Are Porsches Over-Engineered?

[landrovered]

What you are describing is not engineering it is ergonomics.

Over engineering is the Team Cytosport Muscle Milk RS Spyder completing Petite Le Mans after having run the entire race on seven cylinders and finishing second after 11 hours and 1000 miles.

"What a race. It was a tough day in the office I would say! Only Porsches can last for nearly ten hours with one cylinder down. I don't think any other motor would survive that, it's amazing. We had a problem right from the beginning but we didn't give up, we kept digging. We pushed to get the best lap times we could and second place I think was the reward for not giving up." ...Klaus Graf

You don't even notice the real genius of the German engineering in these cars what you are talking about the most superficial level of human machine interaction you could possibly describe. A key fob??? Lord have mercy.

[SeaNile31]

I think everything on the 986/987 is way over-engineered. All except the IMS bearing

[stephen wilson]

It will read the level hot or cold, it's just that the exact level will vary. I find that the level reads lower when hot, or fairly soon after being run.

[husker boxster]

I hate the "intelligent" Bose radio in a 987 that thinks it knows when to increase or decrease the volume depending on the sound it picks up thru a microphone. It basically has a mind of its own. There's no rhyme or reason as to what it does. I hate it. But if you shut that option off, the whole system sounds like a mono speaker. Maybe somebody knows how to deactivate this stupid feature.

[JTP]

Originally Posted by landrovered

What you are describing is not engineering it is ergonomics.

I agree, many of these complaints aren't due to over engineering but mostly bad human/machine interface. Concerning the trunk and door locking algorithm, they probably based their decisions on a poll taken by non Porsche enthusiasts. 911s in 70's and 80's had bad heaters, AC, and controls you couldn't understand but were wonderfully over engineered where it mattered.

[JoeFromPA]

Engineering, in my book, equals mechanical design - durability, reliability, precision, efficiency, etc.

Over-engineering typically refers to something being built far beyond the purpose for which it was built. For example: using a 25mm axle-hub nut to hold down a seat frame rail. Overkill in essence, but damn if it'll ever fail.

To my, my 99 is far from over-engineered. My water pump has a plastic impeller, my coolant tank is known to explode, and my dual-mass flywheel should have been single-mass....oh, and a little thing like an IMS bearing is in there too.

But what really bothers me is that every time I've taken some apart on the car, something plastic has busted off:

1. One of the retaining clips for the return radiator hose below the mount motor

2. Part of the retaining clip that holds the convertible top at the back of the car (thankfully only a small part of it)

3. Some of the plastic pieces that keep the driver-side intake vent in place - thankfully, it still stays in place with its one frigging screw.

And even stuff like the rubber bushings in the steering wheel wearing out and allowing the weight of the airbag to hit the horn contacts....

No, I think it's far from over-engineered. For lack of a better comparator, go look at a 12 year old Honda Accord. It's not like their built from billet,but they were thoughtfully engineered to hold together.

On the flip side though, I was in a P-car dealership today and I sat in a new Carrera S and Boxster, and I think the older P-cars got the seating position and "feel" far better - even with worse ergonomics.

Now, going back to the OP, on the hill holder feature: cars that hill hold indefinitely encourage people to push the clutch in and engage a gear and wait. That puts extra wear on the TO bearing. A 2-3 second hill hold serves its purpose (letting you not roll back at gear engagemnt on an incline) without encouraging bad behavior. That's called smart design.

[PhilNotHill]

Wait!

Where is the oil pressure gauge? Where is the oil temperature gauge?

Are all Pcars like this?

Why?