KUALA LUMPUR, March 21 — The Porsche Cayman GT4, recently introduced in Malaysia by Sime Darby Auto Performance, our local Porsche distributor, is the ultimate Cayman available, that is, until they make a more powerful one. The Cayman, first introduced in 2006, is Porsche’s mid-engine coupe, and although the rear-engine 911 is what people are more familiar with, the Cayman is a sweet car to drive. The mid-engine layout has better balance since the engine is moved to the front of the rear axle rather than behind it.
Although the Cayman looks much the same as the original, the wheelbase has been extended to 97.4 inches compared to the original 95.1 inches. Otherwise, the suspension geometry remains the same, with struts all round. The GT4 gets an active sport suspension with PASM (Porsche Active Suspension Management). Height, camber and toe are adjustable for track use.
As in all Porsche performance cars, there is extensive use of aluminium parts for the suspension arms to keep un-sprung weight as low as possible. (Reducing un-sprung weight, which is the weight of the parts, usually suspension parts, not supported by the vehicle springs, helps in improving driving dynamics). The shock absorbers are mounted in an upside down position.
Elsewhere, the engineers have shave off unnecessary weight to keep the overall weight low, and despite a larger capacity engine and the addition of a roll-over cage, plus a rear wing, the Cayman GT4 maintains the same 1,340 kg kerb weight as the Cayman S. Even the door handles have been replaced with a canvas strap in the weight reduction quest.
The GT4 gets 385 horsepower from a 3.8 litre naturally aspirated flat six from the Carrera S, with some modifications to fit the mid-engine arrangement, and you can have it either with a six-speed manual or a six speed manual. No PDK (direct clutch transmission) is available. Anyway, if you cannot handle a manual, the GT4 is not for you. Brakes are huge, with six-pots at the front, and four-pots at the rear. To help with cornering, Porsche added in ‘torque vectoring’ which distributes more drive to the rear outer wheels. Tyres are 20-inch, 11 inches wide at the rear and 8.5 inches wide at the front.
I was invited by the (very kind) Porsche people here to take the car for a day to check it out – collect it in the morning, and return it in the evening – given that constraint, I decided to take it to Fraser’s Hill and back. This route is a little bit of nostalgia for me, because a little short of ten years ago, I took the Cayman S along the exact same route. I even took photographs at the same locations in Fraser’s Hill.
I was told that this car would be a ‘monster’, but to my surprise, it actually was quite easy to handle. Being no stranger to a manual transmission, it was like a duck taking to water. Hell and toe (a technique that allows one to blip the throttle with the right heel to raise the engine speed while the same foot is on the brakes, to raise the engine speed to meet the higher gear speed when shifting down, before releasing the clutch) is a bit of a challenge as the accelerator pedal is floor-mounted and a little low. With a bit of body adjustment, I could manage.
The engine power comes in progressively if you use the throttle properly – it is possible to putter around the city roads at decent speeds. The engine is tuned for road use, with the high performance coming in at higher engine revolutions, thanks to variable valve timing. Similarly, the first gear ratio is decent enough for a normal take-off from standstill. With 385 horses, and max torque of 420 Nm, and a power to weight ratio of 3.48 kg per horsepower, the Cayman GT4 can pull up even in sixth gear from almost any speed, and hit a top speed of 295 km/h. If push comes to shove, you can redline it to 7,600 rpm and do the zero to 100km/h sprint in a mere 4.4 seconds.
The ratios from second through to sixth are very close, and are over-drive gears from fourth gear onwards. I can sense that the gearbox is built tough, from the sound of the gears meshing together. This gearbox probably wouldn’t have any durability problems even if it were to be used on a 10-ton truck.
Ground clearance might pose a little bit of a problem when parking in spots with high kerbs, or when you go over speed bumps. The GT4 is 18mm lower than the standard Cayman S, which is low enough as it is, but on a race track, or on the highway at high speed, the additional stability will be appreciated.
I got out of the Glenmarie area easily enough, and climbed onto the NSE, headed north. On the highway, the only thing that will stop you from going too fast would be the traffic, and of course I had to abide by the rules. Where possible, I could open up the throttle a little bit, but it wasn’t often. However, the power is appreciated whenever I had to overtake — you get past very easily, and you don’t have to work the gear lever nor the pedals that much. From a standing start, zero to 200 km/h can be done is 14.5 seconds, so you can imagine just how fast it can be when you push pedal to the metal. There are two suspension settings, all done by the push of a button – Normal or Sport. Normal setting is based on the North Loop of the Nurburgring (which means it is already good enough for high speed driving), while ‘Sport’ is for use under race track conditions. I stayed on ‘Normal’ as I found it good enough for my drive, while being more compliant, and thus more comfortable.
Exiting at Bukit Beruntung, I took the back road that skirts Rasa and joins the old trunk road just a few kilometres before the turn-off to Kuala Kubu Baru. Light traffic slowed me down a little, but I could get familiar with the cornering behaviour through the series of bends just before the Kuala Kubu Baru turn-off. Again, with the immense power, overtaking requires so much less space and time.
Once out of the Kuala Kubu Baru township, it was corners, and more corners – with a car that has more than double of what I had in my rally car of the 1980’s, it was fun all the way. I believed though, that I probably drive faster ten years ago in the Cayman S, which had only 295 horsepower then, than in the GT4 – maybe it is age, and maybe the road up to the Gap and then to Fraser’s Hill has deteriorated somewhat. There were many corners that seemed bumpier than before, which caused some ‘bump over steer’, while others had broken edges and some tarmac bits were badly worn out. I had to approach each corner with more caution, and be more alert. The road seemed a little narrower in some parts, possibly due to invasion by vegetation, so I had to be more careful of oncoming traffic. Still, it was a great experience. The wide tyres provided fantastic grip, and despite some very hard cornering, I was never off line, except of course, for those spots when bump steer occurred. Even then the quick steering ratios enabled quick corrections — anticipation also helped. Driven ‘slowly’ the GT4 can be very enjoyable – driven fast, it is more enjoyable, but you have to be on your toes all the time.
On the way down, I was more familiar with the road, and could ‘flow’ the GT4 through the corners, most of the time going one gear higher, since one needs less engine power going downhill. Another reason for this was that I was given only three quarters of a tank of petrol, and by the time I started on the return journey form Fraser’s hill, there was only 76 kilometres range left in the tank, so I had to ‘nurse’ her a little — a refuel stop in Kuala Kubu Baru restored my ‘range’ confidence, and allowed me to enjoy my highway drive back to the Porsche office.
Prudence tells me not to declare what speeds I hit, but it was a pretty short drive in terms of time taken. What I can share from the highway drive is that the brakes work beautifully, and inspire confidence. The overall handling is nothing short of ‘fantastic’ – it is rock steady at any speed, without any of that ‘floating’ feeling you get when you go at high speeds with other cars. There is a button that you can push to change the engine behaviour characteristics, and this includes a more raucous exhaust note, and automatic ‘blipping’ of the throttle on downshifts (to help you if you don’t know how to ‘heel and toe’. I stayed on ‘normal’ as I found it good enough — it was great enough for me to be able to drive a car with a manual transmission again, and a powerful one at that.
On a rating of between one and ten, I rate my little adventure with the Cayman GT4 a nine and a half, with the remaining half reserved just in case I get to drive a more powerful car on the race track (dreams are free). The asking price at the moment is a little short of RM1.0 million, which puts the Cayman GT4 way out of my budget, but perhaps one day, maybe further in future, I might be able to pick one up, used, that is. For the moment, although I would love to have one, I will stick to my ancient alligator.
