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Good feedback, thank you. If you bought your car new and only keep it for 2-3yrs, then no need to worry about OEM strut failures I guess. My impression is most 911 owners keep their cars a lot longer than 2yrs and value retaining OEM parts in good condition for resale.
Not many people mod 991 on this forum nor the chassis has been out long enough for strut failures with lowering springs. There was a member with stock suspension on the 991 and the struts leaked. Rare case, but good thing he's not running after market springs of he'll be be out about $1,000 for one strut + labor.
Here's a good example of a 997.2s with 7,500mi, strut fail after installing springs for 500mi. $2,500 for new parts and could've spent it on Bilstein or KW full coils. That's just a quick search. https://rennlist.com/forums/997-foru...ease-help.html
Of course it's marketing. No matter what they say, Porsche spent way more hours perfecting the spring to strut performance (for ideal street and performance use). It's hard to match that. Spring rates have to go up if you reduce strut travel, there's no avoiding that or you'll bottom out. The only way you'll "improve" handling is to purchase full adjustable coilover and keep tweaking based on the feel of the car. That may require many track weekends to figure out.
Talk to anyone in the strut business who has an unbiased assessment about strut performance/reliability and after market springs, they'll be happy to send data if they have it.
FWIW, I had a KW HAS kit on an M3 for 4+ years that had shocks similar to adjustable dampening shocks that are on our 991s. I never had any problems.
But yeah whenever you modify a car you always run the risk of potential problems. I found multiple examples of people with issues with the bilstein damptronic shocks and that's what made me finally go with KW and keep the factory Porsche shocks. Here's a quick example.
Good feedback, thank you. If you bought your car new and only keep it for 2-3yrs, then no need to worry about OEM strut failures I guess. My impression is most 911 owners keep their cars a lot longer than 2yrs and value retaining OEM parts in good condition for resale.
Not many people mod 991 on this forum nor the chassis has been out long enough for strut failures with lowering springs. There was a member with stock suspension on the 991 and the struts leaked. Rare case, but good thing he's not running after market springs of he'll be be out about $1,000 for one strut + labor.
Here's a good example of a 997.2s with 7,500mi, strut fail after installing springs for 500mi. $2,500 for new parts and could've spent it on Bilstein or KW full coils. That's just a quick search. https://rennlist.com/forums/997-foru...ease-help.html
Of course it's marketing. No matter what they say, Porsche spent way more hours perfecting the spring to strut performance (for ideal street and performance use). It's hard to match that. Spring rates have to go up if you reduce strut travel, there's no avoiding that or you'll bottom out. The only way you'll "improve" handling is to purchase full adjustable coilover and keep tweaking based on the feel of the car. That may require many track weekends to figure out.
Talk to anyone in the strut business who has an unbiased assessment about strut performance/reliability and after market springs, they'll be happy to send data if they have it.
Yep all good, happy to learn more about the potential positives and negatives of all mod options... this is what we're here for. Worst case in the 1% chance something happens and I need new struts I pull the KW HAS, sell it on Rennlist, and get a set of Bilsteins.
I put JRZ coilovers in. $3800 with springs. ~$500 labor including corner balancing. My car didn't come with PASM. Base as base can be. Really love my car now.
In the kit in the OP, are the new control arms required to get a normal alignment back?
Or are the new control arms just for the extended adjustability?
I imagine that might be quite different for front and rear given the multi-link suspension in the rear. It should keep the wheel in place even when lower, no?
Very strange situation. Wrote Chuck several times by email and here in DM, but no any response. I have race in Sunday and very frustrated. I already cuted off the OEM lower perch. So can't use again stock coils.
Sorry for your issues but I'm not surprised. It's a patch work solution at best. As I said in the beginning of this thread, you're much better off with a high end adjustable damper with specific shocks for your valving. Done this too many times to be fooled again. Good luck and hopefully they'll get you sorted.
Very strange situation. Wrote Chuck several times by email and here in DM, but no any response. I have race in Sunday and very frustrated. I already cuted off the OEM lower perch. So can't use again stock coils.
It's a holiday weekend here so not surprising if you weren't getting any response. They'll probably get back to you tomorrow.
I had my KW's installed last week and am very pleased so far. You'll probably feel the same once everything is sorted.
08-05-2016 | 05:59 PM
