Quote:
Originally Posted by Red Bread
I'm all for mid engines, but there's a point of diminishing returns, especially with shorter wheelbases. Most drivers were scared to death of 993 and earlier 911's at vMax. Alpines weren't the friendliest Autobahn cars either.
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Yes rear engined rwd is a very tricky combination. (the simca 1000 and nsu prinz were also rwd rear engine altough very lightweight cars).
A collegue of mine also had an alpine a310 (in fact I had 2 collegues who both had an a310, how rare is that
) and he said he almost lost it once, at a point that he totally didnt expect.
Its quite a miracle that porsche has managed to turn the 911 in an excellent handling car, and holding the ring record for now. But mind you, there is an enormous amount of technology and fine tuning involved into that.
For instance the gearboxes from a gt3/gt3rs/gt2rs have a completely different setup and build that transforms the complete balance of the car than say a gearbox from a 911 turbo.
Porsche 911's are all about getting the engine/gearbox as low as possible in the chassis, and they go to mechanical extremes and trickery to do that. Thats how they control that balance issue.
And mid engined cars are usually very unpractical in use.