I dunno. I will have to ask her next time I see her at the track.

I agree with Brian, The 225/50-15 tires that came on the 76 cars were low tech pizza cutters. They put better tires then that on mini vans today.

I bought my 930 almost entirely stock, only upgrades were 16 wheels with 205 in the front 245s in the back and thermal reactors were replaced with a replacement W pipes (don't know what you call them).

The tires were shot, on the verge of glazed, so I think they could of been on par with the stock 15 inch bike tires the car came with back in 76. I was waiting on tires from tire rack and I couldn't help myself and continued to drive on the crap tires. I was vintage racing a swb 912 at the time, so I know all about Porsche's pendulum effect, especially in an underpowered car, so I am not necessarily a novice driver.

On day two with the 930 (after driving it home from buying it like a bat out of hell for 500 miles) and had a green light to a nice right hand sweeper onto an empty 6 lane road, I decided to see what all the fuss was about. Sure enough, mid turn boost kicked in and I was sideways staring out the side window at my intended path of travel. Thankfully I kept my foot in it and gathered it before hitting the curb. Scared the crap out of me as it happened so fast with the boost onset. To say the least I put it away until the tires came a few days later.

A decent set of tires and a good alignment setup made it more predictable, but I can see why so many got in trouble when it was first introduced.

As for getting a 5 Sec 0-60, it can be done on an early stockish car, it just takes revving the hell out of it and slipping the clutch big time. It does not smell, sound or look very graceful. Im sure that's why the early press cars were always beat to hell.

Articles like this were also rampant on the 1965 911 and how the rear would come around on you in no time if you got on it hard. Every few years a dumb journalist looking to make an interesting article brings this topic back up. They talk about how frighteningly dangerous these cars are and that they can kill you if you are not careful, makes for a good article but its not really true - unless you are an idiot. I know of a wealthy guy that is a big plastering contractor, has a bunch of low miles cars that he almost never drives, only looks at them, he got in one of his 930s with 25 years old tires cause he is too cheap to do maintenance on his cars and spun out on a round freeway onramp while hitting full throttle, now that guy never drives sports cars and knows nothing about cars so yes it can happen but I would refer to him as an idiot driver.

I drive the crap out of all my cars from a 67S to a 67 912 to a 70S to a 73S to the 79 930 and I never get close to losing control of any of those cars. My cars are set up well and I spend time and money on the right setup. Sure I could get the tires to break traction but why, unless controlled and on purpose. The 67S and the 79 930 are both the most fun as they take much more skill to push them hard and they are not for novice drivers.

How many articles have been done on the new Bugattis I wonder. Being ultra rich sure does not mean you are a good driver and I have heard many stories about unskilled drivers in the 1000hp cars ramming into the car in front of them because they don't realize how fast 0-60 in 2.4 seconds is.

I don't see anything silly about a very powerful car, potentially dangerous but far from silly. Our basically stock '87 930 came along in 2009 and I did not mash the throttle for a few months for fear of losing control and I have been on the road since 1968.

Personally I do not take this stuff lightly, people get killed with high perf machines

They get killed with low-perf machines too.

I remember vividly when I bought my 930 the first time I drove it. I told myself that if I had to drive it "stock" I would sell it. I hate the 930 in stock form. It's slow by today's standards and the lag is ridiculous. I didn't find it rewarding at all; it was boring.

I may be the minority but it is my honest opinion. I have since rectified that.

As for the suspension and handling - I agree that I don't quite get the "widowmaker" status. I would also point out that modern tire technology has changed the handling of these cars as well. Modern tires with a 935 coilover setup and front geometry really transforms the car in general.

- Chris.

I'm gonna hav e to investigate the 935 front end.

Bingo!

remember the article is probably talking about a stock 930 with no improvements to help.


I remember the first 930 I drove. it was the fastest car I had ever driven at the time and I remember thinking how could anyone drive this car on a track. it would scare the crap out of me.

the other thing to remember is most or all of you, along with me, have been driving the 930 for a while now and the power is not that big a deal to us until we get in something either much slower or much faster. and you lucky ones that are in the 500+ range, you have gotten use to that so a 300ho 930 is slow. its a matter of what you are use to.

I let a guy at work drive my car that does drifting, autoXing and track days. it blew him away at how fast my car was.

I still say the 930 is a car that demands respect, in more ways than one.

Ditto... I have been tracking my car and have had no issues. Very linear boost, and very easy to modulate/drift/slide...

The car does have an upgraded turbo/sc cams/and near open exhaust. I have never driven a stock 930...

But these cars can be made into fabulous track cars, very predictable...

I was so scared of driving this thing on the track due to its reputation, that EVERY car was passing me the first 1-2 times I went out. I was expecting a death spin in every corner... It just aint so.

I have been in high speed corners and lifted a bit as I was running out of track on the outside... it didn't spin at all...

Todays sticky tires, and minor upgrades, and this car is fairly idiot proof...

The 930 is pretty quick 40mph to about 100mph... basically, second gear :).

0-40, my Toyota highlander is faster. The only way the 930 would be faster would be if you were willing to mercilessly dump the clutch for 5000 rpm... I am too old and too frugal to do that. The sub 5 second 0-60 times of the magazines aren't reproducible (for long) in the real world...

^^ Good one Pete.. :D

Hmmmm, "silly Folklore?" Really? I think the conversation needs to be put into perspective a little bit..

The widow-maker name stuck because of the number of these cars that got wrecked when new. When I say new, I mean 76-77 930.. not necessarily 78 onward. Different animal and if you ever get the chance to drive the two (unmodified) cars back to back.. or spend time in one over the other you'll know.

76 -77.. small (crappy) tires, brakes from the 911S on front, run of the mill on rear.. you're poking around with almost no low end power, then at 4200-5000 rpm someone flips the switch.. and its on, just as they enter or they're midway through a turn. Again, 76 - 77.. who was buying these cars then @ $25k for a Turbo Carrera? Drs, Lawayers etc.. Maybe they'd owned a muscle car or two, few if any DE's existed.. sooooo..

An old Porsche tech that I know loves to talk about how they would take bets/wagers among the other techs and parts guys when a new "Turbo-Carrera" as to how long it would be before the car came back on the hook wrecked and twisted.. The dealer he worked at sold a significant number and the record was about 3hrs so I'm told.

I would much rather be driving a car that takes skill to be able to drive fast, than a car that is like taking a Sunday drive. Sorry, but I like the rawness of the older cars, and my car especially. I have manual brakes (big brakes), no heat, manual windows, no A/C (now that would be nice..LOL), Zork tube, full race suspension, etc, etc. I love the rawness of the car.

^^^^^ absolutely.

I just cannot wait until mine is done.

think I'll compensate by taking a nice drive in my 85 NA today.

recently I was reading an article about driving one of the old 70s vintage camaro race cars, think one driven by Donahue.

they had a stock new camaro SS that could easily keep up with the 'race car'. the guy driving the race car was working his arse off, the other not breaking a sweat.

I worked long on classic Minis. They have tiny little engines compared to the Porsches. During many gofaster conversions, I slowly realized the fact, that a normal driver is just incapable to handle anything above 150bhp/ton on the EDGE. I mean everybody is able to punish the car on a straight, but what is it good for, if he loses so much time on the curves (or even worse: fells in).
The Mini on the other hand is slow and very forgiving - unlike the 930. I am pretty sure that it wont be me, who will drive it on the edge, as my skill is just not enough for this kind of adventure :p.

Love your last paragraph, funny.

I agree. Although I have 0 experience in a stock 930, nor an early one, the 911 platform in general is scary.

If you don't fear one, you've never pushed the rear out. That pendulum effect is no joke! Nothing like the feeling of thinking the rear is about to start to straighten back out, when it kicks out further than before. Then you realize it's not coming back ever and you're now 180° the wrong direction.

I doubt it's folklore, if my 285 rear-tired with helper coilovers can come around easy. I can't imagine a soft rear-ended 930 with old-school, low-technology pizza slicers can even come close to my setup. Eeeekkk.

Lots of BS in this thread. I have an all original 76 930 (Sept 2013 Pano) and a hot rod 86 930 (Mar-Apr 2016 Classic Porsche) that did 440hp at the wheels on .9bars. At 1 bar it is probably closer to 500...

These cars are very different. The 86 is way more of a widow maker than my stock 76 with the nonpower brakes and 225 / 245 tires. The 76 is very tame and like the OP pointed out, has similar performance to today's commuter cars. The difference is the Porsche had this performance level 40 years ago, during the oil embargo when the supposed high performance cars from Detroit had under 200 HP...

They were a supercar back in the day, and still are when you recall that they are 40 year old antiques.

Actually, stiffer rear suspension makes them more likely to step out. Because of this in our Chump 911 with multiple drivers, some not 911 savvy, we did not run a rear sway bar. Take out the rear swaybar and these cars become very forgiving and predictable.

'75-77 930 brakes were actually the same as the 2.7 Carrera RS...standard 911S did not have the aluminum calipers in front. 3-liter turbo brakes were good but not as good as the 917/RSR brake upgrade with the introduction of the 3.3 liter.