Bill Verburg

It's not bad 4 bolts is all that is need to undo after the undertrays and heat duct are off.

it's a lot easier if the rear control arms are off too. AN air chisel is going to be very desireable to remove the old ones.

MB965 just did it this past winter in his home shop. Matbe he'l comment

Bill Verburg

the TRGs are just too big, they interfere w/ the brake vacuum can and are an all around PIA

The only monoballs I have are the shock tops and the rear tow links. The latter I was forced into because it just wouldn't stay aligned w/ the stock toe links. Tarret toe links are available w/ locks to keep the alignment solid

all RS and ERP hard rubber bushes(RS rear ERP front on mine), RS uprights, RS sways, solid side mounts , proper ride height and a good corner balance/ alignment makes for a very tight, nice handling package

fast_freddy

Just picked up the solid side mounts and will be installing them in short while. Thanks for the heads up/tip! Paul thanks you for the business.

Bill Verburg

Just be sure that the top piece is thick enough to allow it to seat fully. Early versions were too thin and allowed the side piece to contact the body seam. You just need a few 1000s clearance. The trouble spots are the leading mounts.

Bill Verburg

be sure that there is clearance between the side piece and the body seam, some of the tops aren't thick enough to prevent contact. If that happens the mounts don't seat properly

NP993

Bill do those pictures show a properly-seated mount, or a situation where there isn't enough clearance, Clarence?

Bill Verburg

They are good, as long as a feeler gauge can get in between the aluminum side and the body seam it's ok.

fast_freddy

Installed the solid side mounts tonight. That was pretty quick and dirty. The forward top passenger side spark plug, not so much. That I had to take the exhaust off to get at the shroud to take that off to get at the plug. What a pain in the ***.

In regards to the solid side mounts I have a couple of questions:

• They seem to be shorter and locate the suspension assembly higher up in the car, does that create any issues?
• In terms of what Bill described above (clearance) it seems as though it runs right up against the body but they seated just fine. 90 ft lbs is lots-o-torque too. Here's a few crappy phone pics one of the solid mounts the other of one of the front A-Arms.

Also, the screws that secure the distributor cap are really on there (I'm changing the rotors). Is there any secret to getting them off other than torque? There seems to be a star shaped washer under the screw, would it help to compress that to unscrew the screw?

Again, many thanks for the help you all have given, especially Bill. This has been a fun/rewarding/frustrating (ABS sensors, spark plug, dist cap screw) project, but most certainly worth it. I wish I did it in March though.

Bill Verburg

It appears from you pic that you are ok, the aluminum cannot be touching the seam, as long as a feeler gauge can be slid in it's fine. As I said I know for a fact that early versions were too thin.

yes, the subframe is raised up into the chassis, it lowers the road height, it helps to restore geometry at lowered height, similar to what RS uprights do in front.

Don't forget that all the rubber bushes need to be indexed to the final ride height.

Haven't you heard May is the new March, snow is in the forecast at higher elevations for the next few days.

last thing to consider for next year is a set of Tarret rear toe links w/ locks. I'd see how well the alignment holds up first thought. The Tarrets are the first mod that has really degraded the ride for casual street use. I wouldn't use them unless it's almost totally a track car.

MarinS4

I am surprised to hear you say that. On my last 993tt I did EPR toe links and upper arms without any change in ride quality. I wonder if its because you did the sub frame mounts and now the toe links provide the first solid link to the cabin from the wheels?

alexl911

Bill: you're the 993 meister! But, I have another question: Please explain what you mean by "...the bushes need to be indexed to the final ride height"???

Bill Verburg

w/ all rubber bushes the the inner face is fixed to the chassis and the outer is fixed to the suspension arm. The rubber connecting them flexes in torsion. This flex is not unlimited. So before they are solidly bolted in place the arms need to be roughly(as close as possible) in their final orientation wrt the chassis. If this isn't done then the rubber can be over flexed and this will lead to premature failure. I suspect that many of the cars that have been lowered and then latter had bushing issues suffer from this.

the procedure is outlined in the shop manuals.

w/ p/u or monoballs this isn't necessary as the control arms w/ these types of bush are free to rotate

trophy

Indexing reduces the pre-load caused by the bushings binding when lowering (or raising) the ride height. This pre-load effectively increases the spring rate.

If you ever re move your front strut (with stock rubber bushings in the arms) you will notice that the arm doesn't swing down and hit the floor, it is held up by the pre-load in the rubber bushings.

A good way to reduce the pre-load (and effective decrease or increase in spring rate) is to then loosen the mounting bolts holding the are releasing the pre-load and then tightening the mounting bolts.

trophy

Bill is a faster typer than me........

fast_freddy

Finished the car last night with the Evo tie rods, oil change, brake bleed and toe adjustment (just to get it to make it "streetable"). All in all it took around 30 man hours to do everything which includes:

• R&R F&R suspension bushings
• R&R Rear suspension subframe sidemounts with Rennline solid sidemounts
• R&R Front uprights, bearings, ABS sensors (including spending a solid 90 minutes trying to get the old ones out which didn't work) The good news is the new ones went in in about 5 minutes with plenty of anti seize.
• R&R Tie Rods
• R&R Spark plugs - as noted before eleven of them are easy, one of them not so much.
• R&R battery with Odyssey dry cell and Rennline carrier
• Oil/filter change
• Replace brake pads
• Flush/Bleed brakes

I'm going to finish the alignment tonight with my handy dandy kinematic toe tool. No alignment shop in the area wants to touch the car... Thats ok. I made some jigs late last night to get the toe and camber settings just right as well as two very long straight edges out of maple (it's jointed perfectly straight) for reference points. Still have to figure out how to make a workable jig for the caster settings.