02. DESIGN
Sibling Rivalry
Sibling Rivalry
Clean diesel vs hi-tech hybrid, Panamera style Words Hannah Macmurray Photography Olgun Kordal
O
ne of this job’s guilty pleasures is, occasionally, being able to drive really great cars. This time that pleasure came in the form of not one but two Porsche Panameras, the hybrid and diesel. Why two? Well, we really had to figure out why Porsche would bother going to the trouble of developing a hybrid luxury sedan when the diesel is, on paper, seemingly a cheaper and efficient option. Firmly cocooned in our driver’s seats Guy Bird and myself set out for a Combined test drive of South London to the monolithic East Beach Café designed by Heatherwick (yes they designed the New Bus for London!) in Littlehampton. The drive down offered the first statistical insight
into the superficially obvious advantages of a super efficient diesel engine on longer distance trials as it averaged 38.7mpg whilst the hybrid averaged 32.5mpg (this given that the hybrid averaged 36mph against the diesel’s 31mph). For Porsche fans the classic ‘turn your engine and hear it roar’ effect is null and void on the hybrid with its electric start and you also forfeit about 110 litres of space in the boot because the 70kg nickel-metal-hybride battery needs somewhere to live! Neither car is terribly generous on space given its voluptuous proportions (just under 5m long and 2m wide), and whilst four adults can very comfortably fit in either vehicle, they would do well to travel light.