tyro

Put me in for one Jim.

reno808

Oddjob post this on the turbo forum

roman944

so how is this different from the Weltmeister one? for better or for worse?

JR944

That would be me and in the photo showing the original and duplicate (I wouldn't consider it a replica as it's EXACTLY reproduced) bar the original is mine. Jim borrowed it to make the new ones.

Just try finding a fabricator willing and able to build these. Good luck. The material is quite stout and the radius of the bends is huge. I believe Jim is pricing these to just break even as a service to a number of people who want one, but didn't get one a couple years ago.

Joe

Oddjob

done - thanks.


The big difference: the factory Cup bar requires the two mounting brackets to be welded to the shock towers - which will require painting to touch up the heat affected zone of the welds and to color match the brackets to the car. The bar itself is bolted in and removeable, but the welded brackets are a permanent modification. Therefore, the Cup bar is not for pristine street cars, and more for owners of modified Track, Race, DE, auto-x cars, etc.

If you want the factory look, this is it. If that doesnt matter to you, there are other options available that require less installation effort. All other aftermarket bars attach to the tops of the strut mounting bolts.

Having had two other brands of strut tower bars on my cars in the past, weltmeister and racing dynamics, I will say that the cup bar setup is more rigid. I thought the weltmeister bar (2nd version) was not a very good design and I am skeptical that it offered much if any stiffening. The racing dynamics bar was a reasonably stout piece, but had various clearance problems - rubbed both the center hood stiffener and the intake manifold.

The local p-car shop is mounting a brace to the cup bars that support the brake mater cylinders. Long term track/race cars are prone to cracking the firewall at the brake and/or clutch master cylinder mounting points due to constant heavy pedal pressure flexing the firewall. I cant think of another aftermarket strut bar that is stiff enough laterally to do this.

As with others, my initial thought was that this would be a very simple fab. I guessed that the originals were a batch built in-house at the Porsche Motorsport machine shop. But in discussing with various metal shops, I was quite surprised by how many were impressed with the difficulty of the bends and said they could not do it. The complex bends are in two planes, bent horizontal and vertical in the same section, and there is a big approx 8 ft radius bend against with width of the bar (1 3/16" wide).

DanR

I would agree on track especially when people are running sticky tires and pushing hard through the corners however for road cars running street tires I am sure that the benefits are far lower.

vette951s

I have discussed the fabrication of these bars at length with Oddjob. I wanted one for my new race car build and he actually encouraged me to build up an additional number of these bars to sell to the community. I never pulled the trigger and have decided not to. Sure I found a fabrication shop who could build them for less, but the finished product and steel specifications leaned more towards the farmer cut and fit spectrum. I finally found a shop with a proper laser cutter and computer aided metal bender which could reproduce the compound bends, etc. Believe me, Oddjob's pricing on these replica bars have the profit meter pointing more towards the benevolent 944 community supporter than to the greedy profiteer side.

Regarding if they are effective, my observation is that every Weissach built race 924/944/968 car had some sort of strut tower structural support augmentation.

John

Kool

I am in for one.

When will the buy take place?

Kool

I have a shop I do a lot of business with that this would be right up his alley.

If you need some good pricing I can probably beat whatever you get. In my general dealing with him he consistently beats landed cost from China vendors.

Let me know if you want me to send him a quote for this?

I am not in this for profit just want to help the community.

Oddjob/vette951s PM me if you want me to do anything.

I also have good relationships with Metric hardware vendors on the east coast. So I can probably help out there as well.

F18Rep

I don't know racing rules and lots of time things are done for good reason that goes right over my head but... I would sure consider some weldnuts. they're like, what, a quarter each. Heck the country boys around here would give me a hard time for tack-welding nuts like that. Just a thought.... Bruce

potent951turbo

Am I the only one that doesn't see any issues with the price? This is a quality piece that I know Jim has gone above and beyond to do his homework on in order to find a quality shop capable or replicating the original.

SamGrant951

+1, I have one installed from the initial run and its a quality made piece, the price is well worth it in my mind and I might pick up another just to hang onto.

Kool

Cheaper is always better.

My guy does a ton of this exact type of work. From the looks of the pictures you have a .5" bar with 2 bends and some holes and a part that is cut in the flat with a little forming and welding.

I am just trying to help. If there is no interest then no skin off my back. I just want to offer a source of good cheap fab work.

ibkevin

That is an outstanding point Eddie!

tifosiman

Nope, you aren't the only one..................I love mine and am grateful that Jim did that first run.

It's just the typical 944 crowd. Remember, this is the same crowd that thinks a timing belt is too expensive and difficult to deal with so they think it would be no problem and cheaper to invent a low-cost aftermarket timing chain to fix the problem instead.