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Difficult one to write this, I’ve actually been thinking about it quite a lot over the last few weeks and this is what I’ve come up with...
About one month ago I sold the S2000, I had the car from new and covered just over 60,000 miles in around four and a half years. Over that time I slowly transformed the car from road car to what I can only describe as a semi track car. The car was lighter, lower, stiffer, wider with more power and more braking, perfect for blasting around the country lanes and obviously it loved the track.
So after spending all this money and time the most sensible option, is to decide you want a new car, and sell it. (multiply this by 10 if your name is MB )
Searching for a replacement wasn't easy I looked at in no particular order M3 CSL, 996 GT3, 370Z, Lotus Exige S PP, Cayman S, Boxster S. In the end I was put off the CSL and GT3 because of potential big bills and running costs, I decided against the Boxster S purely because I had done the last few years in a convertible so it left only two.
The Exige S, I drove various examples and I did like the car a lot, in fact I nearly bought one at one point. I loved how raw it felt as standard, the styling and the lack of safety features, I didn't like the Toyota engine at all or the gearbox but the steering and brakes were nice, I was also bearing in the back of my mind how it would be with the 260bhp remap. This might be slightly contentious but in the end I felt like it was maybe 10% better than my particular S2000 and a decent amount of cash, I actually decided it would be more cost effective to spend some more on the S2000, downforce etc.
Ok now on to the Cayman S, I have drove three Cayman S's on track in the past but never properly on the road. First impressions were mixed, I loved the engine, not so the gearbox, it felt quite soft compared to my S2000 and the Exige, the steering and brakes were also very impressive, very Lotus like. The car felt very well put together somehow as it's not "much" heavier than a standard S2000. One huge factor which swayed me with the Cayman is the huge amount of tuning parts available and lots of Porsche experts in this country. In the end I decided to pluck for the Cayman S on the basis that underneath it felt like a mini-GT3 and with the plethora of tuning parts available for relatively little money I could do what I wanted with the car.
So 1000 miles later...I am pleased to say that I did make the right decision, eventually.
This is the difficult bit to describe, the Porsche has a character just like the S2000 and the Exige, but where in the S2000 and the Exige it's very in your face, very bubbly, like a small dog running round on wooden floor, you can immediately play with it. The Porsche on the other hand is different, it’s like a wooden chest, a hand carved one with little pockets here and there and brass hinges millimetre perfect. You can tell just being around it that it some body, most likely a German with them little round glasses, spent approximately 7 million hours designing it.
As you spend more time in and around the car you start to notice the little pockets and brass hinges appearing all over. The way the CD player starts to buffer as you open the car door so as soon as you put the key in the ignition the music starts to play, the way the music carries on playing and then fades out when you turn the ignition off for a few seconds while you get out. The rain-ex style coating on the side windows to keep them clean and dry when it’s raining on the motorway and the interior light sensor that fades the dash lights in and out depending on how dark it is. How the windscreen demister demists the driver’s side first, how the passenger interior light switch only operates the map light but the drivers operates all the lights for when you’re looking for something. How there is a recess in the passenger side sill that perfectly fits a Porsche Design umbrella to keep the er-indoors hair dry as you walk the two miles from your parking space to the front door of the shopping centre when it’s raining.
When you start to look further into detail this continues, it is entirely flat underneath, there are brake cooling ducts and guides on each of the wishbones and sections of the dust shields cut away in just the right places. The use of aluminium all over the car, especially suspension and steering components, the fact that the hubs where the wheel locates are machined down to just three sections to cut down on un-sprung weight. The use of GT3 parts in the engine and suspension and the dry sump lubrication system.
It soon becomes apparent where the money, time and 7 million design hours have gone.
Out on the road you start to feel the overall quality of the car. The steering for instance, is magic. It is perfectly weighted, direct but not overly and the feel for a power assisted rack is like nothing I have felt before, at low'ish speeds whilst turning you can feel the blocks of the tread shuffling across the surface of the tarmac. The brakes offer a low assistance and high feel, you can brake easily to the point where the ABS is just about to cut in and hold it there all day long, they require effort though so expect a work out. I find the gearshift quite long, after the S2000 nothing compares, but the GT3 short-shift is a direct replacement unit so this may cure this problem for me. The chassis is well balanced, the amount of mechanical grip available without an LSD is impressive. The mid-engined layout allows you to get on the power really very early and when it does move around there are no suprises, it’s all nice and progressive. The ride is actually quite firm, it is setup much more firm than a standard S2000 for those that find the S2000 bumpy, on occasion the rear can become slightly crashy but I guess 37psi in the rear tyres won't help, overall it is very well damped. You can feel the car is running decent size anti-roll bars from the factory, body roll is well controlled and taken care of with ease. The engine being a 3.4 is obviously quite torquey, it will pull from 1500rpm in any gear but to get the best out of it you do need to rev it like the S2000. After 4000rpm there is a cam change that you can feel and hear quite clearly, the engine pulls cleanly all the way to 7300rpm (low I know ) at this point you do tend to be doing quite high speeds due to the long'ish gear ratios. This does take a bit of fun out of B road blasting as where in the S2000 you can give it two or three gears down a short straight in the Cayman it's one or two at the most normally. The car is actually quite noisy as standard, I guess it helps with the engine being inside the car with you. The induction noise from 4000rpm onwards can only be described as addictive and loud, maybe too loud for some. The exhaust is also relatively loud and sounds quite nice, although it is no 911, no accident I’m sure.
As a comparison to a well sorted S2000 on a B road I’d say there's not too much in it although I’m not talking pure speed here, throw in a few big straights and I’m sure you would see more of a difference but then you are talking 2.0 vs 3.4 litres so that’s nothing you wouldn't expect. If you did the same comparison on big open roads then the difference is much more. The car is a lot more planted at speed, it is much easier to drive consistently at high speeds due to the gear ratios, larger engine and the aerodynamics this does make travelling at high speed much easier. For anyone that has driven an S2000 in Europe you will know that once you go past 113mph your on the high cam profile which makes things noisy, not wishing to talk about numbers on here too much you can quite easily drive the Cayman at 140mph for extended periods of time without any hassle at all, from the car at least, big numbers are available with a flex of the right ankle.
Overall it is a better car, the further you drive and the faster you go the more obvious the differences become, this is not to say there is anything wrong with the S2000, the Cayman is almost twice the price and less than half the age, things move on.
I know someone is going to mention modifications, at the moment I have removed a blanking panel from the air intake, this is similar to removing the airbox lid on the S2000 giving a bit more noise and supposedly a few bhp, never noticed. I have also changed the exhaust to a Milltek for the time being, this deletes two of the four cats free'ing up a supposed 24bhp and improving the sound ever so slightly, it does feel slightly quicker so I’m not going to complain.
Finally below are a few pictures I took the other night, I know they are in the dark I will get some more soon in the day light, enjoy.
10-07-2010, 03:54 PM
Porsche Cayman S
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) at this point you do tend to be doing quite high speeds due to the long'ish gear ratios. This does take a bit of fun out of B road blasting as where in the S2000 you can give it two or three gears down a short straight in the Cayman it's one or two at the most normally. The car is actually quite noisy as standard, I guess it helps with the engine being inside the car with you. The induction noise from 4000rpm onwards can only be described as addictive and loud, maybe too loud for some. The exhaust is also relatively loud and sounds quite nice, although it is no 911, no accident I’m sure.
Nice looking car, now you've gotten rid of the footprints 
