Just wondering what the general thought of this style chassis brace was.

http://www.rsbarn.com/968chassisbrace.html

I think its a sound idea but wondering if anyone has first hand experience using one. Brey Krause makes one also but its about 3x the price and does not list a 951 application.

My main concern with this is the reduction in ground clearance.. i feel like if this comes in contact with anything under the car it can easily get ripped off.. essentially ripping out the caster blocks causing a very unsafe condition and obviously severe damage at speed. Also while it lists a 951 application, i wonder about clearance with non stock exhausts (like a 3'' SFR midpipe).

I figure with the ground clearance issues, it can be something i swap on and off before track days as install is relativley simple and install does not alter alignment.

 

I've had the brey krause on my 951 and 968, on the 968 it changed the handling very noticeably, couldn't say I noticed a lot of change on the 951, but that could be due to other issues, I would always use some sort of brace in the future.

Oh yeah and I did hit something with it, aluminium is not that strong..

Removing it when the car is on the ground or on a jack is not feasible, take my word for it.

 

I wanted to make one for my car, but when looking at the underside of the car I realized that with my stock exhaust there is not a straight shot between the two caster blocks. I would have had to lower the bar beneath the exhaust parts to get it to clear, which would have been too low for my preference so I didn't end up making one.

 

hmmm the castor block and bolt in the 968 had less rubber i think so that could kind of help explain Rods rod experience ..
I am a strong believer in the the concept.... you can install a pointer and pen on a brace and measure the chasis flex there as they did in the days before load cells

 

Can also be found from D9

 

yeh my exhaust is 4" at point so its a real challenge

 

Same castor blocks in both cars, probably more that I have driven the 968 harder at the track,no question it stiffened the front considerably.

Don't have the crossover on my 968 turbo so I have room for a x brace

 

What exactply are you doing for the cross brace?

That makes me wonder about making one of those for my car...

 

Something fabricated to connect to the crossmember is what I am thinking of, but my car is work in (slow) progress...

 

i regular piece of flat 3/8 thick steel with 4 holes would do the job and take ten minutes you could drill the holes closer and have a simple jacking screw for preload.but that would take a little welding but a big biulding clamp on the out side of the caster blocks while fitting would do the job .

 

Thingo, are you saying that the bar bent / broke before damage to the mounts occurred?

I did see the D9 underbody brace but do not like how you are required to use different rear caster blocks. Also when compared to the Brey Krause bar, the RSBarn one says it can be installed without changing the alignment.

Here is another picture of the RSBarn brace. It looks like it hangs down pretty low which really makes me iffy on running one. Because i say i will swap it on and off for track only use, but i am lazy...and it will end up staying on all the time .

http://www.968forums.com/index.php?s...ic=3898&st=100

I did think about just using a piece of flat bar stock and drill the holes to fit, but fabricating the mounts is where i think id come into some trouble. I do alot of welding but dont have the patience to make something myself in this case .

If anyone happens to have one of these, i would love a picture from under the car looking straight back. Most of the pictures i see are angled so its hard to judge just how far down this sits on the car.

 

Yes the aluminium bent and cracked, it does sit pretty low but it isn't normally a problem i you watch where you are going

I can't find any pics at the moment sorry, I prefer the brey krause myself, it looks nice polished up.

 

That picture seems to illustrate that you need to have a stock size exhaust for it to fit and on a lower car it is going to have some clearance problems. I'd rather not risk tearing something off at speed.
There is still the school of thought that even with one of these fitted and a top mount brace, you are just creating a parallelogram that can still shift with lateral forces? Very difficult to create some triangulation though...

 

An X -Brace is a good idea, we considered it when I redid my front suspension,
but there is simply no space.

The dilemma I see that a brace would mean something for a trackcar.
But track cars are also lowered and any brace would reduce the clearance.

 

When I start working on my trans mount at school sometime this week I'm going to look at the possibility of making a bolt-in brace that will cross between the two hat channels/frame rails. They'd be farther back than the caster blocks so that they could clear around the exhaust and not hang really low. It obviously wouldn't be as supportive as one directly between the caster blocks, but I would think it would still increase rigidity.

For adding a piece of flat bar stock between the caster blocks, how would that change your caster settings? If you simply drill two holes in each end so that it mounts on the caster block bolts (and assuming you have the 968 style blocks) the caster block should still be able to adjust the angle underneath the bar. The bolt holes that hold the caster blocks inplace don't move.