At what point is the original suspension worn out?

Greetings. My ride a 2002 Targa. 51k miles. Recently picked it up and absolutely love it. Power is plenty for me. Handling leaves a little to be desired. I have researched the threads and it seems for a weekend cruiser, upgrading the springs is the route that works for my budget and driving. If I am going in to do the work I want to address other wearables and set it up for the future. Do we think the struts are on their way out at 51k? (New York roads BTW) Any other bushings or wearable items I should address? Thanks in advance for input.

Upgraded sway bars & tarrett drop links make a big difference from my experience. Dramatically cut floating and/or understeer at corner entry, reduce body roll during corners, etc.

My car is an 01 with 49,000. Purchased with 47,000 miles. Shocks are just fine and car handles great. My mechanic and I checked all components and the only issues were one bad front and one bad rear end link. Depends a lot on the way your was cared for, stored, driven and the roads it was driven on. Mine seems to have been garaged and never been in the rain, or seldom, so no surprise components are in good shape.

Quotes source post: 14982901

There are no "hard and fast" rules for how long the suspension will last. It really depends on how much the car was driven, how hard it was driven, what types of roads, how it was stored and serviced etc... Too many variables to make some off the cuff diagnosis of the viability of the suspension system. There are an awful lot of parts that interact and that make up the entire system. The best judge of how it's performing is you. When you say "handling leaves a little to be desired", what exactly does that mean? Without pointing to specifics it could be as simple as, it needs an alignment or new tires, or it could possibly be one or more of several suspension components. Also, the motor mounts have a substantial effect on how the rear end of the car feels through corners (the "water sloshing in a bucket" feel...). Do some reading about the most common problems and how they sound and feel, and you should be able to put together an idea of what might be going on. The one thing for sure is that if everything is working properly, the handling of these cars doesn't leave much if anything to be desired...Good luck

Great points! I do not have any track experience so cannot speak out the handling in technical terms, but I would say it feels a little "floaty" around the corner. Steering is precise. I would just like to be able to drive it through the corner at higher speeds and feel a more planted (mostly in the rear). The motor mounts are good point.

To an earlier point, (assuming everything else is in decent shape), you may find some uprated swaybars help with the floaty feeling in corners. M030 anti sway bars are a cheap way to add a little stiffness and balance in corners. They're often available used in the classified section relatively inexpensively. Lots of other aftermarket options too, but might be overkill for you intended use.

Age , even with low mileage is a major factor . Before you go buy mo30 kits etc , get the car up on a hoist and check all the bushes , motor mounts shocks etc . My 2004 car was a garage queen with only 35k on it when I bought it and many of the bushes were past it and two shocks were leaking .

At the age of 15 years...

Both rear lower ball joints on my '02 C2 Cab need to be replaced at 68K miles...rear links have dry rotted and boots are open and dry!

I would start with shocks. Even if everything looks OK, shocks are generally what can cause float. I know some folks talk about the motor mounts, but car�s handling didn�t change one bit after I replaced my sagging original 18-yr-old mounts with new ones. Sagging motor mounts isn�t what causes the handling issues in these cars. Broken mounts do though. The stock suspension on these 996s can be very compliant. Steering feel can also leave a lot to be desired. These things add up to some saying the 996 handles a little weird compared to some other 911s.

I replaced all my suspension bushings on my 2003 C2 with 23K original miles (at the time) last year. Most all of the bushings were just fine. All of the bushings at the front of the tuning fork arms were torn. I did the replacement to install poly bushings, coilovers, and various other suspension bits for track purposes to support target alignment settings and running on slicks. If it weren't for that I would only have needed the tuning fork arms replaced x4.