There is always one version of the factory built Porsche 911 that stands head and shoulders above the rest of its backwards engineered brethren. The 911 GT3 is the choice of seasoned racers with a high revving naturally aspirated flat six and a track tuned suspension. The GT3 offers true race car performance in a street vehicle.
Last September, the Koenigsegg Agera R entered the Guinness Book of Records with six amazing records. Unfortunately for the mighty Swedish supercar, one of those six world records - the fastest brake time - has already been smashed. If you remember, the Agera R went from 300 km/h (186 mph) to 0 in 6.66 seconds.
But now, a Porsche 911 GT3 RS 4.0 managed to eclipse that number after posting a time of just 6.5 seconds from its high-speed performance 0-300-0 test at the annual Sport Auto event in Papenburg, Germany. That number is 0.16 seconds faster than the Agera R.
For those of you who have forgotten the GT3 RS 4.0 is powered by a naturally-aspirated 4.0-liter engine that delivers a total of 500 HP at 8,250 rpm and 339 lb-ft of torque, which is a 50 HP and 22 lb-ft increase over the current GT3 RS model.
Porsche has announced that the GT3 R Hybrid will make a return for the 2012 racing season. The vehicle made its first appearance in 2010 at the the Petit Le Mans 10-hour competition where it showed excellent performance.
The GT3 R Hybrid is known as the "rolling race laboratory," and while Porsche has not revealed any specifications on it just yet, we expect to see the same hybrid system as in the previous model: a 4.0 Liter flat six engine delivering 480 HP combined with two electric motors that each produce 100 HP. The new model will be five centimeters wider at the rear and will get almost an extra 15 centimeters on the front fenders.
"There is no way around the hybrid technology in motorsport," stressed Wolfgang Hatz, Board Member for Research and Development, on Saturday on the occasion of the end of year Porsche ‘Night of Champions’ celebrations. "With the 911 GT3 R Hybrid project, we have shown how you can test important future technologies on the race track and pave the way for motorsport success in the future. We will continue to determinedly blaze this trail and further develop the hybrid technology."
For 2012, the POrsche GT3 R Hybrid will race in competitions like the FIA World Endurance Championship, the American Le Mans Series, the Le Mans Series, the International GT Open, and the Le Mans 24 Hours.
The Porsche GT3 RSR is a track-only car enjoyed by drivers working events like the Le Mans 24 Hours, the FIA World Endurance Championship, the Le Mans Series, the American Le Mans Series, and the International GT Open. Only a slim margin of the people wanting to drive the $689,580 GT3 RSR will actually get the chance to do it, and Orbit Racing of South Florida decided that needed to change so they transformed it into a street legal car. Well, kind of.
The man behind Orbit Racing just so happened to own a Porsche GT3 RS so he made the adjustments necessary to turn it into a GT3 RSR that is perfectly legal for any street in the USA. As far as we can tell, the car uses the same 450 HP 3.8-liter flat-six engine, but the ECU has been programmed to run with the RSR exhaust. The tuner also made some modifications to the suspensions and added some RSR bodywork to complete the look. The vehicle was then painted in an aqua blue metallic paint finish and is said to be receiving some cool graphics in the coming weeks. The interior was left untouched because a racer’s interior isn’t exactly comfortable for street driving.
Orbit Racing of South Florida just began testing the street-ready Porsche GT3 RSR to make sure all of the components are running smoothly. We don’t know how much a build like this costs, but the tuner may just be able to make it up if all goes well.
Being able to catch a Porsche 997 GT3 RS 4.0 testing around the Nurburgring race track isn’t something that happens all of the time. Lucky for us, SpotterGijs was able to catch not one, not two, but three (two white and one black) GT3 RS models looping around the race track in superb fashion.
The Porsche 997 GT3 RS 4.0 is powered by a 4.0 liter engine producing an incredible 500 HP and 339 lb-ft of torque, a 50 HP and 22 lb-ft increase over the standard GT3 RS model. This added power will allow the GT3 RS 4.0 to get to the 62mph mark in a killer 3.9 seconds and up to 124 mph in under 12 seconds. The car already clocked an impressive 7:27 around the famous Nurburgring track, but that time may be just the beginning if this video is representative of anything!
Sit back and enjoy, the video is really worth every second!
The Porsche 911 GT3 certainly has a following with customers wanting a pure sports car experience, but sometimes there’s a need for a little more. That’s when tuning companies step in to customize the vehicles that every enthusiast seems to have. REIL Performance has done just this with the GT3 by adding a few extra horses and some well-appointed graphics.
In its standard version, the 911 GT3 uses a 3.8-liter six-cylinder naturally-aspirated engine that develops maximum output of 435 HP. REIL Performance bumped the power with a specially designed Akrapovic exhaust system, which includes an almost indispensable damper control system that helps it adapt to the track. This system adds an extra 20 HP to the engine’s output, bringing it up to a total of 455 HP. The tuner also added an HLS lift kit to bring up the nose of the sports car just enough to avoid getting scraped and ground against those road obstacles.
