2.9 Boxster PDK thoughts....
Discussion
For the last 24hrs, I've had the above mentioned car as a courtesy car from Porsche while I get some minor work done to my 996.
I spent some hours this morning on a hoon outside of London in it having a bit of a test drive. If you saw an unshaven bloke in a beanie with the roof down despite the 0 degs, outside SW London, that was me
I've never had a proper go in a boxster (other than a 20 min test drive or so in both an old 2.7 986 and its 3.2 bigger brother) and have also only had v limited experience of the PDK transmission.
I just thought I'd put "pen to paper" with my impressions of it and see if others have similar thoughts
I also find that writing helps me discover what I truly think about somethign!
Looks:
- MUCH better looking car on the outside than previous Boxsters, which if I'm honest, I've always thought look god-awful (at least in standard form) given how much they cost.
- interior, I'm sorry but it looked cheap, I'm not sure what options were on mine, but I do know I had to insure it for £45k, this did not look like £45k sports car on the inside given the lack of leather (or if it was leather, it needs to be worked on!) and shiny stuff
- my regular spec C4S may be technically behind on interior gizmos, but looks 10 times better IMO, notwithstanding it's had 7 years of wear
Handling:
- I do really like the handling, easier to drive than my C4S, and seemed less prone to understeer, overall gripped v well in corners, yet far more playful, the tail would always give way first in the damp conditions. dare i say it, I might even prefer the handling to my C4S...
- On the other hand grip in a straight line was a bit pants, pulling away hard in second on a damp local road going uphill that I know well had all the electronics going. Never happened in the 996, caught me a bit by surprise to be honest.
- PASM rather clever, although to be honest, I didn't feel a lot of difference between normal, sport and sport plus, at least not compared to the Skyhook on my old Maser, but maybe that's the idea, that it's subtle
Engine:
- the 2.9 engine needs no more power to let the car do it's thing as a sports car, you miss the extra bhp above 60mph in high gears, but I don't really think that's what a Boxster is about, for me it's almost supposed to be a luxury elise type vehicle
- I'd only want the 3.4 if I was doing lots of track days or motorway miles where higher speed oomph is useful
- notwithstanding the above, you do have to rev the SOB to get it going it felt like!
- finally, a big negative: dear god does the exhaust make an awful sound between 5k and 6k rpm. Seriously, i thought I'd blown a gasket like I did in my C4S, or someone had drilled holes in it. It's like they aimed for a muffler-bypass-valve opening effect and got it horribly wrong
PDK Gearbox:
- this has me totally flummuxed (sic?!). It is the best auto by far I've come across but...
- if you're in town driving at 1/10th, you stick it in D and do your thing, perfect. Except for the fact that it changes up irritatingly soon, so I found myself pushing the sport button so i could have some more revs, and thus losing ride comfort!
- as soon as you want to start having a bit of fun though, say 5-7/10ths, I'd push the sport button again, play with the buttons (which I am totally convinced are an epic fail on Porsche's part) in manual mode for about 3 mins, then get bored and let the auto do it's thing, which it does v well at that point too. BUT, half the fun of driving reasonably hard is doing the gears, so it's not so fun
- as soon as you get towards 10/10ths, then I would argue the buttons came in useful. Some faster, narrow roads I was on made them slightly more pleasurable to use, and on a track they might be useful, but only in search of absolute best lap times, not fun. Oh, and a track is the only place I'd use Sport+ button.
- PDK summary? I don't see the point of one if you're going to buy a sportscar for the road and use it as such, as most fun is had at 7-8/10ths for the vast majority of the time, where a manual is far, far more interesting
Soooo, was it fun? Definitely yes. Would I have one in that spec? Not really, I'd save £2k+ on the PDK and add things to make the interior look less cheap. Would I take one in exchange for my C4S? Yes, but only so I could sell it, buy my C4S back and have enough left to get into some open top action in an old Elise.
All IMHO
ETA: I just realised that this came across as quite negative! It's not supposed to be, the car is overall v good If one of these popped up second hand in a few years without a PDK, different/fixed exhaust and slightly better interior, I'd be all over it. Most surprising thing was that for 90% of the time, I genuinely didn't miss the extra horses....I'm convinced open top cars feel faster!
I spent some hours this morning on a hoon outside of London in it having a bit of a test drive. If you saw an unshaven bloke in a beanie with the roof down despite the 0 degs, outside SW London, that was me
I've never had a proper go in a boxster (other than a 20 min test drive or so in both an old 2.7 986 and its 3.2 bigger brother) and have also only had v limited experience of the PDK transmission. I just thought I'd put "pen to paper" with my impressions of it and see if others have similar thoughts
I also find that writing helps me discover what I truly think about somethign!Looks:
- MUCH better looking car on the outside than previous Boxsters, which if I'm honest, I've always thought look god-awful (at least in standard form) given how much they cost.
- interior, I'm sorry but it looked cheap, I'm not sure what options were on mine, but I do know I had to insure it for £45k, this did not look like £45k sports car on the inside given the lack of leather (or if it was leather, it needs to be worked on!) and shiny stuff
- my regular spec C4S may be technically behind on interior gizmos, but looks 10 times better IMO, notwithstanding it's had 7 years of wear
Handling:
- I do really like the handling, easier to drive than my C4S, and seemed less prone to understeer, overall gripped v well in corners, yet far more playful, the tail would always give way first in the damp conditions. dare i say it, I might even prefer the handling to my C4S...
- On the other hand grip in a straight line was a bit pants, pulling away hard in second on a damp local road going uphill that I know well had all the electronics going. Never happened in the 996, caught me a bit by surprise to be honest.
- PASM rather clever, although to be honest, I didn't feel a lot of difference between normal, sport and sport plus, at least not compared to the Skyhook on my old Maser, but maybe that's the idea, that it's subtle
Engine:
- the 2.9 engine needs no more power to let the car do it's thing as a sports car, you miss the extra bhp above 60mph in high gears, but I don't really think that's what a Boxster is about, for me it's almost supposed to be a luxury elise type vehicle
- I'd only want the 3.4 if I was doing lots of track days or motorway miles where higher speed oomph is useful
- notwithstanding the above, you do have to rev the SOB to get it going it felt like!
- finally, a big negative: dear god does the exhaust make an awful sound between 5k and 6k rpm. Seriously, i thought I'd blown a gasket like I did in my C4S, or someone had drilled holes in it. It's like they aimed for a muffler-bypass-valve opening effect and got it horribly wrong
PDK Gearbox:
- this has me totally flummuxed (sic?!). It is the best auto by far I've come across but...
- if you're in town driving at 1/10th, you stick it in D and do your thing, perfect. Except for the fact that it changes up irritatingly soon, so I found myself pushing the sport button so i could have some more revs, and thus losing ride comfort!
- as soon as you want to start having a bit of fun though, say 5-7/10ths, I'd push the sport button again, play with the buttons (which I am totally convinced are an epic fail on Porsche's part) in manual mode for about 3 mins, then get bored and let the auto do it's thing, which it does v well at that point too. BUT, half the fun of driving reasonably hard is doing the gears, so it's not so fun
- as soon as you get towards 10/10ths, then I would argue the buttons came in useful. Some faster, narrow roads I was on made them slightly more pleasurable to use, and on a track they might be useful, but only in search of absolute best lap times, not fun. Oh, and a track is the only place I'd use Sport+ button.
- PDK summary? I don't see the point of one if you're going to buy a sportscar for the road and use it as such, as most fun is had at 7-8/10ths for the vast majority of the time, where a manual is far, far more interesting
Soooo, was it fun? Definitely yes. Would I have one in that spec? Not really, I'd save £2k+ on the PDK and add things to make the interior look less cheap. Would I take one in exchange for my C4S? Yes, but only so I could sell it, buy my C4S back and have enough left to get into some open top action in an old Elise.
All IMHO
ETA: I just realised that this came across as quite negative! It's not supposed to be, the car is overall v good
If one of these popped up second hand in a few years without a PDK, different/fixed exhaust and slightly better interior, I'd be all over it. Most surprising thing was that for 90% of the time, I genuinely didn't miss the extra horses....I'm convinced open top cars feel faster! Edited by Mario149 on Tuesday 22 December 18:12
Callughan said:
PDK should be thought of as the ultimate auto, not a replacement for man. Mario been looking at your recent post seems like you want to change your 4S to something different every day?;)
+1, it really is a clever piece of kit. Compared to the automated manual in my old Maser, it's phenomenal!Ref car chaning, yes, it is a disease I have. What amazes me though is that I can go from toying with the idea, to selecting a short list, to buying a car in the space of less than a month! It normal only depends on how quickly I can sell my car privately/what part ex someone is willing to give me!
philnotts said:
Very surprised that you thought the Boxster interior was bad! i thought it was loads better then the 986 boxsters and 996 911's when i had one!...
phil
The non leather dash's in the current shape Boxster are not terribly nice. When our old 987 gen 1 was in the dealership they leant me a standard 987 with no extras. The dash moulding wasn't pretty. I can only think that's the reason behind the op's dislike. Our car had full leather and the quality was good.phil
Edited by CatherineJ on Tuesday 22 December 17:11
Mario149 said:
Chris, Phil,
Ref interior, having just picked up my car and had a snoop round the showroom while there, I think it's a diff type of leather they've used for the boxster. On the show 911s, it looks nice, in the Boxster it looked like plastic :S
Porsche use 2 types of leather .. standard and natural leather, the latter is softer and more luxurious.Ref interior, having just picked up my car and had a snoop round the showroom while there, I think it's a diff type of leather they've used for the boxster. On the show 911s, it looks nice, in the Boxster it looked like plastic :S
Leather used on 911 and Boxster/Cayman is the same
Edited by SFO on Tuesday 22 December 17:28
SFO said:
Mario149 said:
Chris, Phil,
Ref interior, having just picked up my car and had a snoop round the showroom while there, I think it's a diff type of leather they've used for the boxster. On the show 911s, it looks nice, in the Boxster it looked like plastic :S
Porsche use 2 types of leather .. standard and natural leather, the latter is softer and more luxurious.Ref interior, having just picked up my car and had a snoop round the showroom while there, I think it's a diff type of leather they've used for the boxster. On the show 911s, it looks nice, in the Boxster it looked like plastic :S
Leather used on 911 and Boxster/Cayman is the same
Edited by SFO on Tuesday 22 December 17:28
Regarding the interior, i believe the finish and part numbers are identical now to the 997.2 but the standard boxster interior is indeed a bit cheap without the full leather and doing something with the centre console, like on my car (link below). Without full leather most of the interior is plastic.
I agree on the Grip thing in the current weather but its down the PS2 summer tyres. Grip from the boxster gen 2 in the current weather with the standard PS2 tyres can be awful, it grips like stink in the rain though as long as its a couple of degrees above freezing.
The Sport+ mode should stop the PDK from switching up until red-line, it's not supposed to replace a true manual but gives you most control.
http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...
When the best OPC in the world lent me a Gen 2 C2S PDK I was glad to get out of it after a week... The leather was so hard my butt hurt after 1 hours driving.
It was very different to the soft leather in my RS60 which is very comfortable.
Can't believe an £80k+ Porsche has leather that causes butt pain.
It was very different to the soft leather in my RS60 which is very comfortable.
Can't believe an £80k+ Porsche has leather that causes butt pain.
Nice piece.
1.The Boxster 2.9 is a £35k car not a £45k car. For God's sake don't p*ss away money on extra's that only add to Porsche bottom line and the depreciation yet do nothing for the driving experience.
2. PDK is an automatic gearbox, so what did you really expect? Save a couple of thousand and choose a real man's 'box.
SS7
1.The Boxster 2.9 is a £35k car not a £45k car. For God's sake don't p*ss away money on extra's that only add to Porsche bottom line and the depreciation yet do nothing for the driving experience.
2. PDK is an automatic gearbox, so what did you really expect? Save a couple of thousand and choose a real man's 'box.
SS7
shoestring7 said:
Nice piece.
1.The Boxster 2.9 is a £35k car not a £45k car. For God's sake don't p*ss away money on extra's that only add to Porsche bottom line and the depreciation yet do nothing for the driving experience.
2. PDK is an automatic gearbox, so what did you really expect? Save a couple of thousand and choose a real man's 'box.
SS7
1.The Boxster 2.9 is a £35k car not a £45k car. For God's sake don't p*ss away money on extra's that only add to Porsche bottom line and the depreciation yet do nothing for the driving experience.
2. PDK is an automatic gearbox, so what did you really expect? Save a couple of thousand and choose a real man's 'box.
SS7
How is your internet manhood
squeezebm said:
shoestring7 said:
Nice piece.
1.The Boxster 2.9 is a £35k car not a £45k car. For God's sake don't p*ss away money on extra's that only add to Porsche bottom line and the depreciation yet do nothing for the driving experience.
2. PDK is an automatic gearbox, so what did you really expect? Save a couple of thousand and choose a real man's 'box.
SS7
1.The Boxster 2.9 is a £35k car not a £45k car. For God's sake don't p*ss away money on extra's that only add to Porsche bottom line and the depreciation yet do nothing for the driving experience.
2. PDK is an automatic gearbox, so what did you really expect? Save a couple of thousand and choose a real man's 'box.
SS7
How is your internet manhood
SS7
shoestring7 said:
squeezebm said:
shoestring7 said:
Nice piece.
1.The Boxster 2.9 is a £35k car not a £45k car. For God's sake don't p*ss away money on extra's that only add to Porsche bottom line and the depreciation yet do nothing for the driving experience.
2. PDK is an automatic gearbox, so what did you really expect? Save a couple of thousand and choose a real man's 'box.
SS7
1.The Boxster 2.9 is a £35k car not a £45k car. For God's sake don't p*ss away money on extra's that only add to Porsche bottom line and the depreciation yet do nothing for the driving experience.
2. PDK is an automatic gearbox, so what did you really expect? Save a couple of thousand and choose a real man's 'box.
SS7
How is your internet manhood
SS7
now that is funnyJust came across this thread from the 'Which Cayman thread'. It's all new to me because we only bought our Boxster 2 x weeks ago, a 2.9 Gen2 987 Sept 09 ex-demonstrator and I must confess I find the engine and performance very enjoyable, not spine jarring like my Griff but certainly quick. As for the interior, nosing around the Porsche dealership I got the impression that the interior of the 2.9 Boxster is almost identical to the new 911 Cabrio they had in the showroom, looked the same to me at least!
RichB said:
Just came across this thread from the 'Which Cayman thread'. It's all new to me because we only bought our Boxster 2 x weeks ago, a 2.9 Gen2 987 Sept 09 ex-demonstrator and I must confess I find the engine and performance very enjoyable, not spine jarring like my Griff but certainly quick. As for the interior, nosing around the Porsche dealership I got the impression that the interior of the 2.9 Boxster is almost identical to the new 911 Cabrio they had in the showroom, looked the same to me at least!
And still no pictures Rich! 
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