That's what I was just going to say! And it is! VERY TIGHT AND SWEET!

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The power output is regulated by air restrictors. So Porsche elected to up the displacement to 4L (same as the Ferrari now), mainly to get a much flatter torque curve at lower rpms, sacrificing just a bit of top-end power. The fatter torque curve aids the exit of corners, lessen the needs to downshift and gain more corner exit speed.

This also lowers the peak rpm needed for maximum power, hence increasing reliability and decreasing stress the engine must endure especially during endurance races like Le Mans or Sebring.

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I haven;t looked at the old and new power figures, however, since the displacement has gone up, I'm sure that this car has more torque which helps with down low power, which is always useful when exiting curves. Sometimes, the extra torque can be as important, if not more important than the horsepower. In this case, I believe that the acceleration up high will remain about the same, and down low it will increase from the extra displacement.

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I was wondering if that was a typo....

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The 08 had the same restrictors. I thunk what you are seeing is Porsche being sneaky, the last thing they want is the rules makers slapping additional weight on them.
If you notice the power figure given isn't quoted as max output just output at that rpm. On the 08 the specs quote max power at 8000rpm, given that this new engine has the same 9400 rpm redline you can be sure its more powerful.

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@Craig

Nothing sneaky at all, and you're reading too much into it.

Having a higher redline doesn't mean there's more power above the 8000rpm peak horsepower rev range.

This is a high-strung motor, and if you ever saw the horsepower/torque curve dyno-graph of such an engine, you'll see that once it hits peak horsepower at around 8000rpm, the horsepower will drop from then on until redline.

The whole point of having a higher redline is to accommodate the gear ratios, so that when you upshift at redline, you'll still fall into the torquey part of the rev range for the next gear.

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Its about optimizing the shape of the torque curve to make the car more drivable.
Its like a a turbo supra, the car makes no power until it is at boost, and then its such violent power delivery its hard to drive. But if a car can apply power in a linear manner, the tires will still stick, and it can operate anywhere in the rev range.

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@Turbo
I'm aware of power curves, area under the curve and all that good stuff.
My reference to the redline was to indicate that even though the engine is larger and still wears the same restrictors as the outgoing model it is still able to reach the same redline. With the same restictors if it could only rev to say 9000 you would think it wouldn't make more power than the outgoing model, since it matches the 08 I stand by my belief that it makes more.
When the only difference between two otherwise identical engines is size, the larger one will make more power at any given rpm.

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@Craig

I believe you got them mixed up. If given the same sized air restrictors for both the 3.8L and the 4L engines, the one with the larger displacement will make less power relative to the smaller displacement engine.

Just as a reference, the Ferrari F430 (Porsche's main rival) also has a 4L engine. So it's fair game at the end of the day (in terms of air restrictor size versus engine displacement).

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I thought they already had 4.0L last year? That's what the Lizard guy was saying...

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@Kiiks

You're correct. I believe they had the 4L engine during mid-season. So this year the engine is carried over, but probably with improved tuning for better torque characteristic and fuel consumption.

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It's a race car, what were you expecting? 3 year/30,000 mile warranty & road side assistance?

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