Picture this, you’re scaling the highest volcano in the world when all of a sudden you see two Porsche 911 sports cars scream past you.
While it may seem hard to believe, Porsche has done exactly that in the name of exploring the model’s limits.
The German carmaker employed a team led by endurance racer Romain Dumas to take two highly-modified 911 sports cars and drive them up Ojos del Salado in Chile.
Putting both man and machine through their paces, both cars climbed 6007 metres (19,708 feet) to where the oxygen is half of what it is at sea level while temperatures dropped to 30 degrees Celsius below freezing.
Towards the peak, the team encountered seemingly impassable walls of snow and ice which the 911s managed to scale.
Porsche made use of the 992-generation Carrera 4S as each car’s foundation, keeping the standard 330kW turbocharged flat-six in place.
It also kept the standard seven-speed automatic transmission in place albeit featuring lower gear ratios for better crawling capability.
Portal axles were installed to give each 911 a total ground clearance of 350mm which adjoins the 310mm wide off-road tyres. Tough underbody protection and switchable diff-locks were also added.
Porsche also installed a device called Warp-Connector which creates a mechanical link between all four wheels to provide maximum traction at all times.
The cooling system was also moved higher on each car to protect it against any potential damage the rough volcanic terrain would throw at it.
Both cars were fitted with a roll cage, carbon fibre seats and harnesses for safety purposes.
As a finishing touch, each car featured a unique livery – one featuring the same Porsche Motorsport color scheme adorning the 963 LMDh racer and a second 911-themed livery designed by the styling team in Weissach.
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