I mostly agree with all of the above; hence why I only spent a little over $1000 for the springs, labor to install, and an alignment. Not much money to readjust the balance of the car, and it won't upset the value or desirability of it either. Yes you could go faster with the pricier upgrades, but by how much, and is it worth $5-10K? An individual decision for each of us to make.

Last weekend I was on track with a Ferrari Tributo F8 and an older 600 hp GT2. I let them by on the first lap while I was building temp and pressure in my tires. Takes about 3 laps for me to do that, and then went charging after them. Caught up pretty quick, they upped their pace a little, and then ran another 5 laps with them. They would pull me down the straights and then I would real them back in under braking and cornering. Lots of fun and they were pretty good drivers who were visiting from out of state. Not sure who they were afterward, but they found me at lunch and we chatted for a while. Great guys and they were impressed that a GT4 could keep up with them. Not bad for a car with a "compromised" suspension. Yes it could be better, but learning to work your way around its weaknesses makes you an even better driver. I am lucky, however, that ECR is brand new and very smooth. COTA is not too bad anymore either with some of the recent repaving going on down there. I think we are all very fortunate to have these cars.

 

The thing that amazes me is that nobody really had the ***** to say what many think until recently about the GT4, which is that is it a compromised chassis and suspension. All the Youtube reviews are raving, most of the journalist reviews are very praising. I just don't get it that nobody criticized what is an obvious flaw in the GT4.

The ONLY person who tried to warn my about the GT4's suspension was Randy Pobst in a private chat room for his Youtube members only channel. He said it was not great and was bouncy and under damped, and very uncharacteristic of a Porsche GT product. But I thought maybe he was being overly critical since nobody else shared that opinion. Nope, he was spot on.

 

You are being overly critical. You seem to have a very narrow criteria, which is you (the operative word being you) struggle with confidence over bumps and that it isn't a Camaro. You literally post the same stuff over and over in every thread.

A good driver will have no problem extracting the maximum from a GT4, a 718 with very few mods will do a sub 2:00 at WGI so they are not slow either. You don't track the car so you have no real insight into the cars handling on the limit. Is the suspension compromised? Of course, a multi link rear setup would be preferable. As an enthusiast, learning to drive a car fast is a challenge, and you work around its handling characteristics. In fact, a cars foibles are what some might call 'character'. Have you ever driven a hot hatch with a torsion beam rear? The rear end is all over the place, that's what makes it fun. The GT4 has sublime balance, excellent feedback, rock solid reliability, top tier brakes, and makes a fantastic sports car. No issues with the damping either but that's just my experience having done 10k+ miles and 2 years of track days. The hyperbole you post everywhere is more a reflection of your narrow expectations than the car. You would be better just selling it and buying something else that suits what you want out of vehicle.

 

completely agree! Think every road car has some compromises. That’s the reason the motorsport cars (actual spec race cars) from every manufacturer have different parts and suspension mods than the homologation road ones out there. Think for most ppl here, investment in better driving will pay off more dividends than high end costly mods to make our brains believe the car is faster. For instance, at my track ECR, the house GT4 PDK with just toe links and thrust arm bushing (basically alignment mods) is able to do a 2.03 in the hands of experienced ppl (livio for those who know him). Most ppl (myself included) do around high to mid 2.05 as best time and on data review, most of it is due to driver incompetence and technique. So we know there is 1sec/mile left in the handling of the car with no mods.

As for your “private chat room discussion” with randy pobst, the same person basically summarized the car in 2 words at the MT BDC: “RACE-CAR Johnny”. based on your numerous posts over several years, can’t help but think you bought the wrong car for the wrong purpose without test driving it. In this thread about alignment and mods based on experienced performance oriented folks (e.g. Lovetoturn amongst numerous others), you are actually misguiding some folks into thinking they absolutely NEED them. It’s a textbook example of keyboard racing. Just my 0.02$

 

We can agree is disagree.

There is no reason with today's technology that a $100K + sports car should be unsorted in any way, shape, or form. Just unacceptable. Your standards are too low if that is ok with you. Having "character" as you put it, is just a nice way of saying that the chassis is not settled and moves around too much. Maybe that is your definition of a fun car, but it is not mine. To me a fun car is one that makes the driver feel like a hero, is well sorted and settled, and inspires confidence in all kind of roads, not just smooth ones.

As for Randy saying "Race Car", well DUH, professional journalists that work for a publication are alway going to say something positive rather than negative, that is just comment sense. I am sure what he meant about "Race Car" was that it is direct, which it is. Also the track is smoother than public roads. Behind closed doors though and away from having to be PC, I can tell you that he was not impressed with it on the street.

What you say about the GT4's qualities, I do agree with... it is well balanced, has great brakes, good feedback, and is reliable... HOWEVER I never said those things were not true, my issues are with the chassis and suspension/damping, that IS different than being balanced.

 

You literally have a thread full of guys that drive these cars at the limit, on race tracks (that are not all smooth) and no one is in here repeating the same complaints constantly. Drivers come to this thread actual useful advice on setup so they can be faster on the track.. It's not that no one 'had the *****' to call it out, its that its not an issue to anywhere near the extent you are describing. The car is so throttle/brake adjustable, with such predictable balance, and real time feedback, that some mild rear end instability under extreme conditions is not even close to the deal breaker you are describing. Could it be improved? Of course! No car is perfect in every scenario, for everyone, under every set of conditions, all the time, otherwise we would all be driving it.

You constantly compare it to a Camaro, and a Z06 that no one owns or as even driven yet. I have driven a Camaro, it was very fast, big, numb, with abysmal visibility. I didn't then go and buy one so I could spend everyday on Camaro forums complaining about it for the next 4 years. Your own warped expectations are ultimately preventing you from enjoying the car, try finding some perspective. You never know you might actually enjoy it.

 

It's simply not possible to really work a GT4 to it's limits while on the street. You can easily EXCEED them - plenty of unskilled drivers out there prove it every day on the street. But to successfully walk the line.... IMO not possible. And I say this with arguably more track hours (actual W2W competition, not just DE, and excluding AX) than most people here in this thread (I know it's going to come off arrogant, which isn't my intent... but I'd bet heavy it's true.) It's just not possible drive a car on the street fast enough to work it to it's limits like a truly skilled driver can/would on track.

A canyon road may be bumpy by typical track standards, whereby some will claim that's where the car's flaws are shown ... but that's spoken like someone who has only ever been to FIA or major series-attending tracks. Hit up a smaller club level track in the Midwest, they are WAY more bumpy than even a "rough" California canyon road.

And for the record... my WRL GP1 class Cayman, or my past GP3 class Boxster, when driven on edge at even very smooth tracks like, say, Barber? Moves around a LOT. And this is a full racecar setup - monoballs, JRZ's, motorsports ABS, etc. You generally HAVE to manhandle these cars and "work" them a bit to get the most out of them. So a 718 GT4 moving around a bit? Fully expected behavior IMO. It's not a flaw. It's how these cars need to be driven.

 

Well the temperature is rising in this thread now. Maybe we could try to focus on positive thoughts and share information that will help educate all of us and help our cars go faster.

"It's just not possible to drive a car on the street fast enough to work it to it's limits like a truly skilled driver can/would on track."

I will be bold and agree to say that this is 100% true, and anyone who thinks otherwise, has no idea what they are talking about. You can't even get enough heat into the tires and brakes while driving on the street to even compare to what they can do on the track when up to temp and pressure. Who is going to throw their $100,000+ car into a corner with pavement that is just 12 feet wide, with possible oncoming traffic, at anywhere near the speed that they can do safely on a one-way track that is 40+ feet wide. There is just no comparison between the two.

Yes, the car moves around when at the limits. It is supposed to, if you are driving hard enough to go over the top of the tire friction curve and slightly down the backside of it. It is the behavior of the car in this zone that really determines the overall nature of how it will drive. I love to be aggressively pushing the car into a corner and need a flick of counter steer to keep it on line. Kinda like what you see on most of JC's videos. This is not from a bad suspension, it is from driving on the limit, and I think it is a blast. If you have ever driven a Go-kart at speed, you do this all the time subconsciously to get a quick time.

This last weekend at ECR, where Livio won all of the Spec-Boxster club races, my car was amazing with the new springs. When on my hot laps in the middle of the session, the car had insanely controllable slip angle on most every turn. A delicate touch of throttle or steering and the front slip angle would increase slightly but not to the point of understeer. A touch more throttle and the back end slip angle would increase as much as you wanted to balance with the front and or go a bit over to throttle steer the car. Whatever you wanted. A hint of throttle lift or just touching the brakes and the car would rotate a bit more. Absolutely a pleasure to drive and so predictable at the limits.

It may not have the best OEM shocks and dampening, but this is what Porsche gave us, and it works pretty well for me. It can be a little bouncy for the street, on a bad road, in the soft shock mode, but that is not at all any kind of a deal breaker. A few extra tweaks and I am even happier with my car now. If you don't like part of your car, buy something better and give us some positive feedback on how your experience improved the car for you.

Whatever the car is or isn't, on that weekend it was fast enough to hunt down and run together with a well driven Ferrari Tributo F8 and an older 600 hp gt2 turbo. They would obviously pull me down the straights, but I would make it all up and sometimes more under braking and in the corners. Not too shabby for a GT4.

 

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Can you just do a normal non computer aligment on the 718gt4 or do you need all those sensor calibrations they use on the other porsche models? I don't even think you can fit GT cars with laser cruise control or lane keep, but thought I would ask. As some places seem afraid to touch them for alignment.

 

Mine required no computer coding. Unsure if you have to do anything if you raise or lower the caror change its rake (headlights).

 

I put my story into a video. Ended up having to buy camber plates and toe links to fit my Apex wheel setup. Lot's of info for people new to these things as well. My front camber is 3.0 and rear 2.4. No shims just the plates and toe links. Used to have 2.5 up front on just shims.

 

You make great videos!

 

I like your videos friend. But this sums up why I am quite happy to stay with stock wheel and tyre sizes. Even with 2.5 degrees in the rear I have had some tyre rubbing at certain tracks with standard wheels and tyres so that's a complication that I don't want in life.

I take my wheels off and measure all tread depths using a tread depth gauge after every track day and I have started to see with 3 degrees of camber up front and a little bit of toe out that my inside edges are wearing quite quickly. And this is with mostly track driving too, I barely drive on the street these days, just to and from the track.

Current specs are.
3 degrees front camber, minor toe out. - Inside edge wearing quickly
2.5 degrees rear with toe in - Outside edge is wearing more quickly

Next alignment I get I might either remove the front toe and run with zero, or maybe take some camber out of the front. Not sure if I want more camber in the rear to address the outer wear but this might just be the cost of running a more aggressive alignment.

 

The last outing to the track I experienced the exact same results with my setup -2.4 up front wore out the inside edge, and -2.2 out back, accelerated wear on the outside edge. It appears that suspension had settled a bit from the original settings, as soon I showed them the wear on the tires they immediately booked me in to tune it up a bit. Now it has been backed off to -2 degrees up front, also took out a little toe out and in back we discussed additional camber but they decided to a slight increase in toe to get back to factory spec here, brought the camber back a bit to -2 degrees.