Following the successful start of the Panamera into the market, Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG, Stuttgart, is rapidly expanding the range of models available: Starting in May 2010, both the Panamera and the Panamera 4 will be at the dealership as the new entry-level versions leading into Porsche’s Gran Turismo model series.
Both models are powered by a brand-new 3.6-litre V6 featuring Direct Fuel Injection and developing maximum output of 300 bhp (220 kW) plus peak torque of 400 Nm/295 lb-ft. Following Porsche’s nomenclature, the Panamera transmits its power to the road via the rear wheels, while the Panamera 4 comes as standard with active all-wheel drive.
The two new versions of Porsche’s Gran Turismo are convincing examples of the Porsche Intelligent Performance consistent development strategy. Equipped with PDK Porsche-Doppelkupplungsgetriebe (Porsche Double-Clutch Gearbox) and Auto Start Stop, both models consume far less than 10 litres of fuel on 100 kilometres in the New European Driving Cycle: The Panamera makes do with a mere 9.3 litres/100 kilometres (equal to 30.4 mpg imp), the Panamera 4 averages 9.6 litres/100 kilometres, equal to 29.4 mpg imp. Nineteen-inch all-year tyres with optimised roll resistance available as an option reduce these consumption figures by another 0.2 litres/100 kilometres, giving the Panamera a CO2 rating of just 213 g/km, the Panamera 4 an equally impressive 220 g/km. Both V6 versions of the Panamera fulfil the strict EU5 emission standard in Europe and the LEV standard in the United States.
Superior economy and performance typical of the brand do not rule out each other on these new V6 Gran Turismos. On the contrary – the ideal combination of these qualities is attributable to consistent lightweight construction as one particular highlight, with the axles, doors, engine compartment lid, wings and the rear lid all made either of aluminium or a combination of aluminium and magnesium. At the same time the brand-new V6 power unit built at Porsche’s engine plant in Zuffenhausen and boasting a 90o cylinder angle is approximately 30 kg or 66 lb lighter than the eight-cylinder featured in the Panamera S and 4S, thus contributing to the low overall weight of the Panamera of just 1,730 kg or 3,815 lb.
Like the proven V8 models, both the Panamera and the Panamera 4, as genuine Gran Turismos, combine sporting character with a high standard of comfort and everyday driving qualities. Apart from the regular steel suspension available as an option with variable dampers, adaptive air suspension with additional air volume is also available on request. This provides a very wide range of suspension qualities and features extending from an even higher level of motoring comfort at one end all the way to extremely sporting driving dynamics at the other.
The Panamera and Panamera 4 will be making their world debut at the Beijing Motor Show as of 23 April 2010. Both models will be entering the German market in May 2010 and are scheduled to enter the US market in June.
While the Panamera may polarize the Porsche enthusiasts community, there seems to be know doubt about its popularity among journalists and other automotive pundits. As further proof and on the heals of the Panamera receiving an Edmunds Inside Line Editors’ Most Wanted 2010 trophy at the recent 2009 LA Auto show, Bloomberg News has named the Porsche Panamera its 2009 Car of the Year.
This is Bloomber’s first-ever Car of the Year slection, with seven categories including Car of the Year, Green Car, Economy, Family, All-Around SUV, Sports Car and Executive Sedan. All eligible contenders were evaluated by Bloomberg’s automotive columnist, Jason Harper for overall performance, intelligent design and smart style, desirability and build quality. To qualify, models must have been new or significantly revised for model year 2010, and be on sale by the first quarter of 2010.(read more about the selection process here).
According to Jason, “The Porsche Panamera has broken the sports-sedan category wide open, producing a truly desirable auto that combines the best elements of a sports car and comfortable four-door,” Harper said. “Fast and fun, the Panamera is a car with real appeal.”
I continue to see more and more Panameras on the road and the reports from new owners have all been positive. I’m not sure how yet, but at some point I would like to replace our MB E500 with a Panamera 4S as this Porsche fan’s daily driver. Hey, Porsche! How about a long term review car??
The new Porsche Panamera has been unjustly likened to a tank by some. Well now there might be just cause. Porsche is known for offering a myriad of options on all their new cars. However, when I recently used the Porsche car configurator to option out a new Panamera, I thought I had all there was on offer including a refrigerator in the back seat and a list price just north of $200k. Boy, was I wrong. For another $250k (for a total cost of $450,000) I could have a Panamera worthy of 3rd world dictator (or at least today’s Wall Street CEOs).
According to an article on Luxist.com, JS Armored of Frankfurt Germany is offering a Porsche Panamera Turbo for sale on Jameslist (a global online luxury marketplace). Armored to B4 levels the protective Panamera will stop anything from 9mm rounds to a full metal jacket of a carbine rifle. B4 Armoring specifications include:
1/8″ armored steel (3mm AR500 ballistic steel) in the doors, posts, overlaps and walls.
Bullet resistant glass 39/40mm.
5 Run Flats including Spare.
Armored Fuel Tank.
Armored Battery and Radiator Protection.
3mm AR500 ballistics steel in the roof and floor.
Tailpipe Protection.
Power window driver side.
Suspension Upgrade.
Upraded door hinges.
Some times a good offense is better than an armored defense. While B4 armoring is better than nothing, it won’t stop most automatic rifle fire and can’t withstand a hit from a RPG or IED. Knowing that, it’s nice to have the 500 hp of the Porsche Panamera turbo to rely on in case you need to get out of a bad situation in a hurry. If you need something with a little more protection to it, but want to stick with the Porsche badge, you could always opt for the Porsche Designed AMPV below.
Porsche dealerships around the country have been getting excited for the new Panamera for some time now. This exquisitely controversial (or controversially exquisite, depending on who you ask) four-door Porsche unveiled for sale to the public on October 15th, and I was fortunate enough to attend an unveiling held at a local Cincinnati, Ohio dealership, Porsche of the Village.
I went down to the dealership a day early to grab some pictures of the one Panamera they had on hand (it was delivered early and not visible to the public) so I could get pictures without dozens of people in the shot. Upon arriving, I discovered another surprise in store for guests: a 90P Porsche Indy racer from the early ‘90s!
Participating in three Indy 500 races, this Porsche is a rare sight.
A spectacular blue Panamera Turbo prepares for its public entrance.
The event itself was wonderfully organized. There were some local artists with their work on display throughout the dealership. A local caterer, Fleur de Lys, served cheeses and other assorted hors d’oeuvres, as well as champagne, throughout the evening. Scott Reising Jewelers had a display of men and women’s jewelry on display, and there was a Burmeister home audio display showing off the quality sound system you could have indoors OR inside your new Panamera (for a paltry $3,990 bucks, it is one of the Panamera’s less expensive options!). There was a great looking ice sculpture made for the event, too!
Sculptor Felix Eboigbe, one of the featured artists at this event, was kind enough to pose with one of his works, titled “The Intellectual Abstract Head.”
Partygoers take in the decadent sights, sounds and tastes that could only be topped by seeing the Panamera in person for the very first time.
When the time came to unveil the Panamera, guests crowded into the main showroom to watch an exciting video clip before they revealed not one, not two, but three brand-new Porsche Panameras!
The lights are low, and guests eagerly wait for the car cover to be removed from this new and unique automobile.
Test drives were not allowed, but that didn’t seem to bother anyone – for now.
The Panamera is a hit! Everyone wants to take a seat in this car…
..Until they realized the Turbo was on the other side of the room!
This car was very popular – it was sold within 48 hours of the event!
As you can see from the pictures, these cars were well received! I spoke to a few sales professionals from the dealership and they were all very excited about these cars, stating the Panamera crushed its competition with superior performance. They even went so far as to say the Panamera felt as good on the road as a (gasp!) 911!
This shot of the rear console shows the optional 4-way climate control system. Each seat can have a completely different temperature! It’s stuff like this that can lead one to doubt the sporty nature of the Panamera…
… But the beefy 4.8-liter twin-turbocharged V8 underneath the hood can pull its weight around…. And then some!
On their way out, guests received a wonderful parting gift from Porsche of the Village. As you can see from the pictures below, I picked up….
A bag! And inside the bag…
… A box! And inside that box…
… A replica Panamera key fob that is actually a 1GB USB jump drive filled with Panamera paraphernalia, as well as a small booklet about the new exotic sport sedan!
Overall, it was a great way to spend the evening! I will leave you all with a quote I found in one of the books Porsche released about the Panamera: “The purpose of traveling is to get to a destination; the purpose of driving is being on the road.” I have to wonder what kind of car consumers will identify the Panamera as – a traveler’s car, or a driver’s. Anyone who has driven the car, please feel free to offer your opinions!
Today’s post is compliments of frequent contributor Andrew Granieri. Andrew is a graduate from Miami University with a degree in Technical & Scientific Communications and a minor in Entrepreneurship. He has a strong passion for cars and is working hard as a private contractor and freelance writer so he can continue to support his (pseudo) extravagant enthusiast lifestyle. He currently drives a worn but strong 1986 Porsche 944 that his future wife has come to appreciate and adore.
As if you can’t guess. Find out for sure, tomorrow the 17th at 7:30pm ET on Speed Test Drive as host and 4 time Trans Am champion, Tommy Kendall, heads from California to Georgia, to Oregon, to unleash the power and excitement of the brand new Porsche Panamera (oh no, did I just give it away?).
If you can’t catch the show tomorrow night, record it on your DVR. If you don’t know what a DVR is then go back to your cave and be sure you don’t let the fire go out. Otherwise, you can catch repeat episodes as follows:
By now, most of you have seen the videos of the making of the new Porsche Panamera commercial. Today, Porsche launched the finished product on you tube. While I enjoyed the video below, I do hope they release a much longer version for on-line consumers. It would be great to see more of those amazing cars they compiled to create the commercial.
It feels somewhat ironic, writing a review of the Panamera Turbo for a site called “PorschePurist”. There’s nothing about this five-meter-long sedan that would appeal to most old-school Porsche enthusiast. It’s a front-engined, water-cooled, self-shifting four-door that weighs as much as four 909 Bergspyders stacked vertically. In the modern profit-seeking Porsche tradition, it is priced in the stratosphere and supplied with a depressing lack of standard equipment, though the options list is delightful and comprehensive. And while it looks vaguely like a bloated 996, it is far closer in concept and execution to a “Siebener” BMW than to any Porsche in history.
This past Tuesday, we traveled to Elkhart Lake, WI for limited track and street time in a pair of Panamera Turbos, as well as a few passenger laps in a Panamera 4S with noted Porsche factory racer Patrick Long. Around Road America, the Panameras are surprisingly content. The seven-speed PDK snaps off shifts with seamless vigor, the direct-injected engines are strong and willing, and the brakes hold up for several fast laps before beginning a predictable descent into heat-soaked madness. As one would expect from a modern Porsche product, the Panamera is idiot-proofed by a fundamentally sound weight balance and a flotilla of protective electronic systems. It’s possible to run deep into the “waffles” at Road America’s exit curbs under full throttle without exiting the track backwards; all-wheel-drive works with the latest PSM variant to straighten the car instantly.
Our laps are limited, both in speed and number, but it’s easy to see how the Panamera Turbo broke the eight-minute barrier around the ‘Ring. To some degree, it’s a true point-and-shoot car. Porsche worked hard to mimic the 911’s seating position, creating low-slung front seats and matching the hip point of its smaller cars, but no 911 has ever felt this mild or this composed. There’s virtually no challenge to extracting massive pace, and in this respect the Panamera is spiritually closer to Nissan’s GT-R than to any “race-bred” Porsche in history.
Out on the road, we are free to enjoy the outstanding interior and myriad of features. Clearly, Porsche took the well-justified criticisms of the Cayenne’s interior to heart; the Panamera meets or exceeds the standards of the German D-class competitors. Only the Bentley Flying Spur really has it whipped on interior quality and materials, and specifying a Spur to an equal level would likely cost more than fifty thousand dollars more. There’s two-tone leather and contrast stitching galore, and hardly a shiny piece of plastic to be found. A steeply-sloped center dash mimics the Vertu high-end cellphones so popular among wealthy Eurotrash, while the rear seats are individualized, spacious, and available with a full console’s worth of temperature, position, and audio controls. It’s very satisfying and, more than any other aspect of the vehicle, adequately conveys some justification for the staggering sticker prices.
The newest generation of PCM continues to lag behind Audi’s MMI and BMW’s iDrive in feature count and display quality, and if there is a disappointment to be had inside the Panamera it is the rather substandard nature of the electronics. Everybody else in the class does it better, and surely the same kind of buyer who chooses a Q7 over the Cayenne due to the convenience features might also prefer the less athletic A8 or S8 to a Panamera for similar reasons. Even Mercedes-Benz, which tortured its loyal customers with a couple generations’ worth of absolutely miserable COMAND systems, now offers a better navigation and audio system. The Panamera is full of small annoyances in this regard, from the unnecessary “tuning delay” in the XM system to the Byzantine complexity of destination selection in the nav.
Once again, Porsche has refused to acknowledge the simple superiority of wheel-mounted paddle shifters for manumatic shifting, and as a result Panamera drivers will be forced to memorize the operation of odd sliding selectors which look similar to the two other kinds of Porsche Tiptronic wheel controls but work completely differently. These are pushed forward or back with thumb or index finger. Under pressure or in a hectic track situation, the dexterity and particular hand position required verge on the impossible. [Editor's note: While not yet official, it is our belief that the Paddle Shifter option announced for the 2010 911 Turbo series will make its way downstream to all models in the very near future.]
It is generally acknowledged that the Porsche Boxster is, was, and probably always will be superior to the competing products from BMW and Mercedes-Benz. Try as they might, the other German manufacturers simply cannot create a car with the clarity of purpose and execution found in Porsche’s mid-engined roadster. There’s too much compromise, too much sedan DNA, too much uncertainty in the Z4 and SLK. The Panamera offers a counterpart to that situation. In attempting to infuse a luxury sedan with the spirit of a 911, Porsche has failed to hit all its luxury-sedan marks. The Panamera would be better with Audi’s MMI, a true torque-converter automatic, and a functioning trunk, but then it wouldn’t have the “Porsche DNA” so frequently discussed in the press briefing.
In the end, one will have to be a particular Porsche loyalist to purchase one. The driver merely looking for a best-in-class vehicle would be well-advised to choose an S-class Mercedes. If he has a Panamera Turbo’s worth of personal funding and wishes to buy an outstanding Porsche while simultaneously transporting his family, he might well be better-off purchasing a 911 GT3 and a pair of Greyhound passes.
Today’s post was written by Jack Baruth. Jack is a former professional BMX racer who owns a 993, a 986S, and a forlorn 944. He has worked for a variety of car manufacturers in sales, finance, and manufacturing. Based in Powell, Ohio, Jack spend his weekends racing a Plymouth Neon and dreaming of a Daytona Prototype test day.
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