Porsche has finally abandoned plans to introduce a revised engine for its 963 LMDh World Endurance Championship and IMSA SportsCar Championship contender.
The update, which was centred on a switch to a 90° crankshaft from a 180° or flat-plane crank, is now “dead”, according to Urs Kuratle, project boss on the 963 at Porsche Motorsport.
“We are not doing the crankshaft; it is not going to happen,” said Kuratle, whose comments represent the final confirmation that the revised version of the 4.6-litre twin-turbo V8 has been dropped.
Kuratle had said ahead of the Le Mans 24 Hours double-points WEC round in June that it would continue with the existing unit if it came through the French enduro without major reliability issues that could be traced to the engine.
“Maybe it will be cancelled,” Kuratle told Motorsport.com in the wake of the pre-Le Mans WEC round at Spa in early May.
“We have been to all these races [in WEC and IMSA] this year and we have had no reliability issues, so why introduce it?”
#5 Porsche Penske Motorsport Porsche 963: Matt Campbell, Michael Christensen, Frederic Makowiecki
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Porsche motorsport boss Thomas Laudenbach pointed out that the German manufacturer had no problems at Le Mans on the way to a best finish of fourth, as well getting four cars home in the top 10.
“The car is extremely reliable and the car is fast, so why should we touch it?” he said.
Porsche started development of the revised V8 last year in an effort to reduce vibration, which it believed was adversely affecting the reliability of the off-the-shelf hybrid system mandated under the LMDh rules.
Laudenbach described it as a “workaround” aimed at putting less vibration into the bell-housing mounted motor generator unit (MGU) supplied by Bosch Motorsport.
Subsequent upgrades of the energy-retrieval system over last winter that came in time for Porsche to take victory in the Daytona 24 Hours IMSA season-opener in January overcame the hybrid reliability issues.
Porsche revealed the existence of the revised engine early this year, but never committed to racing it. It only ran on the test bench and never in a car.
The engine would most likely have counted as a so-called evo joker upgrade allowed under the LMDh and Le Mans Hypercar rules.
Neither Laudenbach nor Kuratle would be drawn on whether Porsche will invoke one of the five jokers allowed over the initial five-year lifespan of the 963 for next season.
“Of course, we will try to make some improvements for next year,” said Laudenbach. He would not reveal if that would include playing a joker.