When I was a kid I remember my uncles who lived down on the Indian reservation arguing about how to pronounce it. Uncle Robert insisted it should be "por-shay."



Porsche announces pricing on most expensive hybrid ever, the 918 Spyder

"After the debut of its Cayenne and Panamera hybrids, Porsche has now released the ultimate example that not all hybrids are green.

The sports car maker today released pricing for its plug-in 918 Spyder Hybrid, which it showed at the Frankfurt Motor Show last year. Better be sitting down for this. The pile of green cash to buy the 918 Spyder needs to stack up to $845,000.

Like the 918 RSR race car that the company showed in Detroit this year, the 918 Spyder uses a mid-mounted, direct-injection V8 producing more than 500 hp. The prodigious output drives the rear wheels through an eight-speed automated manual transmission. Two electric motors, powered by a lithium-ion battery pack drive the front wheels, turning the 918 into an all-wheel-drive car. Porsche claims the 918 can accelerate to 60 mph in about 3.6 seconds. (The fastest car we have tested, a Dodge Viper, sprinted 0-60 mph in 4.2 seconds.)

The batteries can be recharged from the grid, giving the Spyder an electric range of 16 miles. That doesn't sound like much, but the plug-in Toyota Prius has a shorter claimed range of 11 miles. When you're not holding your foot to the floor, Porsche claims fuel economy of 79 mpg in those first 16 miles. Then again, what are the chances that a driver after shelling out nearly a million dollars, with taxes, on the supercar would hypermile to the grocery store?

Even if you never travel farther than that without recharging, and somehow manage to accumulate the national average of 12,000 miles a year, that would save you 394 gallons of fuel a year compared with buying Porsche's mainstream roadster, the Boxster. But even with gas at $4 a gallon, it would take 503 years for that savings to make up the difference.

If it could keep you young enough to drive it that long, the 918 Spyder Hybrid might well be worth every penny."

From Consumerreports.org