it is meant to last 2 seasons before it needs rebuilding. As compared to the race GT3 engine that needs a rebuild every 40 hours. To enable such a long life means that the engine is rather under powered to its true potential. Porsche seem to decided its better to slow it down as a way to make it last and also make sure it does not show up the GT3. It also means its cost to make are much cheaper, so that the car will show a profit. It seems Porsche never really made any money on the GT3 as it’s over engineered.  

The GT4 has a brilliant chassis, but the under powered engine and long geared transmission mean it’s not very competitive. In a same car event of course that won’t show. Even in wet testing recently at Silverstone its lack of power shone through when gently testing in the wet. It really is, not that nice to race. 

So this made me wonder how the road going versions of both 718 GT4 and the GTS will actually stack up to the 2.5 litre turbo version that went before them.  In manual form given the gear box is long geared especially in 2nd and has the same foot pound limit at 309 means all the cars are much the same in performance, even if the BHP shows improvement.  The linear torque curve of the 2.5 litre turbo means it pulls very hard from 2,500 revs. The 4.0 litre will need to high up the Rev range to keep it on song, so over 5,000.

What it the right approach…….....

I’ve just added a video on 981 GT4 and 718GT4 comparison…….no surprise the winner is the 981….