Porsche Butts

If there's one thing that can make or break the design of a car, it's the back end. Nothing deflates a car person faster than walking around the newest generation of their favorite car to find a tail that just ruins the whole image for them. Like a supermodel with a tramp stamp portrait of ex boyfriend, you're in love until she turns around; at which point you fall back and let her keep walking... fade away, friend, just fade away.

Some notorious examples of polarizing rumps are the Bangle-butt BMW's, the transformer taillights of the new Corvette C7, and the flat slab Nissan GT-R. On the other hand, there are designs that just seem to keep getting better, each one even prettier than the last, and as far as nice rear ends it's hard to beat a Porsche 911.

"Baby got back"

A contributing factor is of course the rear-engine layout of the 911, meaning the design needs room to fit the drivetrain, in addition to wide rear tires for traction, resulting in a seriously meaty backside. Add the additional cooling or aero required for some of the higher performance variants, and you're left with a very wide, muscular, contoured set of quarter panels. Porsche then completes this effect with beautifully sculpted taillights, creating a low and stretched appearance rarely matched by anyone else on the pavement. Each year, with output increasing, the performance demands mounting with competition nipping at their heels, and inclusion of ever increasing amounts of once race-only features, we see these attributes increasing in dimension.

Compare one of the earliest and most basic 911 models, to one of the new 911s and you start to see how this effect has evolved:

Note, again, the size of the tires being fit along side that rear mounted motor.

...Or simply join me in dreaming of owning both.

Now notice the difference between a new base model, and one of the highest performance variants of the same car, and you'll begin to understand how the width is functional as well as aesthetic.

Wider, lower, more tailpipes, more aerodynamics, more vents, and huge tires.

You're left with a dramatic sweep, from sheer width, over each wheel, straddling a contoured roofline. These "haunches" are so pronounced, in fact, that owners often experience rock strikes and paint chips leading them to  cover each in protective film. It lends the car a purpose built look, as though the sheet metal was pulled taught over the functional components, no line folded without reason. Legendary performers, these rears are as dramatic as the lap times they can crack off.

While so many focus on the front or 3/4 angle of a car, the face, I feel there is so much more to be said about the designers' abilities in rotating it around to view the rear of the vehicle. With tons of beautiful options on the road, it stands as a point of difference separating a car from what you can consider great, and what you can consider perfect. It's a difficult area to perfect, with every line in the car coming to an end, many functional components, lights, tailpipes and so on, a great butt is a rare thing on a car. My personal favorite is the Porsche, and given the performance of most 911s the rear is a view we're all likely to see. Most times that would bother me, but in this case, I don't mind watching one pull away in front, because these cars are perfect from all angles.

See you on the road,

Alexander