Archimedes

stout

At some point, decisions were made to remove the seatbelt mounting bosses and other gear associated with rear seats. Weight savings were noted, as RoW cars didn't have rear seats, either, and the unibody's "butt pans" apparently got lighter at some point, too. At another point, it was decided to not sell a "harness bar" of any kind in the U.S. like those that were available for 996 GT3s and GT2s through various channels (and were definitely not proper roll bars...remember the "blades" that punched through the floorpan?). At still another point, it was decided to delete even the mounting bosses for safety cages. A lot of this happened in the 997 era, and is made worse with the 981/991 platform due to its aluminum/steel construction—which requires special welding techniques across different materials and, I'm told, other hurdles in terms of safe welding. And then you have the passenger LWB sub-hole thing.

I too feel there should be a way to get factory engineered safety gear into a U.S. GT2, GT3, or GT4 if one wants it. If it needs to be back door, fine. If Porsche needs to issue a strong statement that it does not recommend the stuff in U.S. cars and here's why, that's fine by me too. What I am not, however, is a lawyer. So I am not sure how the liability thing plays out—and the M4 may be a different kettle of fish when it comes to what's possible. Or not. But there is someone at PCNA that I could talk to. Can't promise when or what the outcome would be—or that I'd even be able to share the results of it, but I'll try and do so next time the time is "right" to have that conversation. It would be really nice to see factory-engineered safety gear made available in North America, but my suspicion is it isn't as easy as we think it is. Or, maybe it is.

ipse dixit

BMW was able to get the rollcage in the U.S. edition of the BMW M4 GTS because of the number of cars imported into the U.S.

Only 301.

So I guess that begs the question. Would you rather have the option of the OEM rollcage but have the GT3/GT2 RS limited to 301 copies?

Nizer

Good luck. I'll certainly be rooting for you. 981/991 complexity is a read herring but you know that.


Still not buying it. Jeep sells over 750k Wranglers annually in US, each one with essentially a full cage. And again, if they don't want to do it they should provide a safe way for customers to do it themselves. That, or stop marketing and promoting the cars as track cars.

stout

Kind of. Unlike 987/997, which used unibodies that go back to the 1990s-era 986/996, the 981/991 was a clean sheet and integrated a lot of different metals—particularly aluminum. Would be interesting to hear a race shop weigh in on this as an outsider, but as I understand it, the lack of mounting bosses are a big deal after the car is built—requiring not only welding across differing materials but also removal of some things that might be flammable. Possible? Yes, he said. Reasonable may be a different matter.

Jeep is an interesting point. BMW also. Suspect it comes down to distances, and wonder if trucks or off-road vehicles get a pass or an exemption that 911s don't?

And yes, common sense says: Fine, just make it possible for the customer to do it later. Sadly, liability doesn't work that way—even if you and I agree it should and people will be cool. Would be nice if we could at least get cars with those mounting points...