KuHL 951

I've had a few FWD cars and they are fun on tight courses under 70mph but I've never felt safe in one for high speed stability. The 944/951 are unbelieveably stable above 100mph for a car their age The Maxima SE on high speed sweepers was the scariest car in transition I've ever owned. I wouldn't dare take that thing on some routes where I've cruised at 145mph in the 951. My Q45 handles better than the Maxima I had. YMMV

Blue S2

The 944 is still amazingly competent compared to new cars. First of all, shy of high performance German sports cars...there is still no car out there ive driven with the feel of a 944 and the communication it instills between driver and road.

There are cars out there that will outhandle a 944, but they are generally not stock and seldom FWD. My GTI is far from normal, and handles insanely...but I can say immediately its limits are far from the 944s. I've witnessed my 944 in action, and in random emergency situations on the road at higher speeds, and im convinced i would not been so fortunate in the same situation in any other car. (Porsches not included!)

And there is something special about driving a car that needs a driver to drive. No computer in the 944 running the show. No e-gas, no e-brakes, no traction control, no nothing. All those help...but something still very special about driving a car like the 944. There is a connection that you just don't get from many modern cars.

Legoland951

Michael, the 944 was around $30k out the door back in the mid 80s. Its probably equivalent to about $50-$60 in today's market. Eyal, I don't know how you are getting oversteer more than the 951 or any oversteer whatsoever in a FWD car unless your suspension is set up improperly. Are you sure you are not pulling on the parking brake handle?

FRporscheman

Plastic trays under the rear tires...

My uncle had a 928, then a 928S (now dad's car), then a 944 (now mom's car), then a bunch of other garbage. He recently got an '04 525i. Every time we get together he mentions how he wants a 928 or 944 again... So I take it the 944 handles better (or at least is more fun to drive) than a new 525i.

Eyal 951

The Integra is setup very well, and is extremely quick. Its extremely neutral when driving it properly, but on the track, I can get the car to rotate with a lift of the pedal. Obviously I'm not doing MAD driftos, but its much more manipulative and responds to your inputs. I usually run in red group with the car, and don't have any issues keeping up and/or passing. I haven't had the porsche (with STOCK suspension) on track yet, but all that thing does is understeer. (OK, it will oversteer, but you have to admit these things are understeer happy, at least in corner entry)
I'd have no reservations about putting the integra up against that spec car you want to build, and expecting the integra to pull quicker times.
Eyal

Legoland951

What is the HP rating on the integra? I believe the original post is about handling and not HP and track times. Also, with 135 RWHP, some of the guys are getting around 1:35 at Willow big track. What does your car get? With a stock 86 n/a, I can understeer or oversteer to the point it spins around into a turn (ask Kelly Chiu... oops). I don't think you are going to contend that front wheel drive cars don't understeer compared with rear wheel drive cars. Its the nature of the beast. I just don't understand why you oversteer more in the GSR than the 951. You enter the turn as fast as you can in a front wheel drive car and there is absolutely no reason to lift throttle (slow down) to induce oversteer. If you are having understeering problems in the 951 into a turn, I think you are driving it like a front wheel car. I am no stranger to front wheel cars and know there are 8 second quarter mile front engine cars so I know these cars make power. They are to be driven very differently than a RWD car and I have never heard anyone wanting to oversteer in a FWD car.

Porsche-O-Phile

Actually, thinking about it - the Boxster-S I test-drove handled better than the 944, but that's just based on seat-of-the-pants comparison, not any kind of hard numbers. Might have to do with my particular driving style too. I just liked the feel of the mid-engined car a lot more. Not that I don't like the feel of a 944 (I love it) but the Boxster certainly had a lot more zing and was a helluva lot more agile - and it was a convertable. The reasons we didn't end up buying it were: (1) cost (didn't want a car payment and the dealership was asking way too much, IMO), (2) insurance (it's enough of a rip-off out here as-is without having to carry full coverage on a new car to protect a bank), (3) depreciation (seems to me the 986s have some of the worst depreciation characteristics of any car out there), (4) warranty (it was rather limited on that particular one and the cost of repairs on a newer vehicle scares the crap out of me), (5) newer car - I inherently am REALLY leery of anything newer than about 1990 or so. Too much g-damned electronic sh*t in vehicles that's impossible to diagnose and expensive as all hell to repair without dedicated and highly expensive equipment.

In other words, nothing about the CAR was bad (other than the over-abundance of expensive electronics crap that I could do without) - it was all other stuff that kept me away from it. Certainly no complaints about the handling. With a prepped suspension and sticky tires, I bet a 987 would whallop the crap out of quite a few vehicles at the track and probably shock a lot of people. . . It gave me a real "WOW, this car has SERIOUS performance potential" feeling.

I'm fairly certain there will be a Boxster (more likely a Boxster-S) in my future, given how fast they depreciate. Back to the question at hand though, I'd love to see how a well-built 914 or 2nd-gen MR2 or similar vehicle stacks up. Personally I think either could walk all over a 944, 951 or any FWD vehicle out there.

Plus, big tires on the front wheels just looks stupid and a FWD car doing a burnout always makes me laugh, even if it DOES have big HP numbers, just 'cause it looks so dumb.

I love the 944 for what it is - simple and pretty basic at its heart. It doesn't overly rely on a lot of silly electronics crap to do what it does - the basic engineering (50/50) is simple and works well. I'd personally LOVE to pick up a 914 to tinker with 'cause they're so basic and easy to work on, but finding one without rust issues is difficult. Another thing to like about the 944 I guess. . . The galvanized construction resists rust very well.

Legoland951

When I was at Streets of Willow, the fastest car out there was a 914. He was oscillating the throttle to adjust which direction his front end was pointing. He absolutely kicked everything else's butt out there and outcornered and outpowered a modified 500hp Z06 vette on top of every 996, WRX, Acura, or anything out there at will as if they were standing still. I am not sure what he had under the hood but I could hear him even in the back straights of the 1.8 mile course.

BTW, Jeff, you stay up way too late...

tomrc

I drove a 1999 Miata Sport at an autoX twice and thought it was very close in handling with my 944. It felt real close in power and handling I just didn't care for the brakes much, they were hard to modulate.

Unfortunately the '99 Miata Sports are rare cars only so many made and all the autoX'ers snatched them up already.

Porsche-O-Phile

Not stayin' up late, gettin' up early! Almost time to go to work!

Izzy

Having been shopping for something exotic when I considered selling the 911, I inquired about and test drove the new Z06 Corvette (didn't have money for that but wanted to drive it anyways), a '95 somethingorother 911 AWD at Porsche, a Lotus Elise next door, the 2006 Mustang (not the GT), and a Viper some years ago. So we have most of the 'great' American 'sports cars' listed here.

The Viper and Corvette both handled almost similarly, if anything the Viper I drove 5 years ago handled similarly to the newer Corvette. Both cars feel like they have too much power for their body/suspension, the Viper was on track and each turn I could break out the rear very easily. You had to physically fight against losing traction and the suspension wasn't stiff enough stock.

The Mustang was just pure garbage. Weight might have been a factor in the handling, but it definitely felt front-heavy. I don't even know how to describe the handling oversteer understeer? It felt like this OLD cigarette speedboat I had, similar to going 70mph in the water the mustang was SLOW to respond.

Lotus Elise I can't trash talk THAT much, but the car feels too light for a change. Decent acceleration but it handles like a Quattro gokart

The 911 AWD (do I even know what I'm talking about?) handled like a dream, but the AWD doesn't make any sense... wouldn't the car push out more hp without the driveline power loss of a second differential? And power to a SECOND axle?

Now with all these cars, most of them handled pretty well driving offensively. Awesome handling on the street and when you want to step on the gas a little. My S2 feels like a cinderblock on wooden wheels on the street, but the second I got that car onto the track, it blew the rest out of the water. The issue with other cars are, they build the suspensions for the street and almost for luxury driving. The 944 is a purebred German car meant for one thing, the track.

Royal Tiger

The Carrera 4 is so non-Walter Rohl types can drive it in the rain with out killing innocent motorists. I love the WRX STi, but it's a different type of car from a 944/951/968 or even a 911. Built for a different purpose and appeals to a different type of driver.

M758

If you use modern tires and fresh, but stock suspension parts a 944 NA or 951 will handle better than any econobox hands down. It will also handle better that 95% of stock front wheel drive cars. Most front wheel drive cars when pushed suffer baldly from understeer when stock. Sure they can be modified, but I am talking stock vs stock.

Now I have an e39 530i. Nice car great handling with factory sport package. It does very well for a car if its size and in many ways is sharper than my 951 S. I think that however is due to old shocks on my 951. However while the 530 can be driven nicely at speed and is fun in corners, the 951 is just better. At lot of this has to due with weight. The 951 is just so much more tossalbe and responsive since weighs so much less.

The down side to the 944 and 951 however is the suspension design. The cars are a bit soft in general and suffer from too much camber change. So they lag behind many modern sports cars in that respect. They are however very competant machines.

In their day they were some of the best in the world. Today they are better than most modern cars that are simply cars. They are better than most sport sedans because they have less weight. However compared to new sports cars in a similar original price range they are lacking. This is not to mean they are bad, but the newer cars have better done a much better job of cornering stiffness while maintainig ride comfort.

Hey we can't forget the suspension design dates back to the 70's and earlier. Porsche ditched the t-bars and semi trailing arms long ago. Struts are still used up front in many cars, but they have been improved to a great degree.

The one area the 944 line still shines is balance. That comes from the engine and chassis placement which gives the cars their unique balance and even few modern cars don't have. Hell the 911 of today still has the engine hung out the back. That creates an inherent imbalance.

H2

I have an Audi TT Quattro 225 '02 and a I have to agree although I much prefer driving my Porsches. I'm thinking of selling the TT because I don't drive it that much. Only 20k plus miles.

HH

michaelathome

IIRC, the early 944's ('83) started out w/a MSRP of around 18K and went up from there with options. By '86 I think they were still in the low to mid 20's range. Obviously 951's and later 944S' S2's and 968's were increasingly more expensive. I can't find the linky that showed the pricing but none the less 18K in yesterdays $'s would be in the mid 30's today.

http://www.westegg.com/inflation/

Taking a fully loaded '86 951, at about 30K you are looking at 50K in todays $'s.

The 944 was not an econo-sports car. It may have been the lowest price Porsche offering but it was not cheap. As a comparison my 1984 Volvo was 14K new off the lot.

I think the question was how modern cars compare and I think that if you spent 18K in today's $'s there is no way that a new car could hold up against the 944. Now flip that around and spend 30K and you will find a lot more capable cars. 50K and you have quite a few cars that could give the 944's and 951's a run for their money if not out perform them.

Michael