Porsche Cars Australia has just announced it will soon begin importation of additional Panamera models to Australia.

When launched here in October 2009, the big five-door sports coupe was sold with V8 engines (naturally aspirated or turbocharged) and all-wheel drive. This high specification level explains why the price list began at $270,000 and went all the way up to $365 grand. Not a car for those who can be described as only moderately wealthy.

         

Now Panamera is offered with a starting price of only $193,000. This is a significant saving that brings the Porsche into the realms of affordability for significantly more buyers. Though by the time the government and Porsche dealers add their charges the Panamera will still be on the wrong side of $200,000

The saving of almost $80,000 doesn't cause as much of a sacrifice as you might expect. You miss out on two cylinders and the engine is connected only to the rear wheels. This actually brings the Panamera to the normal Porsche setup – because almost all Porsche sports cars come with six cylinders and rear-wheel drive.

Four-wheel drive is also offered in the new Panamera V6 range. The added traction and cornering power provided by also bringing the front wheels into the action adds only $11,400 to the price – the Panamera 4 has a manufacturer’s list price of $204,400.

         

Though the new six-cylinder powerplant has the long-familiar capacity of 3.6 litres, it has a V6 configuration. Surprisingly in these days of shared engineering between car makers, Porsche designed and builds the engine itself. In common with the very latest Porsche 911s it features direct fuel injection. Peak power of 220 kilowatts, with top torque of 400 Newton metres, is extremely impressive for an engine of this relatively modest size.

In performance car terms, this means the engine develops 300 horsepower, 100 down from the 4.8-litre V8 engine.

Power is transferred to the road by a Porsche PDK double-clutch gearbox. The German company invented this type of manual-automatic gearbox almost 40 years ago, so is a past master at the high-efficient concept.

Porsche Panamera is a big car, at just under five metres overall it’s longer than a Commodore or Falcon and is a genuine four-seater. Though it could be called a five-door hatchback, Porsche prefers to see it five-door coupe. The controversial styling of the back end isn't one of Porsche's best styling efforts, but it does make for decent headroom in the back seat and a good load area.

Talking of the rear, you will notice that the Panamera V6 only has dual exhaust tailpipes, not the quad pipes of the V8, but otherwise there aren’t a lot of major styling differences. Car spotters will be able to spot other small changes between the two variants, but there's nothing major to tell the world that you are driving one of the new ‘economy’ Porsches.

        

As we write this, the new Panamera V6 models are about to be revealed to the world at a major event during the Beijing Motor Show. The V6s will come to Australia in July this year. In the meantime it might be worth a call to your dealer as there's likely to be a pent up demand. We can't wait to get ourselves into one and bring you a full road test.