creekman

Many years ago I saw an early 911 with a 350 Chevy engine that I wanted to buy, but couldn't come up with the money at the time. I always remember that car. Since then, I've owned a lot of post-war sports cars including 7 different Porsches. Recently, due to personal changes in my life, I felt like I needed a project, so the 996 that I had bought earlier last year became the focus of my energy and money. I love the 996, it is truly a wonderful car, less some reliability problems with the 996 engine. On a trip back to Texas from California I visited the Renegade factory and saw the installation of the LS motor in the 996. I was impressed with the Renegade conversion parts and decided that I would give it a try... Let me say right off that if you're thinking about making the swap in lieu of making the IMS bearing updates to your 996 engine, don't... I installed all new parts. The swap is not a plug and play by any means and I've been on the project for 7 months to get the car back on the road. I'm not sure how much I have in the project, my computer knows, but I don't want to know, at least not yet... LOL! One of these days I'll push the "996 Conversion" button on my "Quick Books" program and find out the ugly truth, but not now since I still have some issues to resolve. I elected to go with the LS3 crate motor and bought the engine with the cam upgrade that added 50 HP for a total of 480 HP. I also elected to have a taller ring and pinion installed in the transaxle. So that dropped the gearing by 450 RPMs but I still had gobs of torque. On paper, the car is capable with LS3 redline with the ring gear upgrade showing 7,000 RPMs tops out at 197 MPH. I don't think I'll be doing that anytime soon, but it's there for the brave... However, since my car is the C4S, wide body it was an all wheel drive (AWD). Because you can't change the gearing of the front differential to match the transaxle ring and pinion, I removed the front diff. It might be argued, but I think it was the right choice. The installation is pretty straight forward. Unfortunately, Renegade has no instruction manuals for the installation so you're on your own. However, Renegade does provide a lot of pictures and answers if you know what to ask. I feel like they could do a better job in this regard, but their products are first class. In the past I have restored cars and airplanes, and I have a very complete shop with power sanders, a lathe and mill. I also bought a MaxJax 2 post lift for the project that I think is a must for getting safely under the car. I know for a fact that a lot of these conversions are done off of a floor jack, but I think it would make the job a lot more difficult. I know of some people that do these conversions on the cheap, they buy used engines, used accessories which really can lower the bottom line. However, if any of these item go bad, then you're right back where you started. I wanted a reliable car that looked like factory and to do this only once. Renegade furnishes 1-1/4" rubber water hoses which I didn't like so I went with 1-1/2" aluminum water piping. Renegade was engineering the water system as I was installing it. I still might have some tweaking to do since I got ahead of their engineering and testing. I wanted a factory look, not a bunch of rubber hoses winding around the engine room. Even though I've done of a lot of restoration and mechanical work over the years, Renegade would tell me when I asked too many questions, that they were used to dealing with "Professional." Ouch! But, at the same time, I can tell you that for me it took a "Village" to do this. I had a good friend who was a chief maintenance officer on big, big ships who helped me with the piping of the water system and mounts for the Porsche mufflers. Further, I had an old hot rodder friend build my S.S. exhaust system. I also had a friend from the airport who is an IA certified aircraft mechanic help with some of the wiring. Lastly, I had Joe from Alabama come over to tie up the final wiring. He knew which pin, relay, and wires to make the GM ECU work with the Porsche ECU. Renegade takes some short cuts here to make the electrical a little more palatable for the installer. We stripped out all the non-essential wiring, everything looks like a factory job. Joe did an incredible job. We had already done a lot of the basic wiring, but Joe connected all the dots. I think there's a big difference between just making the car run and completing it to make it look factory. I paid many of these individuals for their services, each was a skilled person in their trade, but it did raise the cost of the project so you need to evaluate your abilities and what you expect the finished product is going to look like. Here are some pixs of my job. I might do a write up in the future and start a website of the entire installation which could help others doing the same thing. I'd like to see a venue where we could share our talents and ideas. I know that I've taken the conversion to a new level, and I am sure other DIY'ers that have equally improved ideas that would be of benefit to others. So, to summarize, the 996 is a perfect candidate for the conversion. The LS motor is bullet proof, gobs of horse power and torque. It fits very nicely into the engine room and instead of seeing a bunch of hoses and the air filter from the 996 engine, you get see to an actual big honking V8. It takes a tremendous amount of time and money to do this. I've worked a little each day for 7 months to get the car on the road and I still have issues with some electrical. Turns out there's no provisions to make the cruise control work, I no longer have the articulating spoiler (you need to remove all the equipment under the engine deck lid for engine clearance), but I still get an error message at 75 MPH on the dash, and there are a few other things that I need to work through. The acceleration, V8 sound is breath taking, my rebuilt transaxle is silky smooth, the clutch operates easily, so I believe it makes the 996 a very special car. You have to want a project, not just a quick fix to remedy your 996 engine problems. Mitch Leland "Home in the Hill Country"