IL_Pete

Thanks everyone, for the additional comments and inputs!

The car is at my shop at the track getting the Kline exhaust installed this week, along with the GT4 Rear Diffuser, without the GT4 RS side bits now - but thanks for the suggestion, I will consider those down the road.

I am using the Suncoast kit above. They confirmed for me that the kit is comprised of 100% Porsche OEM Parts, they pull together a kit comprised of many parts to make it easy to order.

Also my Zunsport Front Grill kit arrives today, I may run that down there to have them throw those on there as well.

j-dub

Thanks! interesting that the RS is half the price!

sin911

That is because the RS kit comes with the side fins and center piece only. It does not contain the piece that runs down the middle (the tunnel like piece) and the other pieces like control arm fins.

Alpha Ice

I've always liked the thought of some black colored side skirts, but for any Cayman they are really hard to find. Joe toth made some for th 987.1 which I actually still have. I might have to see if I can find a way to modify them to fit the 718. It would be nice to have some extra aero with the other pieces.
I do love the look and as you said, the black vents and sides balance out the rest of the car!

DriverDaily

There are a bunch of designs for the 981. I would think there's a good chance the side panels are identical to the 718. Something in the matte black plastic of the diffuser and lip would help create visual harmony.

IL_Pete

Got the car back with (1) the Kline Exhaust installed, (2) the Suncoast OEM Rear Diffuser Kit installed, and (3) the Zunsport Front Grills installed. Wow, on all three!!

The car is nearly perfect right now!! The Kline Exhaust sounds amazing with the Soul Street Headers and the BMC Air Filters, as it did in my GT4. With the two pieces of sound deadening removed from under the side compartments, it does sound pretty close to what the GT4 sounded like, as far as the louder / more present engine intake noise inside the cockpit. The Kline Exhaust with Headers is loud under full throttle and high RPMs, as you might imagine. It sounds insanely good with the windows down. With the windows up, you don't really get a feel for how loud it is on the outside, you need to be very careful how loud you rip with it depending where you are and who is around, as was the case with my GT4 last year with the same setup. The full exhaust and DeMan tune makes the car VERY quick, of course faster than a stock GT4, a tune will always make up for the detuning between the GT4/Spyder 414 HP versus the 394 HP of the GTS 4.0, and then some. Combine that with the DeMan short gearing, and this is the very best 718 4.0 I have ever owned. It is incredibly enjoyable to drive, and makes me laugh in joy when driven in a spirited fashion!

The GT4 Rear Diffuser looks AMAZING! I really didn't think it would make as much of a difference as it does. It completes the look of the car. It provides for a perfect visual balance of the top and bottom of the back of the car in combination with the FV Ducktail Spoiler. I was worried that the Rear Diffuser being beefier would throw the visual balance off front to rear with the stock GTS bumper, but I don't think it does, at all. The Zunsport Grills really finish the front, gives it a more polished and more GT4-like look, without having to go to the extent of doing the GT4 front bumper, which many of us here thought turned out to be overkill (myself included).

I really like it visually exactly the way it is now. I think I am completely done in that regard, with the exception of over the winter doing some coilovers to drop it 10mm or so. It handles great (I do have the DSC plus the TPC Rear Toe Links, and wider wheels and tires, which I think is a must for the GTS 4.0). So I am not in a huge hurry for the coilovers, but I do want to do them, for the visual drop and an incremental improvement for performance and handling. All in due time.

Pics here. (Sorry they aren't better pics - I will do some more later when the car is clean and it is a Sunny day.)















I feel like I am hitting the mark now for what I set out to do, to create a "GT4 Touring" sort of build with this GTS 4.0. It ticks all the boxes for me relative to my GT4 that I recently had and loved so much, in a more subtle wingless street car, with the benefit of being able to do the things you can do in the GTS 4.0, particularly the Full Bordeaux Red Leather Interior with Ventilated Seats and a Heated Steering Wheel. Other than the setting money on fire and throwing it out the window part of the GT4 front bumper fail, I am sort of glad that I tried that and it didn't work out, otherwise I wouldn't have figured out that I really do not want or need that for this build. You only really know when you try. (Setting money on fire and throwing it out the window is something I have developed a high resilience to. The total running costs of my Cayman R Track Car combined with my Son's Miata are fairly insane (most of which is the Cayman R), mods to this car are a rounding error in comparison. )

A little more work to do, but at a high level, the mission has been accomplished!! More details and comments on the nuances to follow.

Le Petit Garage

I am happy that you’ve found nirvana with this car. It’s been fun watching you try every combination throughout the years.

Im in a similar mindset where I often must try different things just to know, not to the extent you’ve done on the 718 cars though.

Have a great weekend

OldJedi

Pete, I’m glad that you found your happy place. The car looks great and I’m sure that it sounds awesome. Sorry that you didn’t like the GT4 bumper but maybe someone else on Rennlist will also like the idea of a GT4 Touring ​​​​ and can take it off of your hands. Or maybe you can use it as Porsche wall art. Either way, congratulations on making the car to your specs. And thanks again for all of your help and support on my project, it is truly appreciated. Enjoy your car and be safe.

UncleDude

I think when you drop it down the 10mm, it’ll look sensational. Agree the back looks good, it must be a beast of a car now with all those mods!

FazedChicken

Looks amazing! Couple questions on the insulation delete that you did:

1) Any guide or tutorial to get to these pieces? Do you have to take literally everything apart or is there a simpler way?

2) How much does that insulation weigh!

Attempting to do a 100lbs weight reduction on my car so every little bit helps! It's fun to find small places to cut out the weight (to me).

IL_Pete

I didn't take them out, the guys at DeMan Motorsport did. If you watch a video of installing the BMC Air Filters, you have to take a lot of those parts out in that area. So I asked them to take those two pieces out while they were already in there.

I weighed them for you just now - 2 pounds, 11 ounces.

FazedChicken

Thanks! Will find a video and figure it out. Is that 2lbs combined or for each side?

IL_Pete

For both sides combined. Also see any videos on removing the engine cover, you will see how to remove all the parts in that area, perhaps even see that sound deadening in the video - I don't recall.

I have the Glass Engine Cover as well, I may later have that installed.

Right now I have an issue with a vibration sound inside the cabin, I am not sure if it related to taking out the sound deadening or not. It starts about 5 minutes after starting a drive, and can be pretty annoying. With the windows down or cracked, it is not as noticeable, but with windows up it can be pretty maddening. As part of the troubleshooting process for that, I may try putting the sound deadening back in temporarily to see if that is a contributor to it. The full exhaust with headers creates more bassy frequencies, I wonder if it is something else vibrating in the car from that. I haven't isolated yet where the sound is coming from, my son says it is coming from behind us from the engine compartment, to me in the driver's seat it seems like it is coming from the dash somewhere.

The car is just about perfect, besides that one issue! Always something...

RoadrunnerGTS

@IL_Pete what is the DeMann ECU tune?.... is it rebranded M-Engineering?

What Coilovers were you thinking? I'm about to fit a set of B16DT's with a nose lift.

IL_Pete

I know Rick has a tuning partner, I am not sure who it is. It is something he has been doing for a long time, my Cayman R Race Car that he built has a 3.8L X51 911 Engine in it, and it has his tune as well. The tune is great in both cars!

I am not sure with regards to the coilovers yet. I still need to do some more research and make a decision. I am not in a huge hurry at this point. I look forward to hearing how you like the Bilsteins!