911 GT3 R Hybrid
-
If at first you don't succeed ... make your race car better. That's the principle behind yesterday's launch of the Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid 2.0. It's the second iteration of Porsche's ground-breaking 911 endurance racer fitted with a Kinetic Energy Recovery System, or KERS. The first version of the 911 GT3 R Hybrid, revealed exactly a year ago, led the 24 Hours of Nurburgring in its maiden competition run, until a mechanical failure forced it to retire just a few hours before the checkered flag. That failure, Porsche hastens to point out, was in the combustion engine, not any of the hybrid...
-
Peugeot, Audi Diesels Lead Petit Le Mans, Porsche Hybrid Finishes RaceEndurance racing has more than its share of heartbreak. For Porsche Motorsport, this weekend's Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta provided sweet relief to a galling memory: Its unique 911 GT3 R Hybrid race car retired less than two hours before the checkered flag during May's 24 Hours of Nurburgring...
John Voelcker -
Tuning Porsche's 911 GT3 R Hybrid Race Car: It's All Software
Road Atlanta -- Two days before the Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid competes for the first time on U.S. soil, the head of its development team said the company plans further development of the technology. Dr. Daniel Armbruster, whose official title is manager of the motorsports development process for the...
John Voelcker -
Jaguar Tests Flywheel Hybrid System Just Like Racing Porsche
Since Ford sold Jaguar Land Rover to Indian carmaker Tata in TK, the luxury maker has stepped out a bit. Their green efforts have taken down several interesting technology paths that seem unlikely had they stayed underneath the Blue Oval of Dearborn. The latest to surface is a demonstration vehicle...
John Voelcker -
Why Are Luxury and Sports Brands Going Green? To Survive
It was so much easier just a few short years ago. Luxury cars wafted and sports machines roared, with nary a thought to gasoline consumed. Hybrids were for weenies, and everyone knew their place. But now? A hybrid Ferrari, a hybrid Porsche race car, an electric BMW ... what is the world coming to?...
John Voelcker -
Corvette Could Go Hybrid, Says GM Head Engineer; World To End?
Last week, Karl-Friedrich Stracke, GM's vice president of global vehicle engineering, set to rest rumors of a mid-engine next-generation Chevrolet Corvette. That got a lot of attention among Corvette fans. But a footnote to the story was that Stracke said not only that a hybrid Corvette was...
John Voelcker -
What's it like driving the Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid, the world's fastest hybrid vehicle? Ask driver Patrick Long, and he'll tell you he's "still pretty charged up (forgive the pun)" after returning to the States following two weeks of testing the car on the Lausitzring circuit outside Berlin. We had a chance to chat with Long next to one of the world's only two 911 GT3 R Hybrid models, incongruously parked outside a swanky restaurant in midtown Manhattan. He was there to announce that the groundbreaking hybrid would make its first appearance in U.S. competition in the Petit Le Mans race...
