As great as homologation cars are at bringing race-car levels of performance to the street, there is little that could match the amount of fun a street-legal LMP1 car could be.
The folks over at Porsche also seem to think that would have been a good idea, so they toyed with the idea of a road-going version of the 919 that dominated the LMP1 class back in 2017.
Although not many official numbers are offered, the road-going 919 would likely have been powered by a unit similar to the hybrid 2.0-liter, turbocharged V4 engine found in the race car, though Porsche says that the 919 would have had more than 800 horsepower on tap.
The street car would have been based on the fiber monocoque chassis used by the race car, and likely would have had a dry weight similar to the 1900 pounds of the LMP1 car.
The version you see here is actually the 1:1 clay model constructed by Porsche, which you apparently can see more of in the company’s "Porsche Unseen" book that catalogs a number of other concepts and prototypes not shown to the public.
Is the 919 the successor to the 918 we deserved, or does the next Porsche supercar need more than four cylinders to the German carmaker’s halo car?
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This is the Carerra GT successor we deserved.
Looks the business and would have gone like hell.
It's the same concept as the new Ford GT, just taken to 11..
while i'm sad it never made production, it makes me happy to know Porsche did this design study.
Man, a V4? I thought nobody other than Ford/Saab made one and that was the Taunus.
I wish that had somehow made its way to US roads. Could you imagine seeing one of these on the street with all the SUVs, like a shark in a school of fish? man...
Nothing wrong with a four cylinder supercar if it's got that "I won Le Mans" cred.
LMP1 was wild at that point. Supercaps, flywheels or batteries. Diesel or gasoline. Turbos or naturally aspirated. Four, six or eight cylinders. ICE powering the front or rear wheels. Front or rear engined. If we're going to have insanely expensive racing, let's get some crazy cars out of the deal.
In reply to GIRTHQUAKE :
Yeah, I thought that was a typo when I first read it, but sure enough, it was supposed to have a V4.
I dig it.
Now make it a hypercar and go back to Le Mans.
This is from the 919 Wiki page:
"It has a two-litre (120 cu in) 90-degree V4 mid-mounted mono-turbocharged petrol engine that produces 500 hp (370 kW) and acts as a chassis load-bearing member"
In reply to Aaron_King :
oh, its much more than 500 hp. Porsche made an 'evo' version that basically just said "screw the rules let's go as fast as possible".
After removing fuel flow restrictions they made 710 HP, no fuel flow restrictions on road cars lol.
from wiki:
The V4 engine was retained for the Evo, producing 720 PS (530 kW; 710 hp) without fuel flow restrictions. As the amount of recovered energy that could be used was increased from 6.37 MJ (1.77 kWh) for Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps to 8.49 MJ (2.36 kWh), the output of the electric motors was increased from 400 to 440 PS (294 to 324 kW; 395 to 434 hp). By removing air conditioning, windscreen wipers, headlights and other electrical devices, the car's weight was reduced by 39 kg (86 lb); it weighed at 849 kg (1,872 lb) dry and 888 kg (1,958 lb) with driver ballast. Extensive aerodynamic upgrades to the 919 Evo increased downforce by 53% and increased aerodynamic efficiency by 66%, compared to the 919 Hybrid's 2017 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps qualifying specifications. These upgrades consist of the inclusion of an active drag-reduction system, an enlarged rear wing, a wider front diffuser and fixed-height side skirts.[167][168][169][170]
I can't imagine ever being in a position to own something like this. And even if I had the money, I don' t know if I'd want the stress of ownership. But all that aside, I'd be way more likely to spend my F-U money on something like this than a Ferrari or Lambo.
Colin Wood said:In reply to GIRTHQUAKE :
Yeah, I thought that was a typo when I first read it, but sure enough, it was supposed to have a V4.
That's what the race car had, so it wouldn't make any sense to put anything else in there.
I worked on the turbo systems of the Toyota TS050 LMP1 car, the front engine / FWD Nissan GT-R LM NISMO LMP1, and a development project on the Porsche 919. All of them were batE36 M3 crazy (in a good way) in their own ways, and I would absolutely drive any of them on the street if given the opportunity!
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