Racedoc

My son has finally joined my passion for Porsche and Audi. I would like to have the both of us do more tech. work on the cars but I do not currently work on my cars. We have a GT3, A4 and Jetta turbo. Would anyone be able to suggest where I can go to have the two of us get more hands on experience working on the cars? I think this could be a good Father/son effort. I am located in upstate New York, USA.

Loren and I discussed this and he recommended I put it on this board.

Thanks,

Wait for the 997 based GT3. More power, better interior in suede and more aggresive looks.

I did think about that. A lot. And given how much hassel I am having getting a 996 I am still considering it, but there are three obstacles I am struggling to get past. (i) I would have to wait over a year for it. (ii) It is a substantial slice of cash for something I haven't even seen in the metal, much less had a chance to drive. (iii) Given the second point, I am having serious trouble getting past the fact that a sensibly specified 997GT3 is the cost of a brand new Lexus (IS admittedly) _more_ than a 2 year old 996.

It is a big gamble - active dampers, variable ratio steering and stability control are going to make it drive a whole lot different (the difference in steering feel for a normal 997 vs 996 is way more than I expected, though it is less tiring to drive as a consequence so who knows which will be better. Walter Rohr does, but he will be biased :) ). Also, the ground clearance looks so low it my be an issue driving in my speed hump riddled locale. Waiting until I could test one would mean August, so with the waiting list that would make it the end of Next year before I would have it on my drive...

So I am leaning away from it, though feel free to try to change my mind.

Colin

Colin,

I have not bought a 911 without driving it first. The dealer let me take my current GT3 for as long as I needed. So your point of seeing it and driving it is valid. If I did not have the 996 GT3 I would be looking seriouly at the 997s. Good luck and let us know.

Regards,

Today was a strange day. Until now the only Porsche I had driven was a 964. Today I test drove the 997S and the 996GT3 and it took all of my self control not to make the most expensive decision of my life so far on the spot...

The 997 was a great car and I loved it, then I tried the GT3 (04 model) and frankly I still have the same stupid grin on my face 9 hours later and my old car (of over 9 years - a BMW) felt utterly wrong when I went to drive it home. I guess you guys already know how that feels.

Anyway, before I decide whether or not to take the plunge I wanted to get some thoughts from those who (i) live with these cars day to day and (ii) don't have any vested interest in selling me anything.

Firstly Ceramic brakes - good idea or not. The car that I am thinking of buying has these and my main consideration is : if I wear them out/kill them/damage them then they seem to be pricey items to replace. Does anyone know exactly how much a pair of PCCB disks cost (in the UK), and whether I am even likely to wear them out and need to replace them (car has 12000mi so far. I do plan occasional light track use in the future but not a huge amount of it, and I only cover at most 5k miles a year of normal driving. Car is from a Porsche UK dealer). If I did need to replace them, how practical an option would it be to replace with steel? Or are they really as great as my dealer would have me believe, likely to last me another umpteen thousand miles and I am just being paranoid?

Next ground clearance - how much of a consideration. Seemed okay to me when out driving, but it does look very low on the road. Does anyone have any torrid stories about "traffic calming" features or car parks with GT3s? Can you safely clear any size of sleeping policemen (for non-UK readers who may not be familiar, these are large humps that local councils install on roads to encourage parents to buy SUVs for the school run and create extra business for the shock absorber business) without worrying about anything? Is there anything to worry about with multi-story car parks or anything like that?

Finally - how are they to live with? This would be my only car (though I could borrow something with 4 doors on exceptional circumstances) but I don't drive to get to work (foot, train and underground) so we are talking about every other day use at most - generally short hops with occasional road trips. A more specific question is how far can you drive in the bucket seats comfortably? I have slight reservations about them, and my dealer has said they will swap them for conventional sports seats if it is a deal breaker. Is that something I should consider or does everything think they are fine for driving a couple of hundred miles at a stretch...

Just trying to play devils advocate with myself - what does everyone think. Is a GT3 a day to day car or should I be looking more directly at the 997S?

Thanks for any comments.

Colin

:rolleyes:

Colin, Did you get the GT3?

Today was a strange day. Until now the only Porsche I had driven was a 964. Today I test drove the 997S and the 996GT3 and it took all of my self control not to make the most expensive decision of my life so far on the spot...

The 997 was a great car and I loved it, then I tried the GT3 (04 model) and frankly I still have the same stupid grin on my face 9 hours later and my old car (of over 9 years - a BMW) felt utterly wrong when I went to drive it home. I guess you guys already know how that feels.

Anyway, before I decide whether or not to take the plunge I wanted to get some thoughts from those who (i) live with these cars day to day and (ii) don't have any vested interest in selling me anything.

Firstly Ceramic brakes - good idea or not. The car that I am thinking of buying has these and my main consideration is : if I wear them out/kill them/damage them then they seem to be pricey items to replace. Does anyone know exactly how much a pair of PCCB disks cost (in the UK), and whether I am even likely to wear them out and need to replace them (car has 12000mi so far. I do plan occasional light track use in the future but not a huge amount of it, and I only cover at most 5k miles a year of normal driving. Car is from a Porsche UK dealer). If I did need to replace them, how practical an option would it be to replace with steel? Or are they really as great as my dealer would have me believe, likely to last me another umpteen thousand miles and I am just being paranoid?

Next ground clearance - how much of a consideration. Seemed okay to me when out driving, but it does look very low on the road. Does anyone have any torrid stories about "traffic calming" features or car parks with GT3s? Can you safely clear any size of sleeping policemen (for non-UK readers who may not be familiar, these are large humps that local councils install on roads to encourage parents to buy SUVs for the school run and create extra business for the shock absorber business) without worrying about anything? Is there anything to worry about with multi-story car parks or anything like that?

Finally - how are they to live with? This would be my only car (though I could borrow something with 4 doors on exceptional circumstances) but I don't drive to get to work (foot, train and underground) so we are talking about every other day use at most - generally short hops with occasional road trips. A more specific question is how far can you drive in the bucket seats comfortably? I have slight reservations about them, and my dealer has said they will swap them for conventional sports seats if it is a deal breaker. Is that something I should consider or does everything think they are fine for driving a couple of hundred miles at a stretch...

Just trying to play devils advocate with myself - what does everyone think. Is a GT3 a day to day car or should I be looking more directly at the 997S?

Thanks for any comments.

Colin

:rolleyes:

Colin,

I just came back from taking my '04 GT3 out and I still have that Grin on! Like the others that have commented I have owned my GT3 for awhile (Sept. '04) and love it. I do use it almost as a daily driver and there is no problem with ground clearance or driving. The only challenge is not to race every van and neon that thinks they can keep up with you. I have been in PCA for about 20 years and have owned 8 different Porsches. This is the best and the last one.

Good luck with a great car.

Hi Racedoc... The short answer is "yes". You posted in the 996 GT3 forum so I'll assume that you have a Mk II GT3 at normal ride height. Several things about GT3 alignment. The car is very sensitive to alignment and ride height. Many have been delivered from the factory with the alignment not within spec. The recommended alignment can be different for the street vs the track. Even for the street, factory alignment is such that the rear camber is some amount of negative and the inner shoulder of the the rear tires will wear more quickly than the outside shoulders in normal street driving. That's true for all 911s. All that said, I can get four 4-wheel alignments for less than the price of one rear tire.....so, my GT3 spends a lot of time on the alignment rack. For a street alignment, and to maximise the rear tire life, I run -1.7 degrees of negative camber on the rear and +0.25 degrees of positive toe-in per wheel in the rear. This is within the factory spec, but, at the minimum amount of negative camber and the toward the maximum amount of toe-in within the spec tolerance. My recommendations are in decimal degrees which most Hunter racks can report. The factory specs are in degrees+/-minutes, so you may have to convert. Did I answer your question?

BTW, 9K miles is pretty good for rear tires on a GT3...but, if you had steel belts showing, they were toast some time ago.

Thanks this is what I ws looking for. So it sounds like this is a legal charge from the dealer to make the adjustment for street use.

I have just replaced my tires after about 9,000 miles. When I took off the rear tires they were uneven in their wear pattern. The inside of the tires were down to the chord, with metal coming out, the outside of the tires still had tread. The front tires did not have this. This seems to be too much negative camber in the rear tires since I am more interested in street use than just track.

Has anyone else had this experience? If so did you have the dealer readjust the camber and did it run well on the street?

Thanks for any help.