GTS Ride Quality with or without Active Ride

[BARLOS1973]

It won its first race, Monza 1987 with Piquet who went on to be 1987 World Champion.

The next generation had a hydraulic reservoir problem which couldn't be fixed in a timescale to satisfy sponsors and driver with the resources we had at the time so was converted back to passive. It was very frustrating because the sector times were fastest in the field until air got in the oil.

It was resurrected in the early 90s when far more money and people were available.
It was always obviously better but was banned for 1994.

It won the Championships in1987, 1992 and 1993.

By controlling platform height (a F1 car aerodynamics was hyper height and pitch sensitive in the flat bottom period from 1983 until Senna's death) the car could be positioned for maximum downforce in corners with pitch changes for driver's preference of balance, then dropped to stall the diffuser on the straight for less drag.

Initially the driver had controls to adjust his aero balance from the cockpit. Latterly we had a system which knew where the car was on the circuit (before GPS ) so during practice the various settings could be mapped into the controller. Then the driver just drove and the controller did everything.

There remained control in the cockpit for the driver to deal with things like tyre degradation.

I remember that race. Just to let you know, Piquet and you in the willaims back in days gave me a lot of joy. Pity about 86' though....

Sponsored

 

[dcp10]

As the OP I thought you might be interested in an update. Yesterday afternoon I took delivery of a shiny new Taycan 4S Black Edition with Active Ride.

I'd agonised over GTS vs 4S, but was persuaded that the 4S would give me most of what I want and with the attractive "Black Edition" pricing and a generous dealer discount (and a general lack-of-build-slots for the GTS) I pulled the plug on April Fool's Day (more fool me)…

…The car spent over 10 days sitting at Sheerness, but finally made it to Porsche High Wycombe on Monday and I picked up the car yesterday afternoon. Excellent handover (way better than my wife's Tesla Model 3: "here's the keycard; your car's sitting out in the parking lot"). I highly recommend the sales team at High Wycombe BTW: they're a young, enthusiastic team, well spoken and - unlike some other dealers I might mention - not pushy.

Here are some photos of the pristine car, just after its Gtechniq Ceramic coating:-

I'm still getting used to the car. Plus points:

• I love the sports seats - I have all the bolsters pulled right in to give me a tight hug.
• I also love the Club leather: soft and tactile with a lovely smell.
• The car drives like a dream and corners beautifully.
• Active Ride helps minimise bumps and comes into its own on twisty country roads.

Minus Points:-

• I hate the Porsche dash cam - at least, the way the dealer has fitted it, which means that it's always visible (I've posted about this on another, dash cam, thread).
• Not so keen on the "driver distraction" camera which is installed on the steering column. Not so much the concept - I've already been told off by it (fair enough) - but it's quite an intrusive block of material sitting on top of the column.
• The Touchscreen UI is awful; Porsche could learn a lot from Tesla in this respect. I"m hoping that I can just "set and forget".
• The car feels a bit sluggish compared to my Tesla P100D with "Ludicrous". I think this is partly the throttle mapping in "Normal" mode; I have to use a lot more pedal input just to get the car up our driveway or into our car port. But I expect I'll get used to it.

Back to this thread: ride quality in "Normal" doesn't seem that much different from the GTS frankly (I have the same wheels: RS Spyder, but the tyres are slightly different. I'd specified Summer non-Performance tyres and expected to get Goodyear, but the car came fitted with Pirelli P Zero Elect. The GTS-with-PAR I drove had the Summer Performance tyres, Pirelli P Zero R Elect which gave a (possibly) slightly-more "brittle" feel around town.

Steering feel is good: there's a decent resistance as one moves the wheel off-centre.

Thanks again to everyone for their kind support and patience!

 

[anonymouse]

I agree that Active Ride makes a very positive difference. On a twisty-roads roadtrip through the Picos we found my passenger was very much less likely to complain when i took tight corners at speed, which is a huge win

However if I am understanding correctly, when you switch from Normal to Sport or Sport Plus, some of the Active Ride capability is switched off? So for spirited driving I have the choice of Normal with calm passenger or Sport with better handling?

 

[dcp10]

some of the Active Ride capability is switched off?

Yes, the "helicopter mode" when accelerating and the "lean into corners" is disabled in Sport and Sport Plus, I believe.

Sponsored