LOVE them!!
Do you put up many miles in her?
I have just received these back from Bilstein, I am rather happy with the results!
Well it’s been a long time since an update, have been away a fair bit with work and used the car a fair bit over the summer.
I am currently working on a front end refresh, it will become apparent why with pictures!!
Front end stripped off.
Cleaned/checked the frunk etc
Rads/condensers are in excellent condition as were replaced not long ago.
However the radiator brackets not soooo much!!!
This is how she stands currently, fortunately I managed to remove the brackets without removing rads/condensers. I now have a big list of bits to order from Porsche....
Amazing stuff, I have massive admiration for you, I barely have the skills to maintain a push bike!
Cheers
Rory
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I like these updates from DV. The skill, knowledge and dedication is admirable. I’ve reached my peak at a wash/wax and hoover where anything requiring a screwdriver, hammer, spanner or pliers and it’s goodnight Vienna.
Apologies for the late response!! I’m lucky that my Dad used to race cars and did all his own spannering so I grew up around them, we built a Westfield together when I was at college/on my year out that I paid half of. Was a great experience learning how to build an engine etc and I’ve always tended to work on my own cars, even though it’s a GT3 it’s still only a car and relatively straight forward and simple to work on, loads of forums/blogs/videos to help these days!
Only just discovered this thread and what a read. I bet half the people reading this are hoping it pops up on SC at some point! I wouldn't have the knowledge or confidence to take tools to any car but I struggle to think of the cost of having all this done by a garage.
Keep the updates coming, it's a great thread and very much appreciated.
An inspiration to anyone with a classic of this era to maintain. Particularly interesting for me, with an '03 Boxster, which has many common issues to address.
Car is looking great.
There are definitely advantages to buying the 986/996 cars in general, they are much cheaper because of the supposed engine fragility, but also the rest of the car is DIY fixable.
The horn failed on my 987 Cayman under warranty, and the invoice totalled almost £3k!!! It was all control units and PCBs. The modern cars need too much specialist kit to repair so the tactic is to replace with new parts etc.
Had it been out of warranty I'd have wired a button to the steering column...
Was the final straw to selling the car tbh.
They were charging something like £150p/h so coupled with parts at hundred each, it soon starts to mount up.
Made me wonder what the cost would be if something serious broke!
From your photos it would appear that you should be able to route your trickle charger wire through the bulkhead along with the wiring loom and into the 'frunk'. I've been wondering about that but didn't want to start stripping stuff out if in fact there was no opportunity, so your photos are a help. My trickle charger has a rubber terminal with a flip over cap for when it's not being used. Normally I leave it in the battery compartment, but I would prefer to have it terminate on the 'dry side' of the rubber seal that runs around the opening. I'm also on the lookout for a switched version of the frunk light, so that I can switch it off when the lid is being left open for longer periods. I know a simple in-line switch would do the job but I would prefer to leave the wiring all standard.
Loving it DV. Just an observation I notice you are still using a Lead Acid Battery (which is very heavy). Have you considered a Lithium one.
And easy way to remove a few kgs from the car and we all know GT3 love a strict diet.
Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be asked not to hit it at all.
Friedrich Nietzsche
Currently the car is away having the whole underside/arches stripped back and repainted/stone chip protected, its costing a lot however with the lack of underseal protection on the GT3’s it’s well worth it and will be better than new when it comes back, I’m pretty certain that most of them will need this doing at some point and I wanted to get it sorted before it got really bad. I put in a massive list of parts with Porsche which I collected yesterday, and I’ve just spent the morning cleaning/scrubbing all the plastic shrouds/shields/arch liners and will coat them this afternoon.
£900 worth of Porsche parts!!
New radiator mounts.
All new undertrays!!
I replaced the front undertray on my 997.1 along with all the fixings plus all the hoses and brackets from the long back ones up to the radiators just a couple of weeks ago. I replaced all the coil packs, the heat shields and one of the hydraulic valve solenoids a couple of weeks before that and last week it was the turn of a new window regulator. Today was a new pair of side repeaters. These old Porsches can eat money if you're fussy!
Who's doing the work on the arches if you don't mind me asking?
Nice to see your still updating this thread DV. It has been good to follow so far, looking forward to seeing more updates :)
Thanks guys! I went to see the car yesterday and the standard of the work is incredible, all factory correct colours underneath with the overspray in the right areas. They’ve gone above and beyond, they have taken off and powder coated a number of other components as they were doing the work as they wanted it to be perfect! So nice to find an outfit that puts customer service as no.1, takes pride in their work and doesn’t take any short cuts, don’t get me wrong it’s not cheap by any means but it’s now stopped any chance of it getting any worse and protected the car for another 20 years.
Hi Mike, hope you’re well.
Your car has had some serious love and attention, all credit to you for doing it properly.
Based on your other post recently re your marital situation I just hope you can keep it mate, I had 2 Mercedes back in August and now have neither as solicitor and barrister costs have spiralled out of control to the point I had to liquidate assets!
Today marked the return of the car from the bodyshop where it’s had a complete underside & under arch restoration. It’s also had a number of items blasted/powder coated, all new undertrays fitted and is now better than new underneath and good for another 20 years!. It’s as per the factory in terms of colour/overspray areas and it’s had 4 litres of wax applied on various areas. It was a pretty big outlay financially but well worth it in the long run and I’m pretty certain that all MK’s will be needing doing.
Started working on the car early doors and had the back end back together well within 2 hours:
I then started working on the front/centre rad supports and all the ducts etc, I bought all new bolts/nuts/clips etc etc and full cleaned/degreased all plastics before giving them a thorough coat of plastic restorer. The rads/condensers and all exposed bolts/fixings were given a coat of ACF50 anti corrosion spray. After it was all back together I ran it up to temperature to make sure radiators were all warming at the same time and aircon was nice and cold. My OCD is somewhat expensive sometimes when I end up buying all new everything, however if I ever come to sell her the pile of receipts is ever increasing and the necessary jobs have been carried out!!
Once the bumper is back on its service and MOT time, get the refurbed shocks & new springs on, give the suspension and geo a check over and then get out and give her a good thrashing! Can’t wait to take her to Le Mans!!
Great work Mike and it looks gorgeous. Hope all is ok with you
Not a very exciting picture by any means however another £70 spent at Porsche means I have everything needed to finish a few small jobs, she’s off for a service and MOT at Wrightune in Wallingford on Wednesday and then will be getting some miles on her.
Always enjoy the updates to this thread, thank you!
Please tell me your £70 bought more than what's in the picture.
I’ll never complain about the price of screws in B&Q again.
This must be one of the best sorted 996s out there. Very nice and well done.
I´ve never been a fan of the 996 gen, but GT3 is great no matter the generation!
Well the car is finished and I drove her to service/MOT this morning, its been 7 months since I’ve been behind the wheel and I’ve forgotten just how bloody good a car it is!! I managed to get some photos of the underneath when it was up on the ramp:
During the underbody restoration at GTR Motorsport:
All new undertrays/fixings etc and 4 litres of wax oil:
And back on the road:
It's looking good under there now Mike, congratulations. Mine will be having the same treatment done at some point before next winter.
Incidentally I've had a set of braces on order since mid January from Porsche Reading as mine are extremely pitted (front and rear). I had an email from James last week to inform me they are expected in week 12, so I suppose the beginning of June if they work to a normal financial year!
Or next week if you are an optimist!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Amazing car, great thread and looking forward to the updates. I had a lovely Gen 1 Cayman S for a few years and loved it (not in the same league as the GT3 obviously). Life meant it had to go for a bigger car but hope to move to a 911 at some point.
Thanks again for the comments, I’ve been considering an exhaust system for the car for a while, ideally I wanted an M&M system from Germany, they were the suppliers for Manthey who offered the K400 upgrade for the car, however at around £4500 I wasn’t that keen!
An advert appeared on 911UK with a full system comprising of ceramic coated stainless steel Fabspeed headers, GMG Motorsport silencers and cross over pipes with HJS 200 cell cats. The previous owner had them fitted to a MK2 GT3 and with a remap made significant gains. Again this system was around £5500, I picked it up for £1400.
Once it arrives I will fit the silencers, cross over pipes and cats myself, it will then go up to Matt at Fearnsport to have the headers fitted, the current bolts are rather corroded and if they snap off I have no way to remove them and he has done them plenty of times before! Once the full system is on I will get a remap carried out by Wayne Schofield.
Your insane :)
But what a stunner
Today’s job involved fitting the rather lovely new RSS engine mounts and once again stripping the back of the car off!! This is helped by the fact I’ve done it a few times before and all the fixtures are brand new!
Old engine mounts removed, I think there will be rather a noticeable difference as these are the original factory ones from 21 years and 48k miles ago!!!!
New lovely RSS mounts:
Fitted in the car:
And now with all the exhaust off waiting for the new one!!
love following this and the attention to detail,although are those rear tyres looking a bit low on tread??
Not a particularly exciting update however something that has been annoying me and I’ve been meaning to sort for about two years!!
Much wet and dry sanding and slowly building up the layers of paint let me with this, I’m pretty happy with it to be honest and it won’t annoy me every time I get in the car!!!
That has come out fantastic, great job!
I ordered 2 new engine mount nuts and fitted them today as the old ones were a little tired.
So after finding that the engine mounts were original I wanted to replace the gearbox mount bushes, I’ve ordered some from Cantrell Motorsport in the USA which will be with me next week, I had some spare time today so got the car up on stands/ramps and took out the mount in preparation.
All undertrays off and first gearbox mount bracket
The mount that needs to come off
Removed
Original rather tired bushes
From whence it came!!
With regards to the exhaust I have had the standard fun and games when removing 20+ year old Porsche manifold bolts, the first 6 lulled me into a false sense of security and came out easily, the next three round off, couple more snapped and then I stopped!!
As you can see the are absolutely ruined and rusty, I’ve been hitting them regularly with WD40 fast release penetrant and a fair amount of heat!
Im almost there with the order of tools I need to crack on and get it finished including stud extractors, rounded bolt removal sockets and an impact driver, wish me luck!!
Tools were a no show so I cracked on with removing the old bushes and giving the mount a really quick clean up.
'I ordered 2 new engine mount nuts and fitted them today as the old ones were a little tired'
Can I ask where you are getting parts like 'engine mount nuts' from in the current climate?
All the bits are from online, various Porsche specialists, the gearbox mounts are coming from the USA, obviously I haven’t been out to any motor factors or main dealer.
Loads of bits came from these guys https://www.design911.co.uk/fu/prod1...c&utm_content=