Manual Premium Over Auto? - Page 2 - Porsche General - PistonHeads UK

Had lunch with a couple of friends yesterday, one of whom had recently bought a 991.2S Manual, which he and the other friend, a retired ex-specialist car dealer were discussing. He said that he’d struggled to find a nice ‘manual’ and those he did find were more expensive than the PDK. The ex-dealer said that will become more of an issue in the future, as the mass market will spec ‘auto’ new and, the manual cars, albeit with a dedicated following, will be small in proportion, so good ones will be more sought after. He cited examples of Manual v Tiptronic and older PDKs with potentially high failure costs. And today he sent me this evidence. Paragon Ad: Two identical 997.2 GTSs. Both 2011/11. Both White. Both same spec. - The one with PDK and lower 36k mls - £65k - The one with 6-Spd Manual and 41k mls - £80k Personally, I hope Porsche do keep offering the Manual option.

I have always thought this, but then thought as we all die off will the manuals then tank in value as the new generation won t know how to drive a manual? Can t work it out, personally I m all in on manuals but when do you think the cut off will be, 20 more years before people won t know how to drive a manual full stop, then these just become museum pieces for the future? What are the Driving Schools forecasting?

It isn’t just about knowing how to drive a manual, why would it appeal to young drivers coming through? They will look at the numbers, slower, less fuel efficient, worse emissions etc. They have nothing to offset that with as many of us have having grown up with manuals - memories of great times/drives gone by. Sadly we will are all destined to be driving around in milk floats, albeit quick ones, whether we want to or not.

I think it also depends on what the car is used for. If it's a fun only car, then manual makes a lot of sense. However, as a do it all car, most will want auto. I have recently realised that my current car does not excite me enough to warrant being a fun car, mostly as the gearbox makes going fast too uneventful. It's great for it's intended purposes of being a GT, but it's not enough fun at road speeds for an early morning drive. Obvious in hindsight..... But the thing that made me realise was driving a new MX5 with just a 130hp, but a sweet little manual box.

As cars age the two things that in my mind really date them are a) the transmission (if it’s not an manual0 and b) the SatNav (PCM in Porsche speak). The latter is easily solved with an iPhone. If you want a sports car as a fun car to drive on a Sunday morning do you really want a Tiptronic or early PDK gearbox in it that is worse than your daily driver ? When I bought my manual 997.2 GTS in 2016 they were at that stage maybe £2k cheaper than a PDK car. PDK cars have barely moved since. Sold mine a couple of years ago through RPM.

I guess she these cars are newish, people want a warranty, especially if the car is financed. You can then have all the stuff that can go wrong like your PDK, PDCC, PADM, PTV etc. Beyond the warranty period, these become cars for the high days and you’d buy on condition, look for a manual and perhaps avoid too many techy options. Look at manual v F1 gearbox in Ferraris.

This is the type of game you can never win. Part ex a manual to a dealer "oh nobody wants them, they aren't very popular, so we'll have to lowball you". Yet when you go to buy from a dealer "the manual is super rare, which is why it's more than the auto".

SkinnyPete said: This is the type of game you can never win. Part ex a manual to a dealer "oh nobody wants them, they aren't very popular, so we'll have to lowball you". Yet when you go to buy from a dealer "the manual is super rare, which is why it's more than the auto". yeah trying to sell to a dealer always fun. I tried to trade in my car for another one. Basically paying cash now, because "we don't believe the current asking prices of cars, so can't pay anything close to that for your car", but "no can't give you more discount on asking price than x, because that would be too little for the car" ok then....

SkinnyPete said: This is the type of game you can never win. Part ex a manual to a dealer "oh nobody wants them, they aren't very popular, so we'll have to lowball you". Yet when you go to buy from a dealer "the manual is super rare, which is why it's more than the auto". I agree 100% that this is the relationship with dealers!!! Also, Cheib has a good point. The automated technology moves on, whereas a manual remains what it is.

I think folks overthink this manual vs auto thing. Unless you're driving the car on deserted roads in Wales or Scotland, a manual Porsche is a PITA 90% the time, fantastic 5% of the time and meh the other 5%. That's my experience anyway. The manual gearing is too long for our British roads, so one can barely get out of 3rd to exploit the 4k + rpm powerband. Ok, I live in London, so it's a bit different compared to most. But I recently datalogged a 30-minute journey of approximately 12 miles, a mix of slow and ring road traffic with a speed limit of 50 mph. My average rpm in my 986 3.2 Tip was 1400 rpm. Given that the car is capable of peak rpms of 7200, I'm barely touching the sides. The challenge is not manual vs auto, it's the roads, the policing, and traffic. 99% of the time, auto is better unless you track the thing.

maz8062 said: I think folks overthink this manual vs auto thing. Unless you're driving the car on deserted roads in Wales or Scotland, a manual Porsche is a PITA 90% the time, fantastic 5% of the time and meh the other 5%. That's my experience anyway. The manual gearing is too long for our British roads, so one can barely get out of 3rd to exploit the 4k + rpm powerband. Ok, I live in London , so it's a bit different compared to most. But I recently datalogged a 30-minute journey of approximately 12 miles, a mix of slow and ring road traffic with a speed limit of 50 mph. My average rpm in my 986 3.2 Tip was 1400 rpm. Given that the car is capable of peak rpms of 7200, I'm barely touching the sides. The challenge is not manual vs auto, it's the roads, the policing, and traffic. 99% of the time, auto is better unless you track the thing. If you live in London (or any big city), you're already at a big disadvantage with a manual gearbox. Up in North Yorkshire, I rarely get stuck in big traffic so much more fun to be had on a trip anywhere, although I don't commute anymore so maybe I'm an exception, but for example, there are 17 997.2 Carrera S for sale, only 2 are manual. With choices so limited, there is an argument for a slight premium which makes me happy as mine will hold it's value better...

Yes traffic demographics have changed especially in London and big cities , 20 mph , cycle lanes . A manual would be pure hell hence most are not manual and as I use my RS as a daily would be maddening . New PDK is the best part of the car anyway .

Hopefully we are not suggesting that sports cars should be optimised for 20mph commuting. My sense is that manual gearboxes will become more sought after as everything is increasingly electrified and automatic. As well as never getting old as mentioned.

There is a cache to the rarity of manual versions of certain cars, particularly as they age. Whilst these certainly have low mileages, I'm not sure the asking price would be the same on a PDK. I reckon a good £10k+ premium.

maz8062 said: Unless you're driving the car on deserted roads in Wales or Scotland, a manual Porsche is a PITA 90% the time, fantastic 5% of the time and meh the other 5%. maz8062 said: The challenge is not manual vs auto, it's the roads, the policing, and traffic. 99% of the time, auto is better unless you track the thing Personally, I prefer a manual 95% of the time, and that includes city use. Agree about UK roads. Don’t necessarily agree about track. I would pay a premium for manual if/when it comes to it.

[quote=DMZ]Hopefully we are not suggesting that sports cars should be optimised for 20mph commuting. Haha, comment of the day!

Geneve said: Personally, I prefer a manual 95% of the time, and that includes city use. Agree about UK roads. Don t necessarily agree about track. I would pay a premium for manual if/when it comes to it. me too (I commuted in London in a manual 355 for 2.5 years). I just bought a car with a single-clutch automated transmission, but would have preferred it to be manual - non for sale and way too expensive if there was one (so I guess that answers the value question to a degree) On track I am actually indifferent, mainly due to lack of skills - one less thing to worry about. I stopped doing track days anyway though, so no longer relevant.

Agree on track Manual every time to enjoy the shift , why I love my 993GT2R Evo

maz8062 said: I think folks overthink this manual vs auto thing. Unless you're driving the car on deserted roads in Wales or Scotland, a manual Porsche is a PITA 90% the time, fantastic 5% of the time and meh the other 5%. This is objectively false. Lots of good driving to be done. In the south of England. With little to no policing. I think some people must never leave large conurbations / A roads. There are countless B roads and white roads with little traffic and pretty much zero policing. I live in a population centre of 100k people, fastest train to London about an hour and a quarter. IE, not remote. Within 15 mins of my front door is a 40 minute loop that I get a mostly clean run on more often than not and I've never seen any policing on it in 15 years. Which isn't surprising, because the police simply do not have the resources to cover roads like that and, likewise, you don't find cameras on those kinds of roads. Not enough traffic to justify the installation costs. Of course, there are busy B roads too. And if you're in London or close to the M25, it's mostly going to be a s tshow. But there really is an awful lot of great driving to be had across the south of England (and further north too, more so if anything, but the south often seems to be considered a non starter) for anyone who makes even a cursory effort to get out of town and stay off A roads.

I wonder if we are a typical audience / sample for this question to be objectively answered ? There are manuals and manuals ... 901 / 915 / G50 / and then all the water-cooled car manual boxes which I never knew the codes for ... The synchro's on the early 996.1 GT3 gearboxes were weak, the steels were much better, the seven speed manual didn't gain many plaudits and the latest six speed gearbox is a peach ... so what is it that "we" like ? I would say that it's the complete gear change process ... pedal weight / flywheel effect / pedal positions for clutch, brake and accelerator ... and then there is the learning of the car and the black magic of double de-clutching / heel and toe / and the tactility and joy of "getting it right". And the bragging rights ? So a question ... below what age do these things really become less significant with screens / switches / toggles / thumb wheels taking over for their tactility / getting it right / bragging rights ?? And at what point will the young no longer aspire to taking a manual driving test ? At what point did 80% of Porsche sales become PDK which was launched 15 years ago and really is very very good ?? The youngsters in the main are not buying Porsche GT cars ... they are too busy affording a mortgage / holiday and trying to have as much fun as possible with as little cash as they can ... but look how few miles the old "rockers" in general are doing in their manual cars ?? How long can the manual gearbox continue to be sold and at what price point ? We "rockers" are a dying breed ... so maybe at a point there could be massive oversupply of manual cars ??

Not sure I buy the argument that manual is somehow better because PDK is going to feel dated whereas manual is so archaic that it can’t possibly get any more dated than it already is…? I imagine the premium for manuals has as much to do with the numbers built as it does with any cachet.

Now factor in the age of most existing and remaining manual drivers and their average life span, how does that affect the date? ChatGPT said: Excellent — now we’re getting surgical. Let’s factor in the age demographics of current manual drivers, their remaining driving years, and what that means for the practical extinction date of manual cars from public roads. &#128101; Who Still Drives Manual Today? Let’s assume current U.S./Western data (adjusted similarly for developed countries): Age Group Manual Drivers (%) Est. Avg Driving Years Left 60–80 (Boomers) 60% 5–15 years 40–59 (Gen X) 30–40% 15–25 years 25–39 (Older Millennials) 10–15% 25–35 years <25 (Gen Z & Alpha) ~5% 35–50 years (but mostly automatics) Most daily manual drivers are 40–70 years old now. Their average remaining driving span is ~10–20 years. Manual cars are rarely passed down — younger generations aren't trained to use them. &#129518; Projected Manual Car Demand Fade-Out Combining generational interest loss + lifespan: &#128198; Timeline Projection: Year Manual Demand Outlook 2025 Already niche; <2% of new car sales 2030 Most manual car buyers over 50; training nearly extinct 2035 Vast majority of manual drivers reach 60+ 2040 Functional extinction: 90%+ of drivers can't or won’t drive manual 2045–2050 Manuals effectively gone from daily use; classic-only territory &#129534; Final Estimate: Manual driving will become essentially obsolete in practice by ~2040, with a hard fade-out between 2040–2045, driven by: Generational skills loss EV/automated vehicle dominance The aging out (and retiring) of existing manual drivers Edited by Jones the cat on Monday 30th June 20:42

Geneve said: Personally, I prefer a manual 95% of the time, and that includes city use. Agree about UK roads. Don t necessarily agree about track. I would pay a premium for manual if/when it comes to it. I guess if you are rich enough to afford all the cars for different occasions and do a few hundred miles a year in them . But in real world some need to daily their RS and heel and toeing through the box like in the 70"s is boring .

Well, vinyl records are big business now and this is been driven by people who never used a record player back in the day. Our village had a 'historic transport day' recently. There were young guys taking out their steam engines in the masses. I had no idea that there were so many steam engine drivers locally! There will be loads of people who will be happy to learn how to use a manual in order to drive an air cooled classic and most likely for more modern stuff as well. You'll want to get as far away from the electric dual motor monotony as possible. The advantage of PDK over manual will seem minor for these 'slow' old relics. There will also be 'classic' car garages and they'll be happy to rebuild your manual, but may pass on a PDK with all the sensors and possibly a lack of parts. It should always be possible to get a rebuilt or retro-engineered manual box. ChatGPT isn't intelligent enough I suspect on this topic.

hunter 66 said: Yes traffic demographics have changed especially in London and big cities , 20 mph , cycle lanes . A manual would be pure hell hence most are not manual and as I use my RS as a daily would be maddening . New PDK is the best part of the car anyway . Any sports car sounds like it would be less than ideal in that instance. Quite sad to think that PDK is the best bit about a car. I know it's not as good, but my S Tronic box really detracts from the potential for fun in my car. However, someone mentioned gearing and that is an issue. One of the reasons I didn't buy a 997 CS was due to the long gearing.

Ok, thanks, that was my thinking 2035 to 2040, then who knows what happens to manual pricing, imagine down, if no one about can drive them. What are Driving Schools saying, they will stop manual instruction in 2030 or 2035?

The thing is, as these cars get older, most start to think the manual version is much better. We saw it with the 722.6 Merc 'box, it was amazing at the time, so much so Porsche used it in the 996, now?? Hmmm? SMG II in the E46 M3 was the same, "...lightning fast 80m/s shifts that make the manual redundant." Do we think the same today? Porsche then released the first PDK in a 911 and again it made the manual seem irrelevant, yet today you will pay 20-30% more for the equivalent manual and we now consider that first PDK second best choice wise. I love autos, I bought an E39 528i auto when I was 24 years old, all my mates ripped me to pieces over that choice. I think out of the 50-60 cars I have owned maybe 5 or 6 have been manual, even when I bought my third E46 M3 I chose the SMG, but, when I am daily driving a 530d touring with a ZF8 or the Cayenne with the latest auto 'box, jumping in even a 997.2 with the first PDK you really notice it is older tech, jump into a manual 997 and the level of enjoyment that brings above and beyond the PDK car can't be underestimated. Don't get me wrong, I would happily have either, but I'm not buying an older car as a daily, I'm buying it for fun, and by 2040 a 992 will be older than my 997 is today and I reckon people buying them will be buying them for fun. And, we will probably get more like America is today where "driving a stick" is seen as a bit of a status symbol and will always be seen as the real enthusiasts choice. Rightly or wrongly.

MikeM6 said: Any sports car sounds like it would be less than ideal in that instance. Quite sad to think that PDK is the best bit about a car. I know it's not as good, but my S Tronic box really detracts from the potential for fun in my car. However, someone mentioned gearing and that is an issue. One of the reasons I didn't buy a 997 CS was due to the long gearing. Technically it is brilliant , manual is fun at Le Mans or Daytona but in a road car not so sure anymore . Here at Daytona in my 01RS , this is the best Manual box in my mind Edited by hunter 66 on Wednesday 2nd July 10:47

I get auto in fast cars when for daily or even long distance driving, but for pure fun I'm wondering if I'm missing something by having too much power and an auto.

Similarly, the Quartz watch movement is much more efficient than its mechanical counterpart. It operates automatically without any fiddly winding or adjustments, and keeps far better time. I predict that mechanical watches will die out and be worth less in the future.

hunter 66 said: Technically it is brilliant , manual is fun at Le Mans or Daytona but in a road car not so sure anymore . Here at Daytona in my 01RS , this is the best Manual box in my mind Interesting how much views can vary. When I drove this, the box was probably my least favourite aspect, and I'm manual die hard. I had just driven the 991 Cup behind it, to be fair, and the work rate on the old car suddenly felt quite (very) high! Anyway, not that I personally track a great deal, but find there's plenty to do trying to get the car near the limit and managing it there when I do, don't need manual to make that engaging. On the road, it's exactly the opposite. Hardly driving a modern Porsche GT right up on the limit on the road (or an old Porsche, GT or otherwise), so manual gives you something to do, an element of driving where you can make a bit of a difference and be fully engaged. I think in the long run and provided it's even possible to continue to use old ICE cars, demand for manual will hold up, maybe even increase. If you're buying an old combustion Porsche 20 years from now, I think that's already a pretty esoteric choice and there's a good chance you'll fancy manual, too.

I expect that premium for manuals will only grow in the future on the depressing journey to the self driving car.

My Monaro would be much quicker with something like an 8 speed auto box from a modern Beemer. The manual 6 speed box is not to be rushed through the cogs, at all! And this definitely hinders its performance figures. Do I care? No. In fact I wouldn't have bought it had it been an auto. I bought it for fun, involvement and character. Throttle blips when I choose etc. etc.. There's no doubt the modern auto is a brilliant piece of tech, perfect for the daily slog, but less perfect for fun, IMO. I had a '93' 300zx years ago, granted technology is very different now, but I had converted for auto to manual for the reasons above and it was a much better fun car for it.

Interesting, hope this means my manual 981GTS surprises on the upside when it comes time to sell! Although it never seems to work out that way...