Porsche 911 User Manual

Page 26

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· 54 ·

911 Carrera Cabriolet

· 55 ·

The new 911 | Transmission

The optional Porsche Doppelkup-

plung (PDK), with both manual

gearshift and an automatic mode,

enables smooth gear changes

with no interruption in the flow of

power. This results in significantly

faster acceleration and lower

fuel consumption, without having

to sacrifice the ease of automatic

transmission.

In total, PDK has seven gears at

its disposal. Gears 1 to 6 have

a sports ratio and top speed is

reached in 6

th

gear. The 7

th

gear

has a long ratio and reduces fuel

consumption even further.

PDK is like having two gearboxes

in one and thus requires two

clutches – designed as a double

wet clutch transmission.

This double clutch provides

an alternating, non-positive

connection between the gearbox

and the engine by means of

two separate input shafts (input

shaft 1 is nested inside the

hollowed-out input shaft 2).

The flow of power from the engine

is only ever transmitted through

one clutch at a time, while the

next gear is preselected by the

second clutch. During a gear

change, a conventional shift no

longer takes place. Instead,

one clutch simply opens and the

other closes at the same time.

Gear changes therefore take

place within a few hundredths of

a second.

Clutch 1 controls the odd gears

(1, 3, 5, 7) and reverse. Clutch 2

controls the even gears (2, 4, 6).

As if one clutch didn’t deliver enough performance already.

Porsche Doppelkupplung (PDK).

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