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There are several things to consider when using pressed metal tech to form a part. Pressed metal pieces perform best under compressive force and much less so under tensile force or torque (twisting). This is what surprises me about using this tech for a crank, seems to be one of the least suitable environment.
But, I'm no Porsche engineer, so they must know something I don't. Either that, or the bean counters have veto power over the engineers, which come to think of it, maybe isn't all that much a stretch.
But, with CNCing being all the rage today, it would seem that they could get a cost (and reliability) effective alternative going that route with a forged billet.
Then again, a little perspective may be in order - this is the 1st crank failure that I'm aware of and it occured in an extreme application (racing). Still, it was the X-51 part. I can more easily see the stock crank using pressed metal, but am really astounded to see it adopted for the premium, race purpose part.
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