Porsche 911 Carrera

Some cars are vehicles. They are about passengers and cargo. Other cars are poems. They are about you and the road.
The 1991 Porsche 911 Carrera, unmistakably, is a poem – a motorized work of concise verse.
The car’s body speaks to the point. It’s free of gimcrackery. The front end slopes forward. The back end slants rearward – no tricks, no games, just clean, classic lines.

And those big, round headlamps: They look like car eyes in a happy-car cartoon – you know, the kind where the car is saying something like, “Have a good day!” or “Drive safely!” or “Please change my oil!”
The Carrera 2’s styling is so basic, it’s timeless. Indeed, it has changed little since Porsche began selling 911 models in 1965.

Yet, with all of its exterior simplicity, the Carrera 2 is remarkably different from anything else on the road. You could strip all nameplates and manufacturer’s badges from the thing, and people would still ask, “How do you like that little Porsche?”
Well, I liked it just fine. Life with the Carrera 2 was something special – a week-long celebration of personal mobility.
Background: The rear-engine, rear-drive Carrera 2 is a perfectly selfish car. It does not pretend to want to do anything other than please its driver and one willing front-seat passenger.

The car has two seats in the rear, but it assumes that no one with good taste or good sense would want to sit back there. Those extra seats are for coats, bags and stuff.
“Carrera 2″ refers to Carrera, two-wheel drive. There’s also a “Carerra 4″ – yep, Carerra, four-wheel-drive.
You can get a Carerra Coupe, two-door hardtop; Carrera Targa, removable roof panel; or Carerra Cabriolet, a sweet convertible thing.

If you’re going Carrera 2, you also have an interesting choice of transmissions: the traditional five-speed manual job, which is mostly nice, or the new Tiptronic, which is weird.
The Tiptronic is a dual-function transmission that allows the driver to shift manually without working the clutch; it also permits the driver to run the car with a fully automatic transmission. It’s sort of like having a Porsche with training wheels.
Complaints: The reverse gear on the five-speed transmission is located next to first gear, which would be okay if the reverse gear had a sufficient lockout mechanism. It doesn’t.

Praise: Heck, just get into the Carrera 2 and go. The term “fun to drive” belittles this car. It’s more sensual, more meaningful than that. It’s the way the thing moves that thrills you. And in case you stop moving abruptly, the likelihood is that you’ll be around to remember the experience. Porsche is the only company that puts driver and passenger air bags in all of the cars it sells in the United States.

Head-turning quotient: Total knockout, especially among the older, affluent, wanna-be-wild set.
Ride, acceleration and handling: The ride’s firm, but you wouldn’t want it any other way in this car. Handling is simply superb. Acceleration is, well, uhmm, I take the Fifth.

Braking is excellent. The car stops as fast as it goes. The engine is very nice – 3.6 liter, in-line six-cylinder, dual-ignition, fuel-injected, rated 247 horsepower at 6,100 rpm.

Sound system: Eight-speaker, AM/FM stereo radio and cassette by Blaupunkt. Pretty darned good.

Mileage: About 21 to the gallon (20.3-gallon tank, estimated 415-mile range on usable volume of unleaded premium gasoline), mostly highway and driver only.

Price: Base price on the tested five-speed manual Carrera 2 is $61,915. Dealer’s invoice is $51,830. Price as tested is $66,107, including a $1,000 gas-guzzler tax and an estimated $3,192 luxury tax.

Purse-strings note: Hey, poetry ain’t practical, either.