When Porsche entered the luxury sports utility vehicle market in 2002 with the Porsche Cayenne, Porschefiles
were horrified that Stuttgart was selling a truck! Well, when a truck
has a twin-turbo 550 horsepower V-8 plus sports sedan handling, and
18,507 of the company’s total 42,323 sales in 2013 were Cayennes, the
market has spoken. Some say the success of the Cayenne and the four-door
Panamera sports sedan (5,421 sold in 2013) translates into profits that
can be used to make cars like the 911 Turbo and radical 918 Spyder
exotic. Sounds like a good business case to me!
The Cayenne is available with a 300 horsepower V-6 and 380-horsepower
hybrid, and three 4.8-liter V-8s - 400-horsepower, a 500-horsepopwer
twin-turbo and the twin-turbo 550-horsepower V-8 with max torque of 553
pound-feet in our tester.
Our 4,784 pound test car roared to 60 mph in 5 seconds and 100-mph in
10.2 seconds – crazy fast for a SUV. Launch was instant, all wheels
grabbing, with quad exhaust pipes generating a mellow bellow. Under
maximum launch conditions, it’ll sprint to 60-mph in 4.5 seconds,
pulling an indicated 1.1 G’s on the g-force meter. That’s faster than a
‘14 Porsche 911 Carrera Cabriolet. The eight-speed Tiptronic S automatic
transmission isn’t a dual-clutch PDK like a 911, but shifted cleanly
and quickly in “Sport” mode and staying in Fourth we were ready to tap
down a gear or two for passing. Used with restraint, our tester average
21 mpg.
The Turbo S has an active suspension and active all-wheel-drive, plus
Dynamic Chassis Control to get rid of body roll in corners. There’s also
variable torque distribution to the rear wheels and an electronically
controlled rear differential lock. On asphalt, it boasted amazing grip
in turns and was really fun to drive. Throw it into a turn and the
Cayenne just grabs on and handles the curve with a neutral attitude. Its
torque vectoring system brakes the inside rear wheel to also help in a
turn.
Its air suspension offers three settings. “Comfort” is perfect for
highway touring and off-road. It handled a poorly paved interstate
stretch with no harshness. “Normal” is fine around town. “Sport” is what
you want when you are hustling two tons of German SUV around – tightly
controlled, stiff enough, but it doesn’t beat you up on
less-than-perfect roads. The “Sport” suspension setting also hunkers the
Cayenne down to 7.2-inches ground clearance. But flip the transmission
setting to “Off-Road,” and the Cayenne rises up for 9.5 inches of ground
clearance.
Back on the road, the air-spring suspension’s active anti-roll system
means the Cayenne Turbo S doesn’t lean much. It doesn’t look like it’s
working hard on the skidpad. It just hung on, a touch of understeer if
you really pushed it. In almost any turn at speeds that would make a
regular SUV cringe, the two-ton Cayenne tracked like it was glued to the
road, hydraulic rotary actuators on the axles counteracting body roll.
We stitched turns quickly and smoothly with no drama, the digital
g-meter indicating we pulled 1-G on our skid pad. We found the power
steering extremely accurate and nicely weighted. The ceramic disc brakes
were precise in pedal feel with zero fade even after four hard hits
from 60 mph.
For 2014, Cayenne still lives with a 2011 redesign and wide low
crosshatch grille with a long and sharp 911-style nose. Under the grille
there’s a black skid plate. Designers have done a decent job of
bringing some 911 styling cues into the hood and fender flow. The
fenders have gentle flat-edged flares that frame 21-inch 911 Turbo II
wheels and wearing fairly low-profile P295/35R21-inch Michelin
performance rubber. The roofline is low and ends with a long spoiler
over a tinted window, with huge LED taillights and twin dual-outlet
exhaust pipes in a black lower fascia with tow hitch. It certainly isn’t
as pretty as a 911, but it looks cool when it’s hunkered down in
highway suspension mode. It’s too bad the Turbo S ends its run this
year.
You step over carbon fiber doorsills with illuminated “Cayenne Turbo S”
logos, and then slide over the sculpted lower side bolsters and into
form-fitting perforated leather bucket seats with 18-way power
adjustment plus three memory presets each. They held us in comfortably
on the skidpad as well as on a six-hour road trip. We were surrounded by
leather with aluminum accents and carbon fiber on the dash, doors and
console.
As would be expected, the Cayenne is fitted with a complete gauge
package with an 8,000-rpm tach with digital speedometer. An analog
190-mph speedometer is on the left. There’s also a color LCD trip
computer screen with navigation, audio, performance info (turbo boost
and g-forces), even trip mileage and timing. Framing the gauges is a
thick-rimmed black stitched leather steering wheel with big paddle
shifters. The dash center hosts a large Porsche Communication Management
touchscreen with an AM-FM-CD-SiriusXM Burmester sound system that’s
powerful enough to rattle windows.
The main console is packed with 33 buttons to adjust suspension, engine,
heated/cooled seats, climate control, four-wheel-drive and height,
stability and hill descent control, even a gas-saving engine shut-off at
stoplights. It’s slathered in carbon fiber and framed in red leather
grab handles. A long moonroof stretches past the rear seat passengers.
Underfoot, you’ll find alloy-faced pedals. The Sport Chrono Package
includes a stopwatch and stores performance data, including lap times or
transverse and longitudinal acceleration values and displays it all on
the PCM main screen.
Back seat room is generous, with a rear climate control system and
outboard heated seas. Under the power tailgate, which doesn’t open high
enough to clear my head, there’s decent storage space with a divider
that slides on alloy strips. The rear seats split 40/20/40; the raked
rear window intrudes on some box cargo capacity.
