Porsche 911 Carrera 3.2
Why 7.0: The last of the G-body 911s: a 3.2-litre flat-six with Bosch Motronic injection, 231 hp, a timing-chain tensioner that finally held, and from 1987 the hydraulically clutched G50 gearbox in place of the 915. Porsche called it 80 percent new under the skin; the shape dates to 1974 and the impact bumpers to US law, which is why it is the 911 most people picture when they say the word.
Layout
Natural habitat
Ride comfort
Sound
The 3.2's Motronic plenum and extra displacement give a deeper, torquier flat-six note than the SC, with the same fan whir and clatter that water cooling later silenced. It loses a tenth to the SC because Motronic is quieter than CIS induction and 6,500 rpm keeps the climb short. The everyday air-cooled sound.
6-cylinder · naturally aspirated · 6,500 rpm redline · rated 8.0 / 10 for engine sound
Market value
Median asking price, good condition · €29k (1984) → €66k (2026), trending up · illustrative data
Child seats · ISOFIX
Built before ISOFIX existed, so there are no anchor points at all. A child seat here is a seatbelt installation, and the belt geometry of the period was not designed with one in mind.
Derived from production years and seating layout, not a per-car source. ISOFIX was standardised as ISO 13216 in 1997, required on new EU model types from 2011 and on all new EU cars from 2014.
The long version
The 3.2 is the air-cooled 911 that gets used, and it has been since it was new. It sold in volume, it was the last 911 before the 964's coil springs and power steering, it is simple enough to maintain at home and robust enough to tolerate neglect, so a huge number were daily driven through the 1990s and are still being driven by second and third owners. The air-cooled boom lifted prices from the low twenties to the sixties and seventies in a decade, but it never pushed the 3.2 into the garage: a G50 coupé is still a reasonable trade for a new Cayman, and the people buying them tend to be buying their first air-cooled car to drive, not to store. Sunday-driver miles rather than commuter miles, with club runs, European tours and the occasional track day — the 3.2 racks them up in a way the SC before it and the 964 after it do not quite match. The most-used air-cooled 911, and the score says so.