JVPhoto

Yah I went through and checked that again and all the literature says "two different credit card companies" which (at least for the U.S.) I'm not sure what matters as they each have their own separate line of credit even if they are both Visa from Chase.
They both have a pretty big chunk of available credit on them so hopefully won't be an issue...or could I show them that my LH F ticket was bought and not on miles.
In any event it's more time to dissect the FCT.

dparkinson

Has anyone had Avis fake a damage report upon returning one of these cars? Came back to the states with a thousand dollar credit card bill. Disputed it through AMEX. They claim I lightly scraped the underside of the front bumper. Fortunately Amex backed my play when I told them to pound sand.

Tracer_SEA

Been wanting to do this for a long time, and finally got to the other day. It was a lot of fun and totally worth it.

It took a full hour from the time I arrived at the Avis counter to when I actually got into the car. About 15" in line, 15" to get the rental set up, and another 30" for them to get the car ready and brought over. They did not ask me for 2 credit cards, just one.

My strongest advice is to take the time to get the GPS set up!!! I couldn't get it figured out at first (see tips below), and was antsy after all that waiting so just kind of headed out -- and then after 30 minutes of driving around finally got it set up and it guided me to join the Rheingau route in progress.

The country roads were great -- although there wasn't enough unrestricted speed Autobahn time for my taste. Maybe it's different if you follow the GPS correctly out of the airport, or maybe there are other routes that are better for that.

My 911 4S had ~2500kms on the odometer and a Michelin tire sticker written in German with a big "240km/hr" on it -- which I presumed meant "your tires are rated for 240 km/hr -- don't go any faster!". I got it up to ~235 on the one good straight stretch on the way back to FRA. The car started to shudder at 230. But boy was it a blast to drive. I had it in Sport mode the whole time. The 0-60 was great and so was the 60-100.

GPS TIPS
The thing I couldn't figure out at the Avis lot was that you need to touch the touch screen to turn on the Nav/GPS. (Duh. I pushed all the buttons and they didn't do anything, so I got impatient and headed out. There was no one around to ask.)
Once you get the screen on, then you follow the directions that are listed in the PDF doc:
Press the CAR button
Press OPTION
Select "Set PCM system" then "Language PCM" then your language of choice
Then press the NAVI button, STORED DESTINATIONS and the 4 routes plus FRA pop up as choices.

The other thing that I found odd was that the waypoints on the route are just random coordinates, they aren't places of interest or worth stopping at as best I could tell. About 2 hours in I pulled into a charming country inn/pub to catch my breath, stretch and use the facilities. But otherwise the places of interest that they mention in the booklet aren't indicated on the GPS, and given that my full attention was on piloting the $105,000 beauty, I didn't have time to reconcile the map with the GPS and get to enjoy them. So if you want to see the castles or wineries or whatever, plan ahead.

The GPS has a helpful KM remaining and ETA readout, so it's easy to keep tabs on your 150km and 3 hour allotment. I ended up at about 2:45 and 146km. The gas tank was still 3/4 full after all that.

Returning the car at the FCT was super easy -- a guy came and I just handed him the key. It was a bit weird though to not have an official walk-around inspection and not get a final printout of the bill like you normally do when returning at Avis. Fingers crossed on that, though I think I have more to worry about from Speed Cameras than I do from Avis

JVPhoto

Thanks for the info on the time, I'm going to be doing it next week. I gave myself a cushion for how much time I want to spend in the FCT after and to get in a good 2.5-3 hours with the car...but given how long things take I may get in line an extra 30-35 min before my scheduled pick up time to get the ball rolling.

Durian

I've been doing my homework, my turn is Friday 17, I have arranged my flights in such a away to have 7 hours after arriving from Canada before off to CDG, all delay on Avis side should be manageable... Worse come to worse I'll skip the FCT, the Porsche is the actual highlight

alexj7

Just did this and had a similar experience to Tracer_SEA. Long wait time at Avis, and then I was at the counter for about 20 minutes while they set me up. However, they handed me keys at the counter and I just walked to the car out in the garage. They did need two credit cards. Never checked for a LH boarding pass of any kind.

I also did the Rheingau route. I found the GPS easy to set up, and I had the route selected in minutes so we were on our way quickly. However, the GPS was very confusing leaving the airport area, with many directions like "stay left" where you really had to stay right. So I ended up in the express lanes and missed the turnaround. This added about 5 km to the route, so when I returned I was right at 150km.

I agree that the Rheingau route was nice but not enough time on unrestricted autobahn. A lot of the highway had speed limits on this route. Also, right at the furthest point the road was under construction. There was a moment of panic because I thought I was going to have to backtrack and detour, putting me WAY over 150km (so a costly mistake). Thankfully, we could still get through, although the road was just repaved and had heavy machinery on it (like in the middle of the road, blocking it). I'm still not sure if I was supposed to drive there or not

I mostly kept it in sport mode. Sport Plus is a little too crazy for me, it keeps you in high revs and makes it almost comically loud for driving around town. Managed to hit about 250kph, could've gone faster but the wife was freaking out

On return I had a little trouble. I pulled up to the FCT but the gate didn't open. So I had to leave it parked awkwardly near the street and get someone from inside to help. They took it to Avis so hopefully they didn't joyride at my expense before that!

All in all definitely worth the $$$.

JVPhoto

Did it today and loved it!
Took me a bit to find out how to get to the rental car area in the center of the earth. Once there had minimal interaction with the Avis rep. Didn't ask for LH F BP/HON Card but did ask for 2 credit cards since the first one I gave (UA MP Visa Sig) wasn't platinum.
Was in the car about 5 minutes later.



Little rainy when I started to head to Darmstadt to pick up a friend.



Eventually the sun opened up and I opened the top which was nice. On the A5 back I got to about 220k/h but the slightly wet roads and not being a hard top caused me to ease off. I had done about that fast (135m/h) in high school in my 01 SS Camaro.



Dropping it off at the FCT was no problem either. The GPS had the FCT listed but it send me around to the lower level and I didn't see an entrance so I circled all the way back around and then just followed the Departures T1 sign and then you can't miss it once you're pulling up.

bAAh

First of all I'm very jealous, I live in DE and have yet to get behind the wheel of a Porsche here (but my Audi hits 250km/h with some patience).

Just a warning-Germany has a winter tire requirement, and many rental car companies leave them on all year around. Your car, and probably the rest of the fleet will start getting equipped with winter tires around now, so if you see that sticker take it seriously (as you did)! Losing a tire at that speed can be life threatening, and if it is determined you exceeded that limit you will have a real battle getting the insurance to pay out. On the positive side those numbers do have a bit of a buffer, so be careful, and viel Spaß!

JVPhoto

Mine had the Michelin sticker as well and I would have been hard pressed to get it up to 240. So much fun though.

TheBOSman

Looks like you had the exact same car I had on Sunday, white convertible, same Michelin sticker, and same GPS error on the FCT location. I didn't mind, still had the extra kms and got to enjoy a little extra cornering on the ramps around FRA . I only had to hand over my Amex Platinum CC, they didn't request a second card from me.

I took the Taunus route, which I can highly recommend. Goes through several nice small villages and towns, through some back woods and has a couple of near hairpin turns along with many other tight turns and open stretches. Managed to take one turn just hard enough to get a desired effect .

You get three solid stretches of no posted speed limit (or whatever term you want to use) autobahn southbound on the 3/E35 in the second half of the trip, which is good since you've had time to adjust to the car by then. I got mine up to 233 km/hr (I didn't want to push above that 240, 145 mph was good enough for me) and was doing 220+ for much of the second and third stretches of no posted speed limit. Those speeds are not for the faint of heart though .

FlyingDoctorwu

Anyone have a recent phone number? +496171681377 does not seem to work. At least there is no answer. Instead of overnighting in Mainz tomorrow we will be at the airport. I thought I would try to give the Porsche experiment a try but online bookingisn't an option this close in. I tried calling Avis directly but the guy I got said I had to book through lh...

Fdw

JVPhoto

So I was looking at my credit card statements and I was charge 99....Dollars (~ 77 Euros)! No other Avis charges or anything on it and it has been about 3 weeks. ^ ^

Durian

Try +49 69 69027771, that's the number from my rental slip, I was there 2 weeks ago so it should be accurate
Few comments BTW about the rental:
- from booking on Avis website (link from LH website) until renting the car, I have not been asked any proof of flying First. Actually, not a proof of actually flying on that day.
- only one credit card was sufficient (my Amex is neither Gold-Plat-Black but was OK).
- Staff in the Preferred area of the car park barely speak any english, do not expect some sort of First class service. All I could get from the staff (he was very courteous but language barrier...) was him to switch the NAV system to English... then to find out that there was NO route set up in the GPS.
Bottom line: I took the car for a 2hr spin / 90 kms only driving randomly around FRA in the traffic and the rain.
Good enough for me that said - I was able to take the roof down between 2 rainy sessions and went up to 180kmh, which can reached super easily.

fwb

Is there anyone who can successfully get a car without booking in advance?

I'm flying LH F next month and tried to book through Avis ~1.5 months in advance. My booking online (via the link from LH website) was rejected 4 days after submission. I've sent them an email but no reply.

ShikaSenbei

I'll be visiting the FCT in December in an 8 hr layover.
Will there be too much snow to drive the Porsche then? I would like to see the Christmas festivities in Frankfurt.