MJBird993

I've noticed the same thing with my past cars (964, 993, 996, 997) that Porsche really doesn't care to do anything to reduce road noise other than a bit of carpet on the floors. Any kind of road debris that gets picked up by the tire and flung against the wheel well makes quite a racket as well. I think the "fuzzy wheel well stuff" would be a great start, if you can find the material and figure out a way to attach it to the car in such a manner that it can be removed later on if you decide it isn't working or want to return to stock.

In the past, I've taken out car interiors to add sound insulation, and that does help significantly, but it's a real PITA.

Please keep us posted to any solutions.

Chrono

My 997 has less tire noise than my '04 Maxima! An ever-so-slight out of balance wheel can result in "roar". So can worn wheel bearings.

John's 991

Brad, my experience is similar to yours. I am almost through my second set of Pirelli's at 8,200 miles and lots of track days. I have a set of MPSS that will be installed after the next couple of track days.

chuck911

Car audio guys who are really serious about this will glue lead sheet all over the place, hundreds of pounds of it. They use lead because when it comes to stopping sound fuzzy stuff doesn't really do all that much. What's needed to stop sound is a combination of mass and stiffness. Lead is massive and becomes stiff when bonded to the body, so there you go. This will kill road noise pretty much across the spectrum. The downsides are both the weight, and the fact that in order to work it needs to be bonded, which pretty much kills resale value. But this is by far the most effective option and you could probably get 90% of the benefit by using caulk instead of glue.

Another thing to check is holes in the body. The body has lots of holes, and while they are all filled with rubber grommet seals that keep out moisture they aren't very good at stopping sound. In fact they act like little rubber speakers transmitting sound right into the cabin. I know from sound-proofing home theater rooms that plugging up a few seemingly insignificant holes can do more than thousands of dollars of sound-proofing elsewhere. Find every hole you can and cover it with a nice thick layer of caulk or sealant.

But I'm pretty sure that no matter what you do it will always turn out that the music sounds best with the car parked and the motor off. In a nice quiet parking garage.