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I was a Porsche Tech back in the 80s. It was a great time with the new technology and cars..no regrets and the factory training was excellent.
When the G50 was introduced I went to the usual training for the new transmission. It was explained to me that the G50 was a solution for two problems Porsche had with the 915 transmission.
#1 was noise. The 915 was/is a noisy transmission. With the pending legislation in Europe, Porsche needed a quieter transmission.The G50 was more silent in operation.
#2 was operator experience, particular here in the USA, Porsche's biggest market. The 915 was/is a driver's transmission. The USA Porsche market changed from "enthusiast" to "status" drivers in the 80s and the G50 was more friendly to those who had not grown up driving with a manual transmission (most Europeans drove manual transmissions, most Americans drove automatics).
Porsche was somewhat remorseful with the new G50....it is a very heavy transmission, like 50lbs heavier than the 915. Not a compliment to the Porsche racing heritage.
I remember changing out clutches with a G50...compared with the same job on a 915..the G50 was a lump to move around.
Nothing wrong with a 915 transmission or a G50..just a change in the USA consumer market and new noise laws going forward for Porsche, which had decided to keep the 911 in production rather than drop it for the 928 as they had planned.
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