My 996 Introduction

Hello all! I purchased my first Porsche in January and have been spending the last 9-10 months getting to know the car, it has proved itself over and over to me and has been my favorite car I have owned. Basic information: Bone stock 2002 996 Gaurds Red 3.6L, bare bones car which means not many options (No traction control ) but I like that as the weight of the car should be pretty close to the advertised. Lightweight wheel package is exactly what I was looking for. Bought the car with 62,000 on the clock, just hit 67000 this weekend. Initial thoughts on the car is it handles amazing from the factory and decent power, after a few weeks I started noticing points which I felt lacked. Mainly high speed floating and a little more body roll than I would like. But that is to be expected on a car with factory suspension and 60k on it. Power felt good, but I did feel a need for a little more. I know there is not a lot of power that is easily unlocked with these vehicles so, but focusing on best bang for your buck mods and you can definitely get some more power without spending to much money. Started off bone stock, very clean car and in VERY good condition. Although I didn't think I would dip into modifying this much as first I was bit to by the bug. I have tried to keep everything very simple on the car. I want it to be a 911 at heart and no mistake of its identity. One of her first washes. Only took about two months of ownership before I was attending my first PCA Auto-X. Taught me a lot about the car and what needed to change to suite my driving style and need. Here are a few pictures from the event: Car handled pretty well but as I am sure you can see by the pictures there is just to much body roll and the car sits to high for my liking. Also I felt the stock seats to be insufficient for autocross. I was using the steering wheel as a point to keep my body in the seat. After testing every seat I could I felt the Recaro Profi to be the absolute best fit for my body. Nice and snug (I am 6' tall and weight 165lbs), the holes for the harness come out above my shoulders so this is a perfect seat for me! After a few more events in these seats I decided to pull the trigger on some suspension bits, H&R RSS Coilovers with a GT3 Rear Swaybar for some adjustability, a sport sway in the front. I now feel like I am a part of the car. Car is flat as a board, can be threaded through any turn. Floating above 80MPH? GONE. This car now feels solid as a rock. Absolutely love the handling. When I initially put the coilovers on the wheels sat very close into the fender wells, there was a huge gap and it just looked horrible. 42 Draft Designs 15MM spacers front and rear solved this. Rennline stud conversion kit took care of the extra length I needed for the bolts. Now the wheels sit in there perfectly, no rubbing and the car looks phenomenal in my opinion. Now the last piece of my puzzle was unlocking some extra power. This was done by 42 Draft Designs high flow cats. They were designed on my car and I have nothing but amazing things to say about them. They fit perfectly, sound great, and there is more torque and hp through the powerband. As soon as you stab the gas pedal your head is pulled back against your headrest, as you pull through the RPM's the gains just get greater and greater and you really feel the cars raw power. Much more torque and horsepower than stock. Oh and did I mention the sound? Amazing. Factory like drivability, but with more raw power and sound. I am proud to drive this car every day. It has the looks, handling and power to put a grin on my face ear to ear every-time I get in it. If I were to purchase this car again I would not change anything I did. These cars are great from the factory but there are a few improvements that can be had. High Flow Cats for power, Coilovers to handling and seats if you are going to do any type of competition driving. You can dump $20,000 into these easily and the majority of that will be tons of money for minimal gains. I feel my car with just these minor modifications will be able to keep up with with the majority of them. H&R RSS Coilovers: $1800 42 Draft Designs High Flow Cats: $1699 Recaro Profi Seats: $900/seat These three modifications transformed my 996 into what I feel is a pure driving machine. I would highly recommend these modifications to any 996.

Awesome 996, love guards red. Sounds like your mods are basically exactly what I would want to do for a dual purpose Auto-X/DD.

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Precisely what my car is, drive this every day, Auto-X every chance I get. Every dollar I have put into this car has been on a worthwhile mod. I have been down the road of throwing all my money at my car with diminishing returns, not doing that on this car. It feels pretty damn good now

Really nice. Thanks for sharing.

I 100% agree that coilovers completely transform the car. Great looking car!

Great looking car and intro. Glad to see your enjoying it

Nice intro and complete with pics. Thanks. Welcome to Rennlist and find more ways to spend $. Nice looking red head C2.

Very nice! I love Guards Red.

Welcome. I always tell people that if they want to improve performance, just paint your 996 Guards Red. Everyone knows they are the fastest!

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Thank you! Yes they did! Still the same car, but behind the wheel there are levels of traction and grip and greatly improved. Car feels much more solid. Thank you! Honestly with the High Flow Cats and coilovers I think the next big chunk of my $$ is going to be spent on track days and wheel time. With the cats the car is PLENTY fast, and I definitely will run out of skill in my current situation with my setup before I reach the cars limits. Looking forward to changing that around in the future Me to! It has always been a favorite color of mine but I never thought I would be one to own one. As soon as the garage door opened and I was able to see it in its beauty my mind had been made up I believe it!

Nice stance, wish I could go that low but the crappy roads and fear of losing my oil pan in addition to having an aero kit on mine prevents me from going anywhere near that ride height. Sorta ironic since I'm on GT3 CO's but riding with a slight gap. I had a nice stance initially but ended up scraping everywhere.

great writeup! You have me intrigued on your high flow cats and the results you felt from them. Do you have any more info on them, a photo maybe of them installed? cheers Pete

Welcome and nice write up with great pics. The stance looks 100% better , just remember to keep track of the alignment and tire wear; P-cars tend to go thru rear tires at least double the time it takes to show significant wear on the fronts.. How do you ( and those around you) like the sound with the hi-flow cats? If you think you can get by with some lighter weight Cargraphic, Tubi, Fabspeed or other aftermarket cans, that may be a good move. Also, keep good records of regular service such as oil change, fuel filter service, cabin filter inspection, brake system inspection, brake flush, coolant check and undercarriage inspection for wear & tear & signs of fluid leaks, among other items. Aero bits, brake kits, , lighter wheels, weight-reduction mods and you will be well on your way down the slippery slope.

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There is definitely a nice healthy gain through the RPM range, initially I put on test pipes and felt a pretty solid loss in low end torque, but up top the car really pulled quite amazing. As I auto-x the car any loss in torque especially down low is a big no no. From there I put factory cats back on. I definitely regained my low end power but it did not pull as strong up top. After a few weeks of stock cats, I had the high flow cats installed. With the cats installed I could not feel any loss in low end like I did with the test pipes, instead I was greeted with a nice addition of torque that exponentially got better. There definitely is a gain down low and as you get through the RPM's the gain is more apparent and starts pulling harder up top. Top end does not pull as hard compared to the test pipe, BUT I think high flow cats are the way to go on these cars. No sacrifice in power with nice healthy gains through your power band. If it were a pure track car that spent most of items time in the upper RPM I would consider test pipes or high flow cats with X-Pipes. But for a car that is mainly driven on the street and Auto-X I strongly feel high flow cats are the ticket to best overall performance As for photos, I will have to dig through what I have, I believe I have a prototype picture somewhere, but never photographed the installed pictures as I was to excited to drive it Thanks! I have roughly -2deg of camber in the rear, I will keep an eye on it, but as I have a different set of tires for Winter and Summer I am hoping they will last long enough for me that I will not feel like I am dropping a thousand dollars on tires every season. In terms of the sound I think it sounds PERFECT. No drone, not to loud, when you get on the throttle the sound transforms and sounds amazing! A nice clean exhaust node with no rasp or drone. I did try some tubi style mufflers, I appreciated the weight difference but I preferred the sound of the stock mufflers with cats over the tubi style. Stock mufflers with factory cats is the perfect level I want for the car. Not to mention aftermarket mufflers cost a pretty penny and not much in terms of power except weight reduction. In the future I may invest more in the cars performance, but I think the most beneficial to me and the car will be seat time at a track