This thread is soooo funny!! Some like skinny woman (like me ) some like fat women .. whatever floats your boat but... I would not be surprised that our trusted Government will decide in the next 10 years or so that simple citizens just do not have the ability to shift (multitasking) and they will TAKE THE RIGHTS TO HAVING A 6 SPEED AWAY unless you have a $5,000 dollar / year waiver or rider on your insurance or some other stupid rule / requirement...... Count on it!!.

 

Tom, thanks for the post and let me explain what I was told and hopefully you can shed some light on this.

At this years Sebring 48 hrs I went to see the Speed Merchants coverted Carrera S PDK car turned into a race car. I want to ask them how PDK was holding under race conditions. I spoke with one of the Speed Merchant owners and a mechanic and they told me they went to replace the clutch packs but found no wear so they just replaced the fluid. That is what I was told.

I did not know PDK could not be opened up to service the clutches or whatever else. How in the future would a Porsche dealer or really good trained Indy shop eventually replace clutches or other parts in PDK?

Thanks Tom for any insight and see you soon at the track.

 

My friend, ALL clutches wear. Dry clutches or wet clutches. It's just that wet clutches wear at a much slower rate. The reaction plates between the friction discs can also wear over long periods of operation. I've seen enough wet clutches from mining trucks to assure you that they do indeed wear.

 

This is true. But you CAN say that objectively, the PDK is a higher performance transmission than the manual box, when operated in manual mode and assuming equal driver skill. Performance of a transmission can easily be measured by:
a) time to complete a gear change
b) reduction in power during gear change
c) overall acceleration of the car from speed A to speed B
d) the % accuracy of shifts, including rev-matched downshifts
PDK is significantly better in all of these objective measurements of transmission performance. It is also far more difficult to damage a PDK from human error as well. The only substantial benefit of manual is the "fun" factor and subjective "feeling of control" - which are both great, but do not contribute to transmission performance.

 

You are 100% correct. All we manual owners are trying to say is that "fun" you mention is worth giving up the PDK's performance benefits to us. That makes it "better" for us, while the performance benefits are "better" for others. Neither is "better" for everyone.

 

Every time a car manufacturer takes a big step in technology with their sports cars whether it be heads-up display, traction control, PDK, Stability Control, multi-ride performance, automatic transmission and the like you are taking something away from the true' enjoyment of driving a high performance automobile in my humble opinion. No matter what your skill level is, a true auto enthusiast whats to know that the techniques he/she has worked on for years is not going to be thrown out the window by some new technology because not everyone can come into a turn hard on the brakes while blipping the throttle and down shifting for a 45-90 degree turn. The list of driving techniques go on and on. Not everyone wants to drive faster by eliminating distractions like manual shifting. We are not driving formula one race cars.

Last but not least....My wife can drive the PDK but she cannot drive the 6-Speed manual. I rest my case.

 

These are the kind of posts that make this such a heated debate. You essentially just said that you are better than someone else just because you choose to use your left foot and right hand in a different way. It's simply not true.

I can, and have done all of that and more in Formula Continental and Formula Atlantic which i spent almost 15 years racing in and I would make a hypothesis that I can probably do it all better than most of the so called "true auto enthusiasts." But just because I can do it, doesn't mean I want to when there is an obviously superior option available.

Just because you like to use your left foot for the clutch and right hand for the shifter doesn't make you any better than me. Now that it's a feasible option, I would much prefer my right hand on the wheel and left foot available for braking. If that disqualifies me from being a "true auto enthusiast" so be it.

 

Hold on Superbike....do you even own a car with PDK?

 

I agree with all of your points. I'm just saying that the desire to be objectively faster is itself a subjective preference.

 

I know what you mean. There's a certain pleasure in driving a "simpler" (but still well designed) car which makes you do more of the work, thus connecting you more intimately with the car and road, and more clearly revealing what you're doing well and not. This may come at the expense of speed, but how important is it to squeeze every last bit of speed if we're not pro racers? This said, I'm not arguing that we go back to the days before anti-lock braking and other technologies which improve safety.

Also, my wife does fine with the 6-speed manual and enjoys it, even though she's by no means a serious car enthusiast.

 

No, I've got a 05 C2S 6-speed that I have had since 2006. I live and spend most of my time in Japan (although Seattle his home) where Porsches are severely overpriced (even more the poor USD:Yen exchange rate) so I haven't had the opportunity to trade up yet. Shortly after I move back to the US though I will be trading my 05 for either a new 991 with PDK or possibly a 997 Turbo PDK. I've got a decent amount of experience though with dual-clutch style gearboxes via the GTR which I owned for 18 months. Only sold it due to the declining exchange rate (which allowed me to sell it for more than I bought it for brand new after a year and a half of use) But I was sold on the technology well before I ever spent a significant amount of time with it.

 

Unlikely that a manual could ever be faster than a dual clutch during competent, "all else equal" testing. If it is, could we be paying a big price in wet clutch efficiency?

I'm not quite sold on pdk yet, yes I've owned one. On the other hand, it's sillly to put a 50 year old transmission in a car with direct injection, pasm, antilock, launch control...

 

I hope it isn't too silly to put in a 50 year old driver in the car!

 

I was initially enamored with the idea of launch control, particularly because my C63 is difficult to launch without spinning the wheels or triggering very limiting traction control.

But I've moved towards the view that launch control is really only useful for drag racing and for manufacturers to be able to give better 0-60 times ... which means not that useful overall.

 

It's true that you aren't going to use launch control on a daily basis (well, most of won't at least haha) but when you would like to use it, it's a wonderful thing.