Quote:
Originally Posted by vintage guy
Here's the GT1 that was mentioned earlier. Porsche took the front of a 911 (993) and grafted on the mid-engined rear.
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Actually that is a GT1-98, which uses a custom carbon tub, hence they needed to build a couple road going versions to qualify for GT1 (sort of like the 917 program).
The original GT1 was based on a 993 homologation so kept the front of the unit-body for the crash structure. It may have even used McPherson struts in front. That version proved uncompetetive against the McLarens and Mercedes which were designed as racing cars from the begining (well, the McLaren was not but it was much more track-oriented than the 911). Hence Porsche tried to get competive with the GT1-98.
The GT1-98 won only the LeMans 24 Hours in 1998, and that was on reliability. It never could match the speed of the McLarens or Mercedes. Alan McNish had a good run in the original GT1 in the last race of 1997 at Laguna Seca but the car did not finish as well as hoped. I believe he led for a time.
They started with this:
Then when the 996 came out they changed the lights, but the car was still based on 993. One of these cars caught fire on the Mulsanne Straight in 1997.
And here is the road car with the carbon chassis homologation:
The reason they were uncompetetive was the rules for equivalent performance. The turbocharged small engines did not have the throttle response of the larger V12 engine cars, hampering them on most courses, but not so much LeMans. They were not able to make any more power with the turbos because of the rules.
Norbert Singer wrote about that in his book, and that is what led to the Carrera GT's larger, naturally aspirated V10; a racing engine for a racing car that was cancelled.