OzzieT
Well-Known Member
- First Name
- Oz
- Joined
- Mar 25, 2022
- Threads
- 15
- Messages
- 267
- Reaction score
- 271
- Location
- Sydney
- Vehicles
- 2023 Taycan GTS
- Thread starter
- #1
Greetings TF buddies,
Content is the life of the TF so my plan is to bring you a soup to nuts, or should I say a Gulaschsuppe to Macadamia nut narrative, of my new car from factory to dealer…and beyond. While I ordered a new GTS back in March, I only received the news a couple of weeks ago, about a production slot and order number, which I can use to track progress and report out to you all.
It’s going to be a bit of a long story, since the east coast of Australia is one of the more remote global delivery locations for Porsche. I read with interest the anguish from my UK cousins about having to wait a few days for their Porsche to ship to the UK, or even worse for my US friends having to wait up to two weeks. Well for us Aussies on the east coast it is 56 days at sea, and because there aren’t quite as many vehicle carriers scheduled to come out this way, it can often be a bit of a wait on the dock in Germany beforehand. As with so many of us on the forum, so close and yet so far.
What am I ordering?
You can see it’s a GTS in Dolomite Silver, RS Spyder wheels with an Olea black leather interior inside. I’ve noticed configurators vary quite a bit around the world with the package options, so rather than list the config, it includes:
What were the major selection choices?
What is the current status?
My car is currently scheduled to commence production on February 10th, which is 62 days away. This assumes no production delays. Originally, I had a January production slot which limited me to a Bose sound system only, however with the move to February I’ve been able to reinstate the Burmester sound system to the order, thanks to some fancy footwork from my Dealer.
When will it arrive in Australia?
This required a little bit of detective work, as the Porsche website currently lists June 12th next year as the arrival date. That clearly is too far away! So, car completes production on February 17th and is released for shipping the same day. The website map shows the car departing from the port of Bremerhaven. My current BMW came from the same port on a ship operated by Wallenius Wilhelmsen, and with a quick search of their website I was able to find the following:
So this shows the ‘Toronto’ departing Bremerhaven on February 23rd, with Port Kembla arrival on April 20th. Port Kembla is the location closest to Sydney with vehicle RoRo. Will my vehicle be produced in time, is 6 days enough time for it to be shipped by rail from factory to port, is it earmarked for the ‘Toronto’ or will it sit on the dock and line up with another vessel to align with the June 12th date? Who knows really, but readers I will be keeping you abreast of all changes and developments. I’d also like to point out on the Wallenius Wilhelmsen map above, that the ‘Toronto’ is not able to traverse through the middle of Australia like a hovercraft. You’d think a shipping company would use shipping maps on its website. Note the route on Porsche site, the vessel will hit Australia at the port of Fremantle on the west coast before it heads east to Port Kembla via Melbourne.
Once I have the vehicle VIN, then I will be able to confirm if my car is loaded on the ‘Toronto’ and track it all the way to Port Kembla on the Wallenius Wilhelmsen site and some shipping tracking software.
That’s it for now. Stay tuned.
Content is the life of the TF so my plan is to bring you a soup to nuts, or should I say a Gulaschsuppe to Macadamia nut narrative, of my new car from factory to dealer…and beyond. While I ordered a new GTS back in March, I only received the news a couple of weeks ago, about a production slot and order number, which I can use to track progress and report out to you all.
It’s going to be a bit of a long story, since the east coast of Australia is one of the more remote global delivery locations for Porsche. I read with interest the anguish from my UK cousins about having to wait a few days for their Porsche to ship to the UK, or even worse for my US friends having to wait up to two weeks. Well for us Aussies on the east coast it is 56 days at sea, and because there aren’t quite as many vehicle carriers scheduled to come out this way, it can often be a bit of a wait on the dock in Germany beforehand. As with so many of us on the forum, so close and yet so far.
What am I ordering?
You can see it’s a GTS in Dolomite Silver, RS Spyder wheels with an Olea black leather interior inside. I’ve noticed configurators vary quite a bit around the world with the package options, so rather than list the config, it includes:
- Exterior auto mirrors in car colour with black gloss base, LED courtesy lights, rear axle steering, PSCB brakes with black calipers, thermal/noise insulated glass, electric charging covers
- 18 way sports seats, ambient lighting, seat ventilation, Burmester sound system, passenger display, all available technology options (ACC, HUD, LDW, PESS, SV), full leather interior (race-tex only on b pillars/roof liner), silver internal accents, ionizer
What were the major selection choices?
- Model – I’m coming from a twin turbo V8 BMW, so when I test drove the base Taycan just not enough grunt. While there no was no GTS to test drive, the spec sheet, combined with the included options I wanted to have, made the GTS the model for me.
- Colour combination – coming from BMW to Porsche for the first time, I was not enamoured with the standard Taycan colours. Paint To Sample as a $20K+ expense not worth it. I think the Taycan looks at its best in all Black with a Chalk interior, however I swore after my last black car never again with the maintenance. I like to rotate my car colours and so decided on Dolomite Silver (last silver car for me was 2008) with the black interior.
- Wheels – originally I had spec’d the Mission e wheels in gloss black with matching calipers, however when I was out walking recently, I came across a Taycan (and owner) with gloss black Mission e’s. There were a lot of chips on all of the rims, with a light undercoat underneath and it just did not look very good. The owner said he would not get them again having had the rims re-finished. So, this took me back to the Spyder’s.
- GTS interior spec – I like race-tex to the touch, but I don’t like it to sit in and was worried how it would wear. Additionally, I was going to pass on all of the GTS branding which was included with the spec. So back to leather, went for Olea as I liked the feel of it, and have extended the leather interior fit out with more options and silver accents.
- Pano roof – we have such good light in Sydney all year round, as well as a warm to hot summer and I’ve never been a big user of a sunroof. The pano roof is an amazing piece of engineering, but I did not like the pre-configured settings or the fact there was no internal cover. Looking at all of the forum photos, I can see I will be in the minority here. Perhaps controversially, I also think the GTS looks better without the pano roof.
- Sound system – the Burmester is an $8K option here and while it sounded better than the Bose, it was also the appearance with the silver speaker covers which I felt added nicely to the internal theme I was putting together.
- Note the automatic parking feature has been removed as a feature on the GTS and is no longer available. No big deal.
What is the current status?
My car is currently scheduled to commence production on February 10th, which is 62 days away. This assumes no production delays. Originally, I had a January production slot which limited me to a Bose sound system only, however with the move to February I’ve been able to reinstate the Burmester sound system to the order, thanks to some fancy footwork from my Dealer.
When will it arrive in Australia?
This required a little bit of detective work, as the Porsche website currently lists June 12th next year as the arrival date. That clearly is too far away! So, car completes production on February 17th and is released for shipping the same day. The website map shows the car departing from the port of Bremerhaven. My current BMW came from the same port on a ship operated by Wallenius Wilhelmsen, and with a quick search of their website I was able to find the following:
So this shows the ‘Toronto’ departing Bremerhaven on February 23rd, with Port Kembla arrival on April 20th. Port Kembla is the location closest to Sydney with vehicle RoRo. Will my vehicle be produced in time, is 6 days enough time for it to be shipped by rail from factory to port, is it earmarked for the ‘Toronto’ or will it sit on the dock and line up with another vessel to align with the June 12th date? Who knows really, but readers I will be keeping you abreast of all changes and developments. I’d also like to point out on the Wallenius Wilhelmsen map above, that the ‘Toronto’ is not able to traverse through the middle of Australia like a hovercraft. You’d think a shipping company would use shipping maps on its website. Note the route on Porsche site, the vessel will hit Australia at the port of Fremantle on the west coast before it heads east to Port Kembla via Melbourne.
Once I have the vehicle VIN, then I will be able to confirm if my car is loaded on the ‘Toronto’ and track it all the way to Port Kembla on the Wallenius Wilhelmsen site and some shipping tracking software.
That’s it for now. Stay tuned.
