Four Door Porsche

I'm not talking bout the Cayenne!!

CAR Online has snared the best spy photos yet of Porsche's new four-seater, the Panamera. Think of it as a four-door version of the 928 - a four-seater GT to bridge the gap between the hard-core 911 sports car range and the Cayenne 4x4.

We won't see the Panamera in showrooms before 2009, with prices stretching from £54,000-£84,000.

The Panamera uses a variety of different components plucked from across Porsche's product portfolio. They needed the strongest suspension and brakes around so they borrowed them from the Cayenne SUV. They needed a lightweight, sports car chassis so they used parts of the 911 Turbo

It'll be front-engined and rear-drive, at first at any rate; there's some talk of a four-wheel drive version in the pipeline. Porsche hopes to build 20,000 a year at first


The Panamera is Porsche's answer to the CLS; a geniune four-seater set in the GT mould. The front-engine packaging and long wheelbase are designed to free up lots of cabin room for the four deep-set passenger seats, while the hatchbacked boot will top 475 litres (more with the rear seats folded).

Don't think this Porsche will be a soft comfort-oriented four-door, though. Much of the body will be made from lightweight aluminium and engineers have told CAR Online that the weight will fall around 1800kg. With direct-injection V8 power and up to 500bhp, it's not going to be slow.