How Porsche Built the First Modern Supercar
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- Опубліковано 28 жов 2022
- Porsche is no stranger to motorsport. Holding the record for most manufacturer Le Mans wins, dominating sports car racing in multiple eras, and even running their own one-make series, its safe to say that the brand likes to race. Lesser known however is the company’s flirtation with rally. Lesser known still is that one of Porsche’s most iconic cars was built to dominate rally’s most competitive class. This is the story of the Porsche 959.
#racing #groupb #porsche - Авто та транспорт
953 winning against Pajero in Dakar to me is amazing achievement.
959 is beautiful
Perfectly stated
It was stylish not beautiful.
The turbos made it unreliable.
A Texan raced his two 959s against his friends Testarossa.
Both 959s broke down with the Testa completing the run with a gear to go at 140mph!
@@se7roverify Setsuna Yuki also love this 959.
@@tumslucks9781 Wow, a texan couldn't service his cars.
@@23GreyFox
Do you own two Porsches?
I bet you don't.
So crazily advanced for the 80s. I love it
Still somewhat advanced for today😂
Beat-up by F1 but this was at the time the second best supercar at this time.
959 is the landmark of how 911 Turbo evolved from Rear-wheel drive into All-wheel drive on next generation. Also, 911 RSR (1973-1974) is the pinnacle of GT series they made for track-focused only with sharp cornering and more sophisticated aerodynamic.
These videos are phenomenal.
Yep. Made phenomenal to the extreme.
Talk about a unicorn!?! Porsche hasn't done anything like that before or since. The 959 was WAAAY ahead of it's time. Great vid.
There are very few cars that give me lowkey chills (and ironically many of them are Porsches) but with the 959, the chills aren't lowkey at all. It still amazes me how crazy and ahead of time the 959 really was. To think, almost all other supercars from this era were still stuck with mostly 70s technology and construction, and here you have humble-looking sports car with technological innovations that would not be seen in normal family cars until decades later.
I was taking a walk to the local park in London and saw a Porsche dealership which I recognised from photos - It was actually the original John Cooper workshop (of mini fame). Taking a walk over the road to take a closer look, I spotted a 959 in the window. A few months later on another walk to the park, I saw that the workshop was open. I had a chat with the floor manager (I presume) and he welcomed me in to take a look at the cars. Very awesome and rare car.
Hope your feeling better mate. Thanks for another awesome video!!
You need to cover out the Story of the BMW M3 GTR someday.
the fact that FIA and ALMS had to change the rules to ban the car from racing is still hilarious til this day.
Honestly man a lot of cars did that...... E30 M3, the Porsche 917 family, 956, Audi GTO, 935k3,gt40 etc, etc......
These documentaries are very fun to watch for some reason and it’s simplified anyways yes 959 is legendary
man id love to see something on the Pajero!
Where to start with the 959? Not only it was a breakthrough for super-cars as it proved they could be reliable and daily-driven (The 959 even has a specific gear to drive in snow, that's how much they wanted these cars to be driven) It also marked the future for the 911. The modern 911 owes more to the 959 than it seems, even the base models are turbocharged and offer all wheel drive now. The problem is, in the process, it truly bankrupted Porsche. They didn't sell it at a moderate loss, the cost of each 959 was a bit more than twice the price Porsche were charging (The cost was around 300K, Porsche spent 720K building each one) To make matters worse, a few years later there was an economic crisis where sales of sport-cars tanked. This is why the 964 and 993 generations were developed and built in tight budgets, which meant little room for innovations. Porsche was so desperate for cash that they built a final run of 6 959s in 1992 out of spares they had laying around for two customers. It is unknown how much these cars were sold for, but it is said Porsche made money with them for a change.
Also I love the footage you have sourced for this video!
Yup. And let's not forget which model, with 959/911 DNA saved Porsche from bankruptcy. The humble 986.
ruf yellowbird pls don't kill me
Hey, it was more of an icon than quite a few Group B cars from the era. I'd say it's more recognizable than the RS200 at least.
You do a great job. I enjoy your use of footage from the era.
Great video, mate. I made one of these in the summer. The comparison between this and the F40 is quite striking especially when you consider one was a 4 seater (sort of) whilst the other didn't even have interior door handles!
Another great video.
I would like to suggest an obscure supercar for the next video.
Although it wasn't put into production, the story of it is very interesting.
Jiotto Caspita is the name of the car
Awesome video. Great video production. You are making great documentaries. Keep up the good work.
your pfp....
"The driver perfectly executed a money shift."... You cannot hear the sass by the tone, but you can feel the sass by the dialogue...
Glad that you touched on the 961 - people rarely talk about it when discussing the 959. To be frank, there’s next to no discussion about Group B road racing in general, which I suppose goes to show how it failed. Thank goodness for Stephane Ratel and Group GT1!
People may think of it as just a "Porsche" but true petrolheads know it from the heart to appearance.
Pls make a video on the Chrysler 426 HEMI engine or the cars that it powered. Its an interesting story cause it made Chrysler incredibly competitive in NASCAR and NHRA drag races
Very cool do one on the Ferrari 288 GTO, another mystical "could have been" of the group B era.
It would be very a good idea as it finally dispel the idea that the 288 GTO was built for rallying as it was actually built for a proposed Group B GT circuit racing series/class which meant to replace Group 5 GT racing.
@@flurpoid Yeah the 308 GTB was indeed the car that got some Ferrari works support for Group B rallying but as always the project was lead by privateer teams which were previously very successful with 308 in the Italian Rally Championship which were run to Group 4 rules but we must also remember that Fiat had complete overall control of who race where and had pulled Lancia's works team out of the WRC to allow for Fiat themselves to win it instead with the 131 Abarth even though Lancia were convinced that the Stratos had another two to three years of dominance left in it but by the time the 308 was prepared for Group B the competition had very much passed Ferrari by!
@@adammercer6004 Eh... No quite. Ferrari indeed had the idea to run Group B in both road and rally forms but...
Ferrari had been trying to enter Group B since the inception of the class in 1981 or 1982 and back then, rallying was still a RWD sport and despite Audi's appearance with their AWD system in the Quattro, it wasn't all great and RWD still has a say and was still winning races thus Ferrari kept chugging along with the "RWD Group B machine" and with the Opel Ascona winning in 1982 with both the WDC and WCC and the Ferrari 308 that competed in those WRC events performed well enough too.
However, by 1983, despite Lancia barely winning the WDC and WCC with the 037, the writing was on the wall that RWD wouldn't be the winning formula anymore but there's a problem... Ferrari had no funds to set up another AWD project thus they abandoned their rally ambitions and focus on road racing.
However, as fate tragically unfolds, Group B folded completely and even the road racing section was axed together with the rally side of things thus the 288 GTO didn't even see the day of light for either side of Group B. Worse still, Ferrari actually made an even more powerful version of the 288 GTO which is just called the 288 GTO EVO where it has more aggressive bodywork and a more powerful turbo ripped from the Group C Lancia LC2 and could make upwards of 600hp in 1986, just as Group B folded.
Ahhhh group B what a glorious times of WRC
love these types of videos
Your videos are Motorsport History for Dummies. One after another, brilliant. Thank you!
I miss that original opening tune, gave me those Gran Turismo vibes on this channel.
Amazing video, amazing car, what a legend
Back again with another banger video
Great footage
Fantastic video thank you 👏👍
Please, if you mention something in imperial system, do not forget about the metric system aswell. Would be appreciated.
Awesome content! Just found you recently
Awsome Video
you definetly deserve more attention and you will get it, I am sure! thanks for the content. many videos have been mindblown to me (Mclaren F1 probs my favourite :))
Thoroughly enjoyable. Great work!
Thanks!
Good info on the 959 👍👍👍
Amazing video
I only just discovered your channel but I absolutely love it and think it's a really cool channel
The 959 was a gorgeous car. I was lucky enough to stand talking to the driver of one in 1992/3 (can't remember quite which yaar).
Bro amazing footage you have gold footage every video.
Great video, loved the 959 as a child and the Paris Dakar rally looked so exotic back then, 961 looks great too. Love how the engineers got the Group B project away by pitching as a test bed for the next 911 and they were right with 4wd going into the 964
Love that haynes thumbnail! 👍🏻
Add it to the depressingly long list of depressing automotive what ifs.
Very good video
Seeing their rally cars makes me want to take a modern AWD Porsche and make a Baja inspired build.
Porsche unveiled the 911 Dakar just this week! I think its pretty cool
@@automobilistic ok. I'm off to find a picture of that. Off road and for me prerunners are just really cool.
Man this my fifth video smh I had to sub big bro keep this knowledge coming I need all that
It doesn't even look like it's from the '80s, looking almost a decade newer!
It was an amazing machine when it first came out
Hope to see a Patreon soon, would love to support the channel
Hey nice GT music man
Helmut Bott.
Great name.
Even greater UA-cam Channel!
The first true hypercar.
What a monster of an engine
Probably my favorite Porsche besides the 917... I wish they could have raced the 959 in group b, that would have been epic!
Only one second into the video and I would like to give you 10 times thumbs up. For the correct pronounciation of Porsche!
A video about the de tomaso pantera could be cool, an Italian car mainly sold by ford and competed in Le Mans and IMSA for a while
I always think that Nissan copy the 959’s concept to make the R32 GT-R. High-powered twin-turbo engine with variable traction AWD system.
oh yea that perfectly executed money shift👌🤣
I don’t think people understand how impressive ANYTHING beating the Pajero at the Dakar is.
I don't think you understand that people understand
I do. You're correct: that was the car to beat.
For the car from 1986, this 959 is incredible to see.
Well time to get the popcorn
...If I had any
can u do one on the ford gt in 1966 vs 2016?
Great video!
But .. win in it's class, where it was only two cars)
Hey my friend amazing stories about 80s and 90s cars racing in lemans but i hope a video about the story of the Mercedes clk gtr and the end of Mercedes in 1999 in lemans with the 3 clk gtr destroyed
I've made a video about that! Its called "Why did Mercedes Abandon Le Mans". Really glad you're enjoying the videos
Who needs “high performance road cars”, especially when you’re not in Germany?
*Deletes first message so as to not look as if I had known you had done this vid*.....Bloody amazing, a wee turbo for low speed and a large one to kick it all off!....This thing would have eaten the Audi's for lunch .....
I Heard Porsche 959 was 187mph By some sources But it was Definitely 197mph 😈
Did I see a 959 running on a dyno, only running it’s rear wheels? Thought the torque split was 20/80%, F/R? It was white, like their development car, could have been that one.
That could be to minimise drivetrain losses when testing the engine.
Still advanced today, in ways. 35 years later we can get a Toyota Yaris GR with variable traction control, torque vectoring, electronically controlled suspension and so on. Very cool. But it’s also a sort of limited run, rally-bred feat of engineering that Porsche put together all those years ago (albeit for a much higher price etc compared to the Toyota) that can almost never push the 959 aside as a relic of the past, given the other advances in car tech we’ve had since. Many new SUVs can out-drag a Ferrari 308, but that speaks more about the 308 being a relic whilst the Porsche 959 remains timeless.
I like to believe that Nissan got the pop out fender style from the Audi group be rally cars and put it on the R32 Skyline
group b found its footing in rally, yes, but i often heard that the 959 precisely *wasn't* designed for rally. group b was supposed to be a versatile class and compete on and off track, and the 959, like, for example, the 288 gto, was developped for the *track* variant of group b. group b at that time was supposed to remplace group 4 in endurance racing (most notably the world sportscar championship, racing alongside group c). the only group b cars we'll end up seeing in wsc, though, would be "converted" group 4 cars like the bmw m1 and ferrari 308 gtb. incidentaly, the 959 and the 288 gto were *far* too heavy for wrc. they had much bigger engines, and gave like 200kg to the audi quattro, almost 300 to the peugeot 205 !
i mean, it never even was hidden that track was the idea behing the 288 gto : everybody remembers it as "ferrari going rally", but the car was purposefully rear-wheel drive with track racing in mind, and would only have competed in tarmac events in the wrc for testing purposes. porsche can indeed be a little more confusing, as they did build a four wheel drive car, but the thing is helmut bott wanted a *road* car, a group b one, yes, but a road going one, and he did think that four wheel drive was the future for the road, as well as track racing (as audi would prove in the late-80s and early-90s by dominating every track competition it entered, from transam to dtm to btcc, and building awd supercars now). as they needed reliabilty for endurance racing, porsche went to test its four wheel drive system in the dakar because, well, it's the most difficult race on earth, the group b regulations had proven their worth off-road, and most importantly...you can run prototypes, there ! the dakar rally didn't (and still doesn't) need homologation, just "rules compliance", so it was the perfect test bed for a purpose-built racing car not yet in production.
as for the le mans participation, well, *after* group b was banned (a general ban, for rally and track racing), porsche found itself without a way to enter the 959 in the wsc, so they went to the imsa gtx regulations, that would allow them to run at le mans (as it was a joined imsa/wsc race at the time).
again, this is all "i've been told", i have no source and i couldn't find any reliable one (most papers on the 959 on the internet are fan made and made by fans of rally group b, nobody ever talks about the - admitedly failed - track racing part of the regulation), but i've always found this "alternative" take on the 959 history a lot more sensible.
While it is true that Group B was not specifically a rally class, as I say in the video, I think its relatively safe to say that the 959 was meant to be used in rally events. I think you're absolutely right about the 288 GTO being made for the track, but the 959 had too much off-road credibility for it to have just been used on road. Its likely that Porsche wanted to make a compliant car and leave their options open as to which competitions to enter it with - potentially even supplying privateers for whichever didn't receive factory backing. But as you say finding concrete evidence of the company's intentions is hard, because most of it all fell through.
@@automobilistic I agree with you..... From a visual argument it looks like the 959 was designed mostly for rally..... I mean those are huge wheel to tuck in large tires........I really hate OP argument that the 959 was not designed for off-roading when it obviously was.... I mean God damnit Porsche themselves tested the drivetrain for Paris Dakar first in the 911.........
Video on mitsubishi pajero?
I'll add it to the list!
@@automobilistic Video on the mitsubishi l300 van?
Have you ever ate a Whopper?
top
Hey when can we get a vid about ruf
I have a tamia model of it I have to build
The 959... what todays 911 should be.
So all wheel drive, 911 enthusiasts would like to have a word with you.
the Porsche 959 has some sort of device built in to automatically inflate and deflate the air in the tires without extra touching the tire. i think its well usefull to have the right ammount of air in the tires depending on how much weight is on the vehicle and the temperature of the tires. for driving on loose ground it will be usefull for deflateing the tires much, to have a bigger contact surface to sink in less, the hummer 4x4 has something like that too. then when getting or solid ground again, the vehicle would fill the tires with more air by itself again while driving. useful thing. why dont todays vehicles commonly have that ? they have all all sorts of gimmicks and features, but why no such automatic air pressure regulation for the tires ?? beside that technology, that Porsche 959 looks so ahead of its time, like from today and not from the 80s and 211mph is very fast even by todays standards, crazy fast back then, that technology is aswell ahead of its time aswell as that look. alot of todays sportscars suffer from transformers diseasse, but that 959 looks straight and clean, just right for all times back then till today and i guess in the future too.
Song @ 2:00 ?
Press Fuse by French Fuse
@@automobilistic Thx
It's a real motorsport tragedy that this car never competed in Group B rally. Of course it was probably a good idea to ban Group B but 1987 would have been an amazing year with Porsche as an official rally manufacturer against Lancia and Ford.
Are you good bro?
?
And then the NSX came out...🤣
959: the God car.
If Mercury had a driver's license, he would drive a 959.
he’d probably drive a Mercury bro
Porsche didn't toss the guts of the 959 into the 930 chassis and sent it to the Paris-Dakar Rally because they couldn't make the 959 in time but because the Porsche mechanics were rather skeptical about it as it wasn't tested properly yet and they can't afford to trash the prototype chassis there.
So they came up with a ingenious idea. Since the 901 and 930 chassis 911 were pretty awesome in road rally events already, why not just stuff whatever the 959 could take and shove it into spare 930 chassis laying around in the factory and send them as test mules to the rally? Besides, it's still a flat-six thus it didn't require much cutting and hacking to make everything fit.
Porsche did just that and when they clinched the manufacturer win and driver's win at the same time, the engineers and mechanics were then convinced that it worked and continued with the project.
The owner of KREEPY KRAULY DANNY CHAVOUIR bought a red one ! He emigrated from SOUTH AFRICA 🇿🇦 to the USA . Unfortunately he had to fly the 959 to Europe every year because of the emissions law in the USA 🇺🇸 😕
I think you misspelled "ruined" in the title. The 959 was an engineering marvel, and a great car, no doubt, but it started the trend of these bloated, computer controlled monsters we have as supercars and high end sports cars now (though, to be fair, the R35 GT-R takes the brunt of the blame). Light, fast, and simple is much more interesting and exciting to drive then something with a billion horsepower and a computer taking all your inputs into consideration while IT drives the car. I'd take the 959s contemporary, the F40, any day over the Porsche, just like I'd take a GT3-RS with a manual box and "only" ~500 HP over the modern Ferrari V8s.
Another mythical thing is the jagaur xj13 it was supposed to race 1966 Le Mans but was cancelled while on the truck to France
Not true I'm afraid. The XJ13 was only finished in March 1966 and William Lyons had banned anyone from testing the car until formal testing began in 1967 but the car was never entered for any races let alone Le Mans. The FIA rule change reducing engines to 3 litres finished it for good from a racing application.
@@marks7197 oh I only heard the story cos my grandfather used to work as a designer in the 60s and 70s
@@henrymorrison3079 Norman Dewis told me the details above when I attended an evening talk with him. Although it's widely available online.
@@marks7197 in fairness he ( my grandfather ) only worked on the xj6 interior so he probably didn’t know the true story
@@henrymorrison3079 No worries, he did a great job with his colleagues on the XJ6 though!
then came the Acura NSX.... redefined again
Bro imagine money shifting on a 959!! Gotta be the biggest L anyone can ever achieve LOL 😂
Even if the 959 would've had the opportunity to compete in Group B it was never going to be a rally icon. Rallying is the people's motorsport with folk heroes rather than superstars driving supercars. Imagine Porsche competing in NASCAR - they would be shunned and hated no matter the results - they just don't belong in that category. The Škoda Fabia is the ultimate rally icon. A Porsche? Just not going to happen.
Oh man do I hate the 959
Why?
@@automobilistic it accurately predicted everything wrong with modern supercars. AWD, needless turbos, active suspension, power steering. Things that the F40 (except turbos) or Countach didn't have, and they gave you an experience. With the 959, you don't work for your speed and it feels boring after a while, when the other cars don't. Same with modern supercars, sure they're fast, but most people would rather choose a Miata for the fun factor
The 959 had the highest top speed. RUF said, “hold my beer.”
Air cooling don’t seem that advanced. Getting that beetle engine vibe…
Potato
Looks like a 911 that melted.
Porsche 959 redefined 'Sportscar'
Ferrari F40 redefined 'Supercar'
McLaren F1 invented 'Hypercar'
F40 > 959
Porsche are great to races and terrible to own, very complex and expensive to fix.
The Ferrari F40 was far a better car...
Porche has never won a single WRC event ever and it has tried many times especially on tarmac events. Roundy round stuff may be but the real cars and drivers are to be found in WRC imo.
The 911 was very successful during the late 60s in rally, Winning alot of the major events like Monte Carlo and was champion I believe a few times. This was before the European championship turned into the wrc....
Like it or not Porsche is the most race successful automaker in motorsports.... Most wins in le mans Daytona, sebring, ALMS, group 5, group C, No other brand has been banned, boycotted, handicapped more then Porsche..... Porsche killed the Can Am series, mostly regarded as the most extreme series in motorsports besides group B in history.......
And BTW Porsche hasn't really tried that hard at competing In the Wrc or rally in general...... The 60s stuff, The martini African Safari was one time. In 1980 with Rohrl, Rohrl again with the 924 for the German championship. The Rothmans stuff and then stuff private UK based tuner for the 997........
Technical - YES. But it looked sooo ugly!
Best looking Porsche ever: Porsche 918 Spyder
I disagree! I like the 959's looks, I think its a good looking car! The 918 is also a great looking car, I will agree with you there, but I'm not sure its the best looking, theres a lot to choose from haha
@@automobilistic We obviously have a different taste 😉