I would agree. I put Knoni's on my 87 and regret staying with the stock springs. It's still too soft IMO.

I have an 89 that's almost finished and we put Ebach springs with Koni's on it. In a couple of weeks I will be able to do a side by side comparison. (If it doesn't snow first).

 

A friend put Koni/Eibach's on their GT while they were doing autocross and tracking the car, and were very happy with the setup in that environment.

The car is now strictly street, and the suspension is way too stiff. It is so stiff that the fear is that the pounding will cause the ECU or some other connection/component to prematurely fail.

The original shocks/springs would have been reinstalled, but were sold a long time ago when the Koni's were installed.

 

Most people are building these cars for oem stock setting. And these people are also mostly past or at middle age. So the soft/stock settings make sense.

Current modern cars cars are quite stiff. Very stiff. Go drive a new bmw or smaller Mercedes without automatic suspensions - almost “nervous” as is described here.

I drove a GT3. Flinty stiff and loved it.

 

I can't speak for the gamut of German Camry clones (they all look the same to me and when you drive them ... but that's another thread) ...

... but the modern Porsches are able to have less body motion (roll, pitch, squat) while being less harsh and not nervous at all and do it with giant 20" rims.

As per DrB's post: the untutored - i.e. those that manufactures seem to seek out for their marketing focus groups - seem to equate stiff with good handling and stiffer with even better handling. IMO, in many cases manufacturers make a car stiffer to hide handling deficiencies (most commonly catastrophic understeer) behind a thin veil of "stiffness."

 

As the guy who bought them in post #2, I did buy them for the GT and while I don't track cars, this one will be for spirited driving in the north GA mountains etc.

If I want cushy/comfortable I can jump in the 87 or 88 or for a little more suspension, the 93 GTS and worst case I can put the stock springs back in.

While middle age (52) I don't expect this to be much stiffer than the Bilsteins and springs in the 996, albeit its a lighter car.

 

996, 997, or a 991 GT3?

 

I did 2 hours at PDE in Long Beach.

991 GT3

If I am a repeat customer (1k a pop) I can maybe drive the RS

 

Brendan, very nice, I would love to drive one properly on the back roads for a day.

According to the GT3 guys, the 996 GT3 is the most brutal suspension-wise, with each successive version softer and more compliant. They say it is the rawest by far, and it's a major reason why one either likes it or not. The guys that don't appreciate the punishment will buy the 997 or 991 GT3 instead.

So really, it all boils down to personal preference, as usual. In our case over here, we have our street-legal, fully-caged racecars to zip around in on the weekend, but would never want them as daily drivers constantly beating us up.

And because we do have our racecars to jump in and out of is why we all really appreciate the balance of the stock GT/sport suspension on 18" wheels.

 

Absolutely. It is really subjective. I would say you guys up der in the Chi-Wis area have it better at least in the summer. We have "cats eyes" on the highway (and you don't, because... Snow plows) and they really make the highway less enjoyable if you have a car which reacts badly to them. A 928 with big wheels and a jiggly suspension can make you wince.

 

Certainly 87 to 95 they are all the same springs front and rear. Sport/GT was the Boge red shocks or maybe special order Bilsteins but the springs were all the same.
The only different springs were the CS/SE front springs but they are unobtainium.

 

Roger, I'm pretty sure the GT front springs are 10% stiffer than S4/GTS.

 

Nope - popular 928 myth.

 

Put a set of Eibach/Bilsteins on my GT and like an idiot, tossed the stock springs and Boges. I should have at least kept the stock springs.
I wouldn't say horrible or bad when I compare the E/B setup to the stock (albeit tired) setup that was on the GT. I do agree with the harsher-than-stock ride that the E/B combo provides - particularly when setting out on a cold day before they aren't warmed up, but the overall handling in all road conditions was vastly improved over the GT's stock springs and tired Boges.
I agree with you Dave, when you say they feel "nervous" when straight line highway cruising.
Since I don't track the GT, and the S4 that I do track has Koni/Hypercoils, a swap would probably make the most sense..
..but that's down the list for sure.

I had heard mention of GT springs over the years, but I'll put that notion down as a myth. Does the GT require special blinker fluid ?

 

The CS springs were about 10% stiffer.

When the springs were made, there were minor differences between the springs and they were marked to make sure a soft spring didn't get paired with a stiffer spring. Porsche does do some "cherry picking" of parts, when they assemble cars, without necessarily acknowledging what they did. For instance, all the "GT" cylinder heads are stamped "GT"......although there isn't any difference acknowledged in the parts system.

It would not shock me to learn that they picked the springs with the highest spring rate (among the assorted stock springs), for the GT cars.....I certainly would have.

 

Okay, thank you Roger and Greg.