There was a time when cars were bought off the showroom floor, but with the time changing and the customers becoming more aware of what exactly they want and how they want their machine to look, it was about time Porsche brought in a dedicated configurator room. Just in time as they celebrate 70 years of making the best sportscars on the market, Porsche India recently set up their configurator room at their Mumbai dealership and when they invited us over to poke around, we couldn’t say no! Heck, we weren’t even required to buy a car for this experience!

Arriving at Porsche Centre Mumbai, we were greeted by the sales team. Now across the world, Porsche Centres, as Porsche likes to call their dealerships, are known to be some of the most enthusiast friendly dealerships on the performance car market. Cue to the old Porsche advert featuring the Type 997 Mark I Porsche 911 Carrera S and an enthusiastic school kid. Porsche Centre Mumbai is no different. There have been various instances of enthusiats just walking into the showroom to have a look at the beauties on the showroom floor and leaving hours later with drool-drenched tees. As welcoming as ever, the staff escorted us to the corner in the dealership that houses the configurator room. Needless to say, there were way too many detours before we finally made our ways to the configurator room after being distracted by a Porsche Panamera turbo Executive’s fascinating wing action and a rather smashing Porsche 718 Boxster.
 

Finally, into the room where dreams are shaped up before they are made into a reality, we discovered a plethora of bits and pieces that could go into your dream Porsche. Here, a customer can see, touch and feel the various materials, colours and elements that comprise the interior of your Porsche. They have the entire range of the colour palate in the form of paint samples, pieces of leather samples and other materials like aluminium, wood, carbon fibre etc. But this isn’t all, as the sales head points out, there is no limit to what a customer can do with his or her car via the Porsche Exclusive Manufaktur wing. Right from having a special shade formulated to your taste to a new interior trim, there is no end. Albeit, prepare yourself to wait for a while before you receive your car.

Without further ado, we went on with what we were here for - configuring our dream Porsche. Our of the whole range of 718, Panamera, Cayenne and 911 models available, we went with the 911 GT3 RS. Why not the GT2 RS? Oh well, it is already sold out for India and we were trying to be as realistic a Porsche customer as possible, haha!
Beginning with the spec, we went ahead with Racing Yellow for it has been one of my most favourite colours on the 911. Wheels were painted satin black to set it off with the yellow body and match the essential Weissach RS package which adds a whole load of carbon fibre parts like the hood, roof and wing along with a roll cage, ‘cuz race car! Further, we went ahead and selected the full bucket seats to hold our derrière in place while and went with partial leather and partial alcantara seats. Personally, never been a fan of the GT3 RS decals that came on the doors so when Porsche allows you to delete them, you hit tick. Other essentials was the reversing camera and front axle lift so that the car breezes through the Indian street chaos. On the interiors, we went with the stitching and seat belts to match the yellow exterior and ticked on the painted climate control panel just to add a pop of color on the centre console. Not too much, not too less, just how we like it! Complete with the Porsche Carbon Ceramic Brakes, we had already added a hefty INR 80 Lac worth of options to our GT3 RS and now it looked like an absolute Pokemon!

The kind of tech Porsche puts into their rear engined 911 to behave like the way a discerning drive would want it to is bonkers. The spec sheet itself has a bunch of options and abbreviations that would drive you nuts. Let us try breaking some of them down for you.

— PCCB (Porsche Carbon Ceramic Brakes) : These are high performance brakes that increase your car’s stopping power by leaps.  A hugely expensive option which is best ticked if your car is going to see you chasing lap times frequently. Else just save yourself that cash and buy yourself a new VW Polo GTi for the city runs.

— PDCC (Porsche Dynamic Chassis Control) : It is an active antiroll system that suppresses lateral body movement during cornering maneuver. It also minimizes the lateral instability of the vehicle on uneven ground. This basically results in improved dynamic performance and increased ride comfort – at all speeds – as well as optimized turn-in and stable load transfer characteristics.

— Porsche Sports Chrono : The Porsche Sport Chrono Package enhances vehicle performance through a system that simultaneously alters elements of chassis, engine, and transmission. In addition to the ability to take performance to new heights, the Sport Chrono Package equips the vehicle with a performance display, digital and analog stopwatches, and the Sport Plus button. In short, it is a must tick.

— PTV (Porsche Torque Vectoring) : PTV for manual cars and PTV Plus for the ones equipped with Porsche Doppelkupplungsgetriebe (PDK, for starters) is a system that operates in conjunction with a rear differential lock and works by intelligently braking the rear wheels as the situation demands. The rear differential lock is regulated mechanically, while PTV Plus is equipped with electronic control offering fully variable torque distribution. In interaction with Porsche Stability Management (PSM), the system improves driving stability not least on road surfaces with varying grip as well as in the wet and snow. What does this mean? Tremendous fun in the corners.

— PSM (Porsche Stability Management) : All 911 models are equipped with enhanced Porsche Stability Management as standard. PSM maintains stability even at the limits of dynamic driving performance. Sensors continuously monitor the direction, speed, yaw velocity and lateral acceleration of the car. Using this information, PSM is able to calculate the actual direction of travel at any given moment and initiates strategic braking of individual wheels to prevent you from deviating from your intended line.

 So these comprise of some of the very basic German geekery that Porsche offers. A few 911 models come with these as standard and a few as an option. And this is a just a part of the rocket science that makes the 911 what it is. Most of the geekery is standard on the car and not advertised and that is what makes a flawed formula of a rear engined car an absolute winner!


On our way out, we had a quick chat with Mr. Pavan Shetty, the head of Porsche India. Through the talk, we dis ask him the staple question of how does it feel to be at the helm of a brand thats has been monumentally significant in the automotive history and he says “It’s an absolute privilege to be working with Porsche. The smile that this brand brings to every face is extremely satisfying.

A Porsche is not like anything else because it is a sportscar which you can drive in your everyday life! It’s like a dream come true and we strongly believe in not setting limits to your dreams. At the core of the Porsche brand is fascination and it’s great to be able to excite our customers and share their passion for our cars.”
And since we were here primarily to have a good look at the configurator room, we had to ask the man behind Porsche India what his dream Porsche would be and it turns out “Definitely the Porsche 911! I love the way it has evolved over the years and still managed to stay relevant in every way through time. My 911 will be in white colour & most definitely have the Sport Chrono Package which helps unleash the 911 performance in its entirety.”

This brings us to the end of our stint of pretending to be a Porsche customer. But one day, we shall definitely be back and this time with the cheque. The 911 has been around for ages now and the aspirational value that this car carries is unparalleled. As they say, if you have Porsche in your garage, you do really know your cars well. Not the kind of car that would turn the most heads or drop the most jaws or the one most fit for some flexing for the ‘gram, but definitely the one if driving pleasure is you first and only requirement. Here’s hoping to see Porsche bring on many more such cars on Indian roads and also start offering PTS or Paint To Sample build slots in India soon!