Nothing definitive yet ...... I think there is someting to this[>:]
2.7 Lux Engine Fact or Fiction?
- Thread starter carreraboy
- Start date
George Elliott
New member
like most 944 engine development, it was spun off the back of the 928 engine development.
The 2.5 944 was half a 5.0 928, the 2.7 was half a 5.4 928, the 16v 944 was half a 32v 928. There are a few should have beens, a 32v 6.0 928 off the 16v 3.0 968.
this modular approach as since been further developed by VAG, and now Bentley, VW, Audi, Seat, Skoda, Porsche. They will soon get a 911 out of the same platform as a Golf!
The 2.5 944 was half a 5.0 928, the 2.7 was half a 5.4 928, the 16v 944 was half a 32v 928. There are a few should have beens, a 32v 6.0 928 off the 16v 3.0 968.
this modular approach as since been further developed by VAG, and now Bentley, VW, Audi, Seat, Skoda, Porsche. They will soon get a 911 out of the same platform as a Golf!
Neil Haughey
New member
George hits the nail on the head for me. I have always thought that the only reason why the 2.7 existed was due to the move to the newer block and head architecture. Now it is quite possible that the special 968 turbo RS engine could be confused in with this, who is to say if Porsche hadn't of intended to make the late 944 turbo a 3.0 8v turbo but this got stamped on by the marketing men so they built up 2.7 engines with whatever they had? In other words I can't believe that the 2.7 was ever actually intentionally designed to be what it became it just happened as a result of other engine developments.
Well that's all clear then[
] ....
] ....
TTM
Well-known member
Except the 5.4 V8 engine didn't appear before the 928 GTS in 1992, 3 years later than the 2.7.
To me it's only marketing, as I see no simplification of the parts bin.
Instead it gets more crowded :
- with one more 8V cylinder head casting + valves to deal with. I do not think the 2.7 head is made out of modifying a 2.5 head, just have to look at intake ports.
- adding a casting modification on the 16V head of the 928 S4, so that it could fit the water passage on the 3.0 block for the S2.
The 944 S2 replaces the S, while the 2.7 8V replaces the 2.5 8V, both bumping up the performance of the previous NA models and filling the gap between the S and the T250 as the T220 was discontinued.
As for the 2.7 lasting only one year, I suppose they simply didn't quite sell as many as expected!
To me it's only marketing, as I see no simplification of the parts bin.
Instead it gets more crowded :
- with one more 8V cylinder head casting + valves to deal with. I do not think the 2.7 head is made out of modifying a 2.5 head, just have to look at intake ports.
- adding a casting modification on the 16V head of the 928 S4, so that it could fit the water passage on the 3.0 block for the S2.
The 944 S2 replaces the S, while the 2.7 8V replaces the 2.5 8V, both bumping up the performance of the previous NA models and filling the gap between the S and the T250 as the T220 was discontinued.
As for the 2.7 lasting only one year, I suppose they simply didn't quite sell as many as expected!
JamesO
New member
Ref the valves, it is possible as the turbo exhaust valves are (almost) the same size as the 2.7 valve, about .5mm diff in length IIRC and a slightly changed profile on the face. Both valves will fit the same head.
It would mean if true that when I changed mine over I was wasting my time.
It would mean if true that when I changed mine over I was wasting my time.
Neil Haughey
New member
Exactly, which is why as I said I could certainly believe that there is a ring of truth to the OP. After all I find it very hard to believe that Porsche went to all those lengths and costs to end up producing a bottom of the range engine no better really than the one it replaced. It just doesn't make commercial sense to me, thus I can well believe they had other intentions that morphed into the 2.7 engine.
Hate to say it as a long term S2 owner but it would have been more effective for them to have developed the S into the S2 with no other changes, maybe only 200 Bhp top end, and increased the capacity of the turbo to improve its drivability i.e. no more power but a bigger capacity to get more low down grunt for the turbo and a simpler cheaper S2. The product strategy they ended up with didn't look like a strategy at all just a muddled mess IMHO that made Porsche in the early 90's almost bankrupt.
Hate to say it as a long term S2 owner but it would have been more effective for them to have developed the S into the S2 with no other changes, maybe only 200 Bhp top end, and increased the capacity of the turbo to improve its drivability i.e. no more power but a bigger capacity to get more low down grunt for the turbo and a simpler cheaper S2. The product strategy they ended up with didn't look like a strategy at all just a muddled mess IMHO that made Porsche in the early 90's almost bankrupt.
George Elliott
New member
So, back to the question; True or false?
given all the comments, and bearing in mind the Porsche Company changed strategic direction about this time, I think it is possible your anorak may be correct.
Imagine its mid 1986 and the Produkt Strategie Kommitee are planning the Range development.
Two things are happening, one is the 911 is coming back into the limelight, and the second is the 928 / 944 are under pressure from the Japs. The 944 turbo is £35k and the Mitsubishi Starion is about half that. The Toyota Supra is making a monkey of the 928, because good as the 928 is, its too good/expensive,......like the 944 range.
The 911 is just getting the G50 'box, so anyone will be able to drive it (but not demise the screen[])
Meanwhile, some of Herr Mezger's boys? are 98% thru the development of a 951 - engine code M44-53 which is going to launch at £50k, its a 320bhp engine at 0.8 bar and will be involved in the current Race Support program, it will be the 1988 Cup Car with CS wheels, hardened syncro's, M030 dampers, LSD, a larger turbo..........and a fancy silver rose colour scheme at launch
But some-one says, ve should hav four vheel drive,... ze Audi etc etc......Gruppe B rallying is important, and ve hav ze 4wd 959........... ze 951 is not adaptable for zis.........and so a major strategic change takes place and the 964 is planned enabling a 4wd platform very easily,........and the screen will be able to be demised by anyone......ooops.
Suddenly the 951 M44-53 is canned, the 951 looses its forged rods, a watered down 2.5 8v is launched with the upgraded K26/8......it is no longer the future.........why were there some unused terminals in the M44-52 ECU?????
Shortly after Group B is banned for being too good........
I can see how Porsche may have been left with an engine which they "found a use for" with a 2.7 model 944 and a bigger 928 engine sharing many common parts. There is no way the Marketing Team asked for this engine.
They also had a 16v head in development which was much more de rigueur in the mid 80's and originated back at the 2.5 16v Le Mans engine........
.....which begs the question, why did they launch a 2.7 8v na engine?
I say " very possibly True" Des, can you find out / tell us more? Or am i seeing ghosts?
George
given all the comments, and bearing in mind the Porsche Company changed strategic direction about this time, I think it is possible your anorak may be correct.
Imagine its mid 1986 and the Produkt Strategie Kommitee are planning the Range development.
Two things are happening, one is the 911 is coming back into the limelight, and the second is the 928 / 944 are under pressure from the Japs. The 944 turbo is £35k and the Mitsubishi Starion is about half that. The Toyota Supra is making a monkey of the 928, because good as the 928 is, its too good/expensive,......like the 944 range.
The 911 is just getting the G50 'box, so anyone will be able to drive it (but not demise the screen[
])Meanwhile, some of Herr Mezger's boys? are 98% thru the development of a 951 - engine code M44-53 which is going to launch at £50k, its a 320bhp engine at 0.8 bar and will be involved in the current Race Support program, it will be the 1988 Cup Car with CS wheels, hardened syncro's, M030 dampers, LSD, a larger turbo..........and a fancy silver rose colour scheme at launch
But some-one says, ve should hav four vheel drive,... ze Audi etc etc......Gruppe B rallying is important, and ve hav ze 4wd 959........... ze 951 is not adaptable for zis.........and so a major strategic change takes place and the 964 is planned enabling a 4wd platform very easily,........and the screen will be able to be demised by anyone......ooops.
Suddenly the 951 M44-53 is canned, the 951 looses its forged rods, a watered down 2.5 8v is launched with the upgraded K26/8......it is no longer the future.........why were there some unused terminals in the M44-52 ECU?????
Shortly after Group B is banned for being too good........
I can see how Porsche may have been left with an engine which they "found a use for" with a 2.7 model 944 and a bigger 928 engine sharing many common parts. There is no way the Marketing Team asked for this engine.
They also had a 16v head in development which was much more de rigueur in the mid 80's and originated back at the 2.5 16v Le Mans engine........
.....which begs the question, why did they launch a 2.7 8v na engine?
I say " very possibly True" Des, can you find out / tell us more? Or am i seeing ghosts?
George
George,
did you had your laptop with you in your local Pub []
We have to remember cars are not designed that fast. When front engine models production was ended in 1995, first Boxster protos were already there. What comes to 944's, first 968 protos were on test phase in late '80's. Original plan was to leave 944 Turbo & S2 front on it and just replace the rear. 968 front was a very late change to original plan. I have very hard to belive factory planned 2.7L turbo. As i wrote earlier it was just a savings model and shared the same block with S2 models. It takes time to design car and features for them. Most likely 2.7L version was in tests in 1986/87 when they developed S2.First "true" preproduction S2 models were ready in summer of 1987. Odd, but 944 S was launched then.Now we have used to the fact when a new models are launched, the following model is already on "drawing board". Features like ABS & Air Bag system were in first tests in 1984. First factory turbos hit the road on 1983/4.
Some 968 proto pictures
1984 Turbo proto
S2 engine press release picture from summer of 1988
Vin number of one of the last factory owned 944 Turbos which were made for air bag system testing(showing a non production VIN number. Numbers 0-16 were reserved for factory owned pre-production cars). Friend owned this car few years ago. This car had even a totally different style crossover pipe system which did not went to production versions. Also glove box was a special aluminum one.
This is quite interesting one. A Baur made cab prototype (imho better than ASC version). Shown here in spring 1985. Including late version ET wheels, Air Bag system & ABS. All of these features two years earlier when they came into production vechiles. So it took about 4-5 years when cabriolets were ready to be sold to the public.
did you had your laptop with you in your local Pub [
]We have to remember cars are not designed that fast. When front engine models production was ended in 1995, first Boxster protos were already there. What comes to 944's, first 968 protos were on test phase in late '80's. Original plan was to leave 944 Turbo & S2 front on it and just replace the rear. 968 front was a very late change to original plan. I have very hard to belive factory planned 2.7L turbo. As i wrote earlier it was just a savings model and shared the same block with S2 models. It takes time to design car and features for them. Most likely 2.7L version was in tests in 1986/87 when they developed S2.First "true" preproduction S2 models were ready in summer of 1987. Odd, but 944 S was launched then.Now we have used to the fact when a new models are launched, the following model is already on "drawing board". Features like ABS & Air Bag system were in first tests in 1984. First factory turbos hit the road on 1983/4.
Some 968 proto pictures
1984 Turbo proto
S2 engine press release picture from summer of 1988
Vin number of one of the last factory owned 944 Turbos which were made for air bag system testing(showing a non production VIN number. Numbers 0-16 were reserved for factory owned pre-production cars). Friend owned this car few years ago. This car had even a totally different style crossover pipe system which did not went to production versions. Also glove box was a special aluminum one.
This is quite interesting one. A Baur made cab prototype (imho better than ASC version). Shown here in spring 1985. Including late version ET wheels, Air Bag system & ABS. All of these features two years earlier when they came into production vechiles. So it took about 4-5 years when cabriolets were ready to be sold to the public.
Was with Gerhardt yesterday at the RS Oulton day, good to see so many modified 944 spanking the hair dryers[]
Anyway back to the debate. He tells me the 2.7 944 Engine is sought after by the 968 Turbo S recreation or original (very few) owners. Is the basis for this awesome Turbo engine, particularly USA .... He swears this was an abandoned Turbo engine, 3.0 block with special head and those sodium valves £1,000 a set! Then he went on about water jackets ets, all pointing to Turbocharging ... he promises me a full technical email that I can paste and post.
]Anyway back to the debate. He tells me the 2.7 944 Engine is sought after by the 968 Turbo S recreation or original (very few) owners. Is the basis for this awesome Turbo engine, particularly USA .... He swears this was an abandoned Turbo engine, 3.0 block with special head and those sodium valves £1,000 a set! Then he went on about water jackets ets, all pointing to Turbocharging ... he promises me a full technical email that I can paste and post.
Nothing new here. People have build 3.0L turbo engines using 2.7L head, S2 block & crank for some time. Pistons can be bought from few places to this setup. I had 4 factory new 2.7L heads. Sold two of them to to friends 3.0L turbo build ups. Still have two left. Will put them to my warehouse to wait better days. Next own engine will be 16V 3.0L turbo. Have all parts already collected.
Here's Mahle 3.0L 8V turbo pistons, sorry about picture quality, used my cell phone.
One of my factory new 2.7L heads
Here you can see what your friend meant when he talked about water passages.
Finnish made rods i have with 3.0 build up's
Here's Mahle 3.0L 8V turbo pistons, sorry about picture quality, used my cell phone.
One of my factory new 2.7L heads
Here you can see what your friend meant when he talked about water passages.
Finnish made rods i have with 3.0 build up's
£1000 is for a set of standard 2.7 valves!
His comments do seem to run true .... it is his business.
Jonny944CS
New member
An interesting read gents, thank you.
Do I get a point for spotting the prototype 'plastic' oil sump in Oli's '88 S2 press release pic? Did any of these ever make it past production sign-off?
Do I get a point for spotting the prototype 'plastic' oil sump in Oli's '88 S2 press release pic? Did any of these ever make it past production sign-off?
ORIGINAL: os951
S2 engine press release picture from summer of 1988
Not sure of the oil pan, is it plastic, metal or what ever.
Interesting to see how all valve covers & cam gear housings have changed color during the years. That "silver" is how even production ones came out off the factory. At least the ones i checked out back in autumn 1989 had that color.
Interesting to see how all valve covers & cam gear housings have changed color during the years. That "silver" is how even production ones came out off the factory. At least the ones i checked out back in autumn 1989 had that color.
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