Porsche reveals 911 Carrera 4

PORSCHE has revealed the all-wheel-drive Carrera 4 versions of its all-new 911 – in both coupe and convertible forms – a month ahead of their first public appearance at the Paris motor show.

And Porsche Cars Australia has announced pricing that reveals increases of up to $21,400 and a premium of between $25,500 and $26,700 over the equivalent two-wheel-drive versions of the 991 series that were launched here in March.

This price premium is more than $7000 greater than in the previous generation.

In Coupe form, the 3.4-litre Carrera 4 is priced at $255,400 plus on-road costs with the standard seven-speed manual gearbox – an increase of $14,200 over the previous model – while the more powerful 3.8-litre Carrera 4S is priced at $289,400 (up $18,400).

Convertible versions are priced at $280,900 for the Carrera 4 Cabriolet (up $17,400) and $315,000 for the Carrera 4S Cabriolet (up $21,400).

Porsche’s familiar double-clutch PDK automatic transmission is a $5950 option, as with other 911 models.

The all-wheel-drive models are 44mm wider at the rear than the 2WD models – as they have been in previous generations – with flared wheelarches covering 10mm-wider rear tyres.

And the Carrera 4s are again visually distinguished by a red light band between the tail-lights – just below the giveaway Carrera 4 badge – that accentuates the wider rear end.

Of course, they are heavier than the equivalent two-wheel-drive models – by between 50kg and 110kg – which blunts performance slightly, but are still up to 65kg lighter than the previous generation and therefore both quicker and more efficient, using up to 16 per cent less petrol.

Porsche claims the 911 Carrera 4 Coupe with PDK accelerates from 0-100km/h in just 4.5 seconds (0.1s slower than the 2WD version but a few tenths faster than the 997 series) while the heavier Cabriolet completes the sprint two-tenths slower at 4.7s.

The more powerful 4S variants – with 294kW of power and 440Nm of torque from the 3.8-litre flat-six engine compared with 257kW and 390Nm from the smaller 3.4-litre unit in the regular Carreras – cover the sprint in 4.1s (Coupe) and 4.3s (Cabriolet).

In addition to all the advances made to the 991 series already seen in the regular Carrera models, the Carrera 4 sports further refinements to the PTM (Porsche Traction Management) all-wheel-drive system.

It also gains a new menu in the instrument cluster that provides the driver with a graphic of how the PTM is distributing engine power to the four wheels.

New options include a radar-based active cruise control function (which with PDK-equipped models also adds the Porsche Active Safe automatic emergency braking function to help prevent front-end collisions) and a sliding glass sunroof (only on the Coupe models, of course).

And selecting the optional Sport Chrono pack on a manual gearbox model brings a new system that automatically double-declutches and blips the engine on downshifts.

Carrera 4 variants accounted for a significant 34 per cent share of sales of the previous-generation 997 Series II range, representing 24,000 sales globally since 2008.

Porsche Cars Australia is taking orders now for all four Carrera 4 models, with local deliveries scheduled to start in the first quarter of 2013.

Porsche 911 Carrera 4 pricing (plus on-roads):
4 Coupe	$255,400
4S Coupe	$289,400
4 Cabriolet	$280,900
4S Cabriolet	$315,000