Porsche’s Printed Pistons Are Powerful And Precise

July 28, 2020 by Kristina Panos 49 Comments

The 700-horsepower Porsche 911 GT2 RS is already pretty darn fast — over three times faster than the average regular-person car on the road today. For the sports car enthusiast, there’s likely no ceiling on the need for speed and performance. And so, Porsche was able to wrangle another thirty horsepower out of their limited-run supercar by printing a set of ultra-lightweight pistons.

Pistons being lasered into existence. Image via The Drive

These pistons are printed from high-purity aluminium alloy powder that was developed by German auto parts manufacturer Mahle. Porsche is having these produced by Mahle in partnership with industrial machine maker Trumpf using the laser metal fusion (LMF) process. It’s a lot like selective laser sintering (SLS), but with metal powder instead of plastic.

The machine dusts the print bed with a layer of powder, and then a laser melts the powder according to the CAD file, hardening it into shape. This process repeats one layer at a time, and supports are zapped together wherever necessary. When the print job is finished, the pistons are machined into their shiny final form and thoroughly tested, just like their cast metal cousins have been for decades. Continue reading “Porsche’s Printed Pistons Are Powerful And Precise” →

Toil In Style With Salvaged Porsche Office Chairs

August 22, 2018 by Tom Nardi 22 Comments

It seems as if everyone has finally decided to stop pretending that standing in front of a desk for 8+ hours was something anyone actually wanted to do, and once again embrace the classic adjustable office chair. But whether you’re writing code in a cubicle or are one of those people who apparently makes a living by having people watch them play video games, one thing is certain: your chair needs to be cool enough to make up for the years shaved off your life by sitting in it all day.

Case in point, these chairs that were made out of seats salvaged from a Porsche 996 by [Colby Newman]. You might never be able to afford the car they came out of on your salary, but at least you can pretend you’re power shifting into fifth while doing your TPS reports.

The first step, and arguably the most important one, was getting the seats from a Porsche. [Colby] wisely cautions the reader that they should avoid seats with air bags, as the last thing you want is your chair to explode while you’re streaming Fortnite. This is especially true if you are looking to salvage the seats yourself from the junkyard, as special care needs to be taken on how you remove them from the vehicle.

Assuming you got the seat without blowing yourself up, the next step is to mate it to the adjustable base. This part is going to depend on the make and model of vehicle you got the seats out of, but in this case it was fairly easy to use some flat steel bars to adapt the tubular frame of the Porsche’s seat to the base from the donor office chair. [Colby] put everything together with nuts and bolts, but this could potentially be an excuse to drag out the welder.

We’ve previously seen the driver seat salvaged from a wrecked car for use in a simulator, and a standard office chair upgraded with force feedback. We wonder who will be the first to combine all these ideas into one ultimate office racing chair…

Porsche-themed Mancave Clock: There Is No Substitute

September 19, 2015 by Dan Maloney 13 Comments

With an extra Porsche brake rotor lying about and a persistent friend to be silenced, [GordsGarage] decided to fabricate a one-of-a-kind man cave wall clock.

This was not to be a boring old hang-it-flat-on-the-wall design, though. The Porsche rotor is a composite design, with a steel hub and a ceramic disc weighing only a third of what an all-steel rotor weighs. That inspired [GordsGarage] to fabricate a wall bracket to hold the rotor and allow it to spin, showing off both sides. The business side has a brushed aluminum clock face with decals cut with a s vinyl-plotter and designed to look like a Porsche tachometer, while the reverse side has a nice custom badge for his friend’s shop. The build log shares some of the nice touches that went into the clock, like powder coated parts to mimic stock Porsche red brake calipers, and the secret [GordsGarage] logo.

It may not have been a clock for social good, but it’s a great design and a nice build that’s sure to brighten up his friend’s shop. And mancave warming presents are apparently a thing now, so we’ll be sure to keep our finger on the pulse of this social trend.

Porsche 911 Made Electric

November 16, 2012 by Brian Benchoff 63 Comments

[Kurt] wanted an electric car, and always wanted to drive a Porsche. Killing two birds with one stone, he decided to combine these wishes and convert a 2002 Porsche 911 into an electric vehicle.

After removing the engine, fuel tank, exhaust, radiator, and all the other things that make an internal combustion engine work, [Kurt] installed a high power motor, controller and 72 lithium phosphate batteries weighing in at over 500 pounds. He’s put over 300 miles on the car in the last few months while working out the kinks, but now he’s finally gotten the bugs out of the system allowing him to take it up to some relatively high speeds.

Already [Kurt] has taken his new ride to 100 mph and done a little bit of range testing that told him he should expect around 40 miles per charge in his new ride. It’s not exactly what he hoped, but more than enough for a few trips around town while riding in style.

After the break is a video [Kurt]’s first test drive of his electric Porsche.

Continue reading “Porsche 911 Made Electric” →

World’s Slowest Porsche, Still Faster Than My Car

June 13, 2010 by Jakob Griffith 51 Comments

Well, maybe the title is not so true. This “Porsche” GT3‘s construction is a bit unorthodox, the chassis looks to be aluminum tubing, with bicycle tires and other man-powered parts for propulsion. The body is entirely plastic and tape, yeah…gold…foil…tape. Hey, when you really really want to turn someones head.

Regardless, the car even comes complete with working lights, horn, doors, trunk, and lexan windows. Sure it will never go 0 to 60 (yet), but the mileage is amazing! Follow an amusing video of it after the rift.

[via OMGsoysauce]

Continue reading “World’s Slowest Porsche, Still Faster Than My Car” →