Porsche 7DT (PDK)
7-speed dual-clutch · longitudinal · 2008–present
Also known as: 7dt, pdk, doppelkupplung, 7dt-45, 7dt-70, porsche dual-clutch, 7dt-series
Porsche's seven-speed dual-clutch — PDK — in the 911 and Panamera.
It is a WET dual-clutch, so the low-speed judder that defines the dry units on this site is not a characteristic of it: a shudder from rest on a PDK is a fault, not the design meeting a driving habit.
Most of what owners report is behaviour. These change constantly, hold a very tall top gear, and creep differently from a torque-converter automatic — all of it designed, and best settled against another example of the same model rather than with a scan tool.
Its expensive failure is the mechatronic unit, and it presents electrically: a gear refused, a limp mode, a code naming a solenoid or a clutch position sensor. Nothing slips first, which is what separates it from clutch wear.
Fluid is a control question rather than maintenance. The oil serves the clutches and the hydraulics that move them, so worn fluid makes the gearbox change badly long before it makes anything fail — and the interval is far shorter than the word lifetime suggests.
Cars fitted with this gearbox
2 generations. Only where a source names the model and the generation together — a gearbox is documented as a product far more often than as a fitment, so this list is deliberately shorter than the truth.
Porsche
Information, not instruction
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Have anything you intend to act on checked by a trained person against the manufacturer's own procedure for your vehicle. Nothing here replaces that procedure.
Community experience
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- The car — make, model, year and engine. The same fault behaves differently on each.
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