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Written by Stephen Dobie
A car has broken a world record for towing. Which perhaps might not make it onto TopGear.com ordinarily, but that car is a Porsche. And it was towing a jumbo jet. Yep, thought that"d get your attention.The Cayenne S Diesel pulled a 285-tonne Air France Airbus A380, breaking the previous "heaviest aircraft pull by a production car" Guinness World Record by 115 tonnes. Blimey.It"s impressive not only because the A380 is over 100 times as heavy as the Cayenne, but because the car in question was standard.The record was the brainchild of Porsche GB technician Richard Payne. We know him well as someone who comes along and delivers cars to our photoshoots, often having towed them to us behind his trusty Cayenne.It"s in this role the idea struck him. A (presumably bamboozling) bit of maths later, he"d calculated that the Cayenne"s engine, gearbox and chassis structure could pull a plane without modification. A call to Air France later and the challenge was on.Air France very kindly lent Richie a spare A380, and it was hooked up to some special towing equipment that slotted onto the Cayenne"s regular tow bar. Then the Porsche"s 385bhp and 627lb ft got to work and tugged the jet across 42 metres of Paris"s Charles de Gaulle Airport, and itself and Richie into the record books. It went so well the exercise was repeated with a less torquey petrol Cayenne Turbo S.
Date written: 1 May 2017
More of this article on the Top gear website
ID: 7632
A car has broken a world record for towing. Which perhaps might not make it onto TopGear.com ordinarily, but that car is a Porsche. And it was towing a jumbo jet. Yep, thought that"d get your attention.The Cayenne S Diesel pulled a 285-tonne Air France Airbus A380, breaking the previous "heaviest aircraft pull by a production car" Guinness World Record by 115 tonnes. Blimey.It"s impressive not only because the A380 is over 100 times as heavy as the Cayenne, but because the car in question was standard.The record was the brainchild of Porsche GB technician Richard Payne. We know him well as someone who comes along and delivers cars to our photoshoots, often having towed them to us behind his trusty Cayenne.It"s in this role the idea struck him. A (presumably bamboozling) bit of maths later, he"d calculated that the Cayenne"s engine, gearbox and chassis structure could pull a plane without modification. A call to Air France later and the challenge was on.Air France very kindly lent Richie a spare A380, and it was hooked up to some special towing equipment that slotted onto the Cayenne"s regular tow bar. Then the Porsche"s 385bhp and 627lb ft got to work and tugged the jet across 42 metres of Paris"s Charles de Gaulle Airport, and itself and Richie into the record books. It went so well the exercise was repeated with a less torquey petrol Cayenne Turbo S.
Date written: 1 May 2017
More of this article on the Top gear website
ID: 7632
