JICs: Short Review and Another alternative to PSS9's...

So this project 996 is on its way to being more and more of a DE car (the owner has a street 996 as well lol) so we went back and forth on suspension choices. Motons, whilst being a great track set up are a bit out of range price-wise and the PSS9s are on the soft side for the track. X74 and M030 were going to be too soft and offer no real levels of adjustments that the owner wanted. So we settled on JIC/Cross, which I hadn't done a lot of on C2s (we do Motons or PSS9s usually). We'd had some success with them on TT/C4S before but after having played around dialing it in I must say I'm pretty darn impressed. Certainly stiffer (we went with the "medium" springs) than PSS9s even on the medium settings (15 dampening settings in all). Adjusting camber with the camber plates is a good idea however there's no real room to do that when they are mounted to the car (unless you cut away more of the chasis). You really need to drop the strut to get good access. Mating them up with some GT3 sway bars makes it interesting so can play with understeer and oversteer too. Another thing I really like about these is the "detense" when adjusting the dampening. There's much more "feel" too it and you can actually hear a "click" unlike with the PSS9s which I think have rather poor detense. I spend a good bit of the time on the phone telling people which settings to use only to find that when the car comes in they're about 3-4 clicks away from where they should be due to the poor detense described. Anyways sorry for rambling but I always like being pleasantly surprised by cheaper solutions. Doesn't happen too often but there you have it. Obviously this suspension isn�t for everyone but for those of you that have said �I like my PSS9s but they�re a bit soft at the track even in the firm settings� you�ll know what I mean. I think the JICs are a good way to go. The shop 996TT has an all out GTR3S suspension conversion with double adjustable JRZs and then some but for our NA 996 I think we�ll go with these over the Motons (mostly due to the cost). So far this car has the GT3 seats, schroth harness and the GMG roll bar, which I must say according to the owner's experience and my own (I have one in my TT) really did give the car some additional rigidity. It's much more of a "real" bar than the Porsche Tequipment one. More cross bracing, much better mounting (more solid for sure) and thicker all the way around. It's not fun getting into the back but hey... I don't know if GMG is a sponsor on here but you can either get those from them or me. The install is a little tougher than the Tequipment one so be ready to use some brute force One thing to NOTE: If you're going to use GT3 sway bars you WILL need different drop links in the front. The geometry of the stock ones will NOT work.

Oopsie.. here's a pic of the roll bar.

The other thing that you'll notice is that you can change the ride height without affecting the spring rate / travel. Nice for corner weighting. I have a set on my 2000 S Boxster and love them. Bro

Bro.. absolutely correct and really good point for the track guys and alignment guys too:P Haven't used tried them on a Boxster yet. All I've done were PSS9s and Motons. The PSS9s were ok but still kind of soft and mushy. The motons well.. once dialed in were ab. fab.

They are easier to install since you don't have to use the factory mounts too. I have the softest ones and use them on the street as well, they're nice. The best part is being able to get more camber in the front than in the back to reduce that awful factory understeer. Hey what settings on the sway bars did you end up using? I'll probably get the H&Rs though because the rear sway bar is beefier than the GT3. I prefer oversteer, it's more fun.

I haven't used the soft springs yet but I'm sure I'll try. I'd like to see how much more friendly they are on the street... I only wish the hole on the top of the strut/chasis was larger so it is easier to adjust those nice camber plates Not their fault though. The real way to do it on these cars is to use adjustable control arms from the GT2/3 with shims etc... At least that's how we do it (to make it easier lol). Stick with the H&Rs to avoid having to get other drop links. We set them lose in the front and middle in the rear. Gets rid of a bit more understeer and you can go stiffest in the rear for more.

I have these on my car, and they are coming off. Here in New York, they are just not an option for someone looking for a daily driver. As a track car that sees the highway on a nice summer day, maybe. But as an everyday, not a chance. I had the lightest spring setting and the car has been to a dealer multiple times to "check" the setting. I have been in and have driven stock GT3's, and they are almost plush in comparison. I think its interesting that most people that responded, are in California. From my expereince, public roads are in better shape in CA. Now, on the track, their unreal and I will miss them dearly. I also had the GT3 sways.

Well, let me tell you, i am eagerly awaiting my test drive!

I hear you about brutal roads... A lot of guys from the East Coast have told me that the roads in NY, Chicago etc.. are really bad

If it wasn't raining so darned hard today! ****.. I have to test out your car, then I have to test out a new GT640 Turbo on RA-1s. Greeeeeat!

PSS9's are soft & mushy? Eek, I ordered a set!

Think only on the track On the street they're very well balanced... On the track you want a stiffer spring rate so you don't nose dive and bounce with hard braking for example

Soft & mushy - just think of having JELL-O cups as the bump stops! Squish, squish! They make your car ride like a Buick LeSabre! Just kidding! Sorry, I couldn't help myself!

I think my car was one of the first that Sharkey installed JICs on. They TOTALLY transformed the car. I swear by them, but they may be a bit harsh on the street (even in CA) for some.

Yups I remember back in the day! I'm glad you rolled with it.. On the shop C2 we'll use these as well. I think for the money they come with a good bit more hardware than the PSS9s Yes they're stiffer...

Just to clarify with a bi-tube shock like a JIC, the static spring height is set and should not be adjusted. This allows the shock to retain the intended shock travel as Bro mentioned. Raising a corner on any shock does not change the spring rate. This is a constant. Also if you raise a corner with the JICs, you are changing your alignment settings and affecting the corner balance of the car. The JICs have no special attirbutes here. As mentioned though they do have a lot of other nice features for a good price..

what range of camber adjustment did you get on the fronts after the JIC install?

They all come with camber plates so you can put as much or little as you want. But choose wisely because once you install them there is a limited amount of range you can move them unless you unbolt em. Or I guess you can cut back some of the sheet metal. I like mine for daily and on the track. But I have the softer shocks. The two piece shocks are a little more forgiving on bumps.

Sharkster - how much are the GMG roll bars?

i thought that was the point of the adjustible plates - you can adjust them while installed on the car so you can make quicker adjustments

It is on most cars where theres a releif in the shock tower to see the top of the strutt. Unfortunatly on the 996 it doesn't have that opening hence the suggestions that you'd have to cut away material from the shock towers. I've got camber plates on my M3 that take me all of 10 minutes to adjust both sides. Still trying to figure out what's the best route to go with the 996 to get the desired additional camber for this car. I too would like to konw the Maximum camber value that you can get with the JIC plates / coilovers. In my experience some have a much better range of adjustment than others. Andy

have people done that?..."cut away material from the shock towers"?? so....how exactly is front camber adjusted on a 996 (with coilovers?)

I'm not really inclined to do so on my car just yet though I haven't ruled it out. Hard to justify cutting up an expensive car that's not a track-only car. Well there's two options. TRG makes a billet camber plate for the car that's a fixed position plate. Meaning there's not a range of adjutment rather just two different ways to mount the camber plate on the car. Mount it one way and you'll get stock camber. Mount it the other way and you'll get "X" amount more negative camber. No adjustment inbetween the two values you get what you get. I tried to shoot them an e-mail the other day for more info on specs for their plate and havn't heard anything back. While this is an "easier" way to go after a camber plate than the JIC's due to the design of the car it's still not ideal. JIC's got the idea down with conventional plates but the car prevents any easy adjusting of the plates. Or...you can do the GT3 control arms which use shims to space out the bottom geometry of the suspension creating negative camber as well. Lots of money involved in that and some of the GT3 guys complain of rubbing if using too agressive of a shim. Andy

You can adjust the camber some but say you set the camber on the JIC camber plate to 1 degree of negative camber. You should be able to adjust it from .75 to 2+ degrees by moving it along the stock camber adjustment holes. You have to look at the shock towers. But if you want to go from 0 front to 4 degrees (Which makes no sense) you'll have to unbolt them and swing them underneath the fender. Which isn't that big of a deal.

edit...nevermind - just got my quesiton answered

when i had my alignment done, here's what we found out. RoWM030 suspension: MAX negative camber on left side -.7 MIN negative camber on right side -1.0 thats with the left strut pushed all they way in, and the right strut all the way out. i'm hoping i can get the desired camber once i get JIC's what does "swing them underneath the fender" mean?

That doesn't suprise me that there's only .3 of a degree in movement. There's very litle room there for adjustments in stock form. By swinging the shock under the fender..I think he means taking the top 3 bolts down and pulling the shock away from the tower in order to make your adjustments. I can't imagein how much time my local allighment shop would charge me when setting up the car that way!!! Seeing as though I'm pretty new to the 996...what's the sweet spot for camber anyhow? I won't even tell you the rediculous numbers I run on the M3...lets just say I run -2 all the time as my street settings. Andy

well i'm hoping for -2.5 to -3 for my track settings. hopefully the lowering of the ride height combined with camber adjustment should help me go from -.7 without too much trouble.

it does bother me much though that the MAX on one side was -1 and the MIN on another side was -.7. chassis bent perhaps????

I don't understand comparing max to min. What was the max to max comparison and min to min comparison...I'm guessing if you take the Min (-.7) and slide it as far as you can to get the max on that same side you're not going to get any more than .3-.5 putting that side right about -1 max as well...did I read something wrong there or possibly mix up max and min?