Porsche museum tour?

[Markus30]

Will be traveling to Germany this summer and curious if anyone here could share some insights on the Porsche factory/museum tour. Should I order tickets in advance and how to place order?

Regards,
Mark

[emcon5]

I believe you need to arrange them through your local Porsche dealer.

Tom

[Rick Lee]

Definitely try to arrange this through your local dealer first. I had to try a few times to get a response. If you don't get anywhere, send me an email, as I have emailed a few times with the factory tour guy in Zuffenhausen. The people at Porsche HQ in Germany are extremely friendly and helpful.

You need tickets to visit the factory and its museum? I thought it was free?

[Rick Lee]

It is free. But they don't take walk-ons. They need to know how many people to expect at a given time and which language skills their guide(s) will need.

[Hellgate]

The museum is free, at least is was in 1985, don't know about the factory. One thing you need to check on is holidays. Germanys take every holiday known and unknown to mankind. Go to the BMW web site and search under euro delivery, they have all of the Bavarian holidays listed, southern Germany has different holiday's from northern Germany, Protesant vs. Catholic.

If you are there on May 2 be sure to say hello.

[Tim Polzin]

You don't need a reservation for the museum, but certainly do for the factory tour. The tour itself usually includes body assembly and the engine assembly lines. When I was there two years ago, they only had one robot, and it applied the adhesive to the windshield, everything else was by hand.

The museum is actually quite small, but has some really interesting vehicles.

Parking around the factory is nearly impossible, either walk or take the Strassenbahn.

[Kevin Reilly]

Recently someone posted a link to photos taken at the tour, on the 993 board at Rennlist. It was a post with the word 'mecca' in the title. You might ask the poster over there.

[Rick Lee]

DO NOT skip the Porsche Zentrum dealership across the street from the factory. It's as good as the museum.

[jfitzoz]

I went to the Porsche museum outside of Stuttgart several years ago. I was saddened by the relatively small and lackluster facility. There must have been about 20 to 30 great cars in there, but the building looked like it had been used as a company auditorium before conversion to the museum.

Honestly, I went to the Monterey Historic races in '98 and saw more great Porsches displayed in a modern format under a tent than anything that closely resembles a museum at the Porsche factory.

Mercedes, down the road, has a great museum and factory tour.

BMW has a descent museum and factory tour, but not Porsche.

Ferrari probably is the best sports car museum in Europe created to celebrate their fifty year anniversary!

It makes me wonder: what the hell do the Porsche board of directors do with all their net income?

Has anybody seen the Porsche factory museum in Zuffenhausen??
It sucks! Right???

[Rick Lee]

Well, I have to say they did not expend too much effort in designing the museum. But there's plenty surrounding it that worth seeing. How about the Porsche Zentrum dealership across the street? They have almost as many classic gems there as the museum. Then there's the original spare parts dept., storage lots, resotration facilities. I think it's well worth a visit. Though I'd say BMW's museum dwarfs Porsche's.

[jluetjen]

I think the Porsche Museum is great and perfectly fits their temperment. It is focused on the key aspects of making their cars go fast. It presents their cars in a simple, no-nonsense environment with all the relevent information. The same applies to BMW and Mercedes, their museums reflect their temperments. BMW has always been more involved with the "design" aspects in conjunction with performance while Porsche has been traditionally focused on winning races. So the BMW museum has a much "artsier" feel. Mercedes on the other hand has built and done it all since Gottlieb Daimler invented the modern motorcar. That is reflected in their museum - it contains everything: the first cars, limos, airplane engines, ship engines and oh yeah, race cars.

[dad911]

When we went, it was with a PCA tour. We also got a tour of Weissach facility & rides on test track. Well worth going with a tour group, for that experience alone.