silverboy

Hi all,

In the ideal world I guess I should just buy both the shocks and the complete under chassis mods (dog bones, toe steer kit, anti-sway bars...etc).

But sadly I got a family to feed and have to choose.

Which should I buy first? B16 Damptronics or the under chassis mods?

On the shocks I was considering perhaps Motons but am freaked out on dialing them in.

I track about six times a year.

Thanks and wish everyone a happy Christmas in advance!

Peter

911SLOW

First mod for every GT owner IMO should be adjustable rear toe arms killing the eccentric bolts.
From there the sky is the limit. : )

The 997 guys will tell you more..

silverboy

Thanks Slow!

mooty

1. get rid of the family, buy more cars.
2. if you only do 6 days a year. get toe links and locking plates if you must. everything else are not needed. the oem shock is very good, indeed. dog bones dont do anything until you really track the car A LOT, say 30+ days a year or AX a lot. you dont need any monoballs based on your description of how you use the car.
3. save the money, until you start to track more. then i'll help you burn the benjamins like you would not believe.

CRex

I was in similar shoes a while ago. My advice: don't mess with the shocks/springs if you street drive more than you track. The NVH tradeoffs just don't make sense. Whatever shocks you go with, adjustable or otherwise, they're bound to be stiffer than your OEM PASMs. My .1 RS developed 3x more rattles & squeaks after I put on KW V3s and it got so bad in the end that it was like a Noah's Ark.

Sway bars, LCA monoballs, toe steer and dog bones will be my order of business if I have to do it again.

But looking back I'd invest the dollars in upgrading my skills first. My incoming .2RS is staying stock until I beat my laptime target on my hometrack

(Ok, maybe I'll put on a sharky before then... but that's about it)

P.J.S.

hardware and sway bars first
then motons or whatever you choose
just my opinion if you don't do it all at once

silverboy

Thanks for the excellent feedback guys.

Just to provide more clarity - the car is driven aggressively 60% of the time it goes out since there's no speed limit here especially in the back roads. So although I don't similar G's as compared to a track it can get pretty hairy too.

But I guess the verdict is to upgrade the hardware to varying degrees depending on my cash burn rate before the shocks.

Nizer

Here are my thoughts FWTW:

- taking rubber out of suspension is easy (install and set once then pretty much forget) with little downside in terms of comfort (I noticed zip). Noticeable gain on track will be modest but will make for more confident, reactive drive. Expect about a $4-5k hit to change all out unless you plan to install yourself.

- changing out shocks doesn't make sense without also doing springs. impact on street comfort will be noticeable and potentially quite large depending on how aggressive you go. Initial investment based on what I've seen can range from $5k - $15k including the install. expect some follow-on costs to dial in setup.

- you'll know when you're fast enough to warrant a shock/spring upgrade because you'll start getting a lot more vertical movement in the car than comfortable. personally, I'd hold off on changing out shock/springs for as long as possible or until I started using more dedicated track rubber, in which case you really don't have a choice.

996FLT6

Toe links and sharky bypass : ). Mike

FFaust

As I'm finding out, everything is related, and every mod leads to another. Once you tweak or tighten one thing, it tends to highlight the "next weakest link". So just be aware as you go into this.

Hard to add anything to the above, but once you take care of the basics, i.e. rear toe and lock, the next step should be wheels and brakes IMHO.

Wheels, but only if street and track are very different for you. And from the description of your local driving, it sounds as though both might be similar enough that you wouldn't need a different set of tires. Also from what I recall, you probably don't need wets... so never mind the second set of wheels.

That leaves us with brakes. Get a good set of street/track pads and replace your fluid with good racing fluid with a higher boiling point.

Then go out and drive the crap out of it

Larry Cable

+1 on this, unless you personally, or a good tech locally, has the expertise to setup a suspension properly its hard to beat the job that Porsche did in the 1st place.

What I mean by this is that once you install an adjustable suspension (even just the shocks themselves never mind the myriad of control arms etc) "you" need to be able to adjust all of these components to provide you with the handling characteristics you desire (per track if you are a professional racer)

I doubt that many, if any of us, are able to do this, or that a local shop (that does not campaign a car in a racing series) has the abillity to do this properly.

P.J.S.

I did the toe links, control arms, monoballs, lock outs and sway bars and tracked it with the stock susp for a year (this past year)...

now motons are going in now courtesy of RL group buy.

the price to pay for waiting -- paying for another cornerbalance and aligmenment... and residual labor...

If I had to do it over again, I would drive it stock and save my money until I was ready to go all in -- there is a labor savings in doing it all at once AND if you know you are going to end up doing it all in the end anyway you might as well do it all at once.

I know it is is a chunk of change... and a chunk of change getting thrown at a depreciating asset etc... you simply cannot look at that way and have fun... it is barely logical to mod these cars for anything other than safety...

I have to look at the mod money as my Tuition at Porsche U... I failed the 996-3 course and I am about to fail the 997.1RS course... the only way I pass is if I keep the car a long time which would be new ground for me.

Graduating with honors - I would have stripped my 996-3 and saved the money... which may have meant that I was actually smart enough to learn from others mistakes... oh well... at least the new owner sends me pics once in a while

Larry Cable

have you measured your lap times before/after the modifications, are you seeing significant improvements in your times with the suspension modifications?

not meant as a "personal" question, just curious if you have done any before/after analysis?

FFaust

Kind of ironic isn't it how "scary" it would be to commit to stripping a perfectly good 996 GT3 because it would be hard to justify financially. Yet, in the end, it might be the most cost-effective and fun way to go.

P.J.S.

good question Larry --

Having done all of the "hardware" on my 996-3 - I put that stuff on my RS before I tracked it in stock form... so I do not have before and after on that... and the motons are currently in the works and will be in use next season.

So I will have before and after - from hardware to hardware with motons.

I did pick up almost 2 seconds by switiching to a working diff (guard) and changing my gears to a closer ratio set up... on a tight track with very short straight (max speed on the straight maybe 125)...

This upcoming season will be interesting tinkering around with the motons...