Understeer HE11 at Autocross today.

I've owned my 2000 996 C2 for two years now and while I have tracked it about ten times over the last 1 1/2 years, I've never Autocrossed it. My Autocross car has always been the older 1984 Carrera, with it's uprated suspension and some weight removed. I've always been able to get that car to handle very well on an autocross course, with only minimal understeer in tight corners which is very easily overcome with some throttle steering. Easy to drive for me - and fun! Not so the 996. It understeered so badly today that I basically just gave up after the second session and went home. It plowed like an old Buick. It was maddening and no fun at all. Even when I did everything I could to get the nose to come around (like dropping the throttle suddenly mid corner or even tapping the brakes), it just understeered less or, at best, would momentarily twitch into a slight oversteer for just a split second. That car, as set up, HATES slow and medium speed corners. I lost count of how many times I just understeered into the cones today. The '84 is so much better behaved at slow and medium speeds so I rarely understeer into cones in that car. If I hit a cone, it's usually due to oversteer, but the result of that car's oversteer is that I can drive it much more aggressively on the course than I can with the 996. By the way, I helped to set up the course yesterday and then took about five laps with the '84 and it felt great, but the brake pedal got a little soft at the end so I decided to bring the 996 to its inaugural Autocross (I need to replace the brake fluid in the '84). Ugh! Bad idea. Do any of you guys have suggestions as to how to dial out the terminal understeer with this car? Will a PSS9 system help or will I need GT3 lower control arms in addition? Or should I just give up ever autocrossing this car again? My tires are Falken Azenis RT-615's, which are normally considered outstanding Autocross tires. Sizes are 255/17 rear and 215/17 front. Thanks for an help you can offer.

The stock and M030 susp do plow a lot. M030 a little less. Get set of GT3 adjustable front and rear sway bars. If you set front full soft and set rear full hard you may not have understeer but you will likely have a handful of the the other. I'de forget the GT3 lower control arms.. Just have your current alignment set for max negative camber up front which if you are lucky will give you close to -1.5 to 1.25. Then do a classic autox toe alignment on the car which you likely already know about.

Hmm. I was under the impression that the stock 996 suspension didn't really allow any camber adjustment. If I really can can get some negative camber up front, that should help a bit. Also, I really like your idea about the adjustable anti-sway bars. It looks like I'll be purchasing a set asap. Thanks.

Hey Scott, good to see you at Cars & Coffee yesterday. You should have let me know about this and I could have gone cone-plowing with you. (btw, my German friends scored a nice 930 at Pomona today....) What's a good source for those swaybars, Sunset?, anywhere else?

The stock susp allows for some negative camber. The 3 bolts that protrude up at the top of the front struts into the trunk area sit in little slots. When your car get's aligned they loosen these and push them inward towards the center of the car for more negative camber. The following is just some info: some folks have been known to elongate the slots in the sheet metal to allow for even more negative camber than what the factory allows up front.

Dave, good thing you didn't go because you would have been as frustrated as I was today. I'll be looking for GT3 sways asap.

Paul, thanks again for the info. I've read quite a few threads that you have participated in concerning understeer and its remedies. Your information has been enlightening for me. On a side note, I'm aware of how Camber is adjusted in most cars, I've just been told in the past that Porsche didn't design the 996 for much - if any - camber adjustment (which I thought was idiotic, personally). I've heard about the idea of elongating the slots. We'll see, I may consider it.

You need more rear spring rate in addition to more rear anti-roll rate. There are several ways to get there, but the stock 996 suspension just doesn't have it.

Man can I relate. When I first bought my car I went to PCA autocross school and one of the lessons was to force your car to spin by turning hard and lift the throttle. Well I couldn't make the tail come out. The car just plowed to a stop. The instructors couldn't believe it. The rest of the class was booing me. What tire size do you have up front? My car came with 205/17s. I moved to 225/45/17's for my track tires. This helped quite a bit. I also have PSS9s with front camber at max negative. Both of these corrections made the understeer much more manageable. I'm thinking of adding GT3 sway bars to give me even more control over the balance.

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Ha ha!! You gave me a good laugh. I needed that! My car has skinny 215's up front for now, but I'm planning to go with used GT3 wheels so I can get 235's and 295's under the fenders. I'm looking at a number of different coilovers and it looks like I'll need to add the GT3 sways and drop links too.

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+1 I did what Doug suggests by adding ROW 030... stiffer rear sway bar and stiffer rear shocks included in kit.... don't forget the alignment as well... many who go beyond this setup keep the ROW 030 shocks and springs but upgrade to GT3 swaybars.... from what my shop tells me that's a huge upgrade... but make sure you get them with the droplinks that don't make noise while driving around