Re : Porsche 911 (996) Turbo | The Brave Pill
Discussion
ATM said:
£135 for wheel alignment - that's a lot.
I don't agree, they've got expensive Hunter kit - my local place charges up to 170 for the same service!In the swing of things, it's one of the most important things to do on a high performance car, I certainly don't mind paying it on a regular basis given how money I waste on other things
Never you mind said:
When you start to hit speeds that will get you banned the 996TT will feel very much faster but up to that point, not much in it I reckon. And on tight twisty rounds the AMG would hammer the 996TT. A long track, like spa, the porsche would be way better. Never felt like the design brief for all 911 turbos was outright speed everywhere, they have always, IMHO, gone for the long distance cruise approach, hence why they gave us GT3/GT3RS/RS etc etc
I've never owned a Turbo, but have done plenty of miles in them, and I had an A45 alongside my C2 for a while and I disagree. An A45 wouldn't see which way a 996 Turbo went down a country road. The biggest thing about the 911 is how you can string corners together nicely you don't notice how quickly you're going. I loved my A45, but it didn't have the steering feel or handling to do that. More hurtle towards a corner, brake hard and put the power down again and repeat over and over. Less feel, less fun and less involving to drive IMOEdited by Never you mind on Sunday 12th January 20:43
nebpor said:
ATM said:
£135 for wheel alignment - that's a lot.
I don't agree, they've got expensive Hunter kit - my local place charges up to 170 for the same service!In the swing of things, it's one of the most important things to do on a high performance car, I certainly don't mind paying it on a regular basis given how money I waste on other things
Hunter machine
Paid £55 to align my 981
Paid £55 to align my 996
Recommend
Limpet said:
What would be a reasonable annual maintenance/bork budget for one of these if you stayed clear of OPCs for servicing and used a good independent? Are they maintenance friendly in terms of doing odd jobs yourself, assuming of course you know one end of a spanner from another?
They qualify for the porsche classic thing now so you do get a discount from your OPC (15%?) and if you join the Porsche club you get even more discount. From memory might just be on parts. Mine did chuck up a big bill but partly down to me wanting to get things replaced while other work was going on. But for the 3 years before that bill it was about 1- 1.5K per year, including a new set of rear tyres. All OPC.
What are the Tiptronic ones like ?
Got me looking but prices are all over the place, from late twenties looking on eBay to one thats up for £51,950 despite not being super low miles and a bit fiddled with.
What are the major issues with them, no IMS/RMS but imagine it can still throw big bills up, dont seem to rust, brakes and tyres dont seem that expensive but guessing some items are eye watering.
Got me looking but prices are all over the place, from late twenties looking on eBay to one thats up for £51,950 despite not being super low miles and a bit fiddled with.
What are the major issues with them, no IMS/RMS but imagine it can still throw big bills up, dont seem to rust, brakes and tyres dont seem that expensive but guessing some items are eye watering.
ATM said:
nebpor said:
ATM said:
£135 for wheel alignment - that's a lot.
I don't agree, they've got expensive Hunter kit - my local place charges up to 170 for the same service!In the swing of things, it's one of the most important things to do on a high performance car, I certainly don't mind paying it on a regular basis given how money I waste on other things
Hunter machine
Paid £55 to align my 981
Paid £55 to align my 996
Recommend
J4CKO said:
What are the Tiptronic ones like ?
Got me looking but prices are all over the place, from late twenties looking on eBay to one thats up for £51,950 despite not being super low miles and a bit fiddled with.
What are the major issues with them, no IMS/RMS but imagine it can still throw big bills up, dont seem to rust, brakes and tyres dont seem that expensive but guessing some items are eye watering.
Was thinking the same on 996 GT2s, as they seem to start around £80K-odd and run to over £200KGot me looking but prices are all over the place, from late twenties looking on eBay to one thats up for £51,950 despite not being super low miles and a bit fiddled with.
What are the major issues with them, no IMS/RMS but imagine it can still throw big bills up, dont seem to rust, brakes and tyres dont seem that expensive but guessing some items are eye watering.
Fast Bug said:
I've never owned a Turbo, but have done plenty of miles in them, and I had an A45 alongside my C2 for a while and I disagree. An A45 wouldn't see which way a 996 Turbo went down a country road. The biggest thing about the 911 is how you can string corners together nicely you don't notice how quickly you're going. I loved my A45, but it didn't have the steering feel or handling to do that. More hurtle towards a corner, brake hard and put the power down again and repeat over and over. Less feel, less fun and less involving to drive IMO
I'd agree with that. I've not owned an A45 but have had quite a few of the recent/current crop of silly fast hatches (some of which were slightly breathed on). An extremely generous and trusting salesman gave me a loan of a 996tt for a month while a C4 I'd bought from them was in for repairs. I don't really care what the statistics look like on paper but in comparison to any of those hatches I initially found the way that the turbo relentlessly kept piling speed on quite terrifying. I did get used to it after about a week but the novelty was still there. Regardless of the speed, the bigger difference was in how planted and connected the car felt. In comparison to any hatch I've driven it was so communicative and confidence inspiring that it really would get you into bother. It really made me appreciate the difference between a car that's been designed as a sports car from day1 and a shopping cart/rep mobile that's had more power added.
I can understand why folk who tool around in Tuscans and Lambo's and the like might think it's a boring car but for us mere mortals it's anything but.
nebpor said:
ATM said:
£135 for wheel alignment - that's a lot.
I don't agree, they've got expensive Hunter kit - my local place charges up to 170 for the same service!In the swing of things, it's one of the most important things to do on a high performance car, I certainly don't mind paying it on a regular basis given how money I waste on other things
BMW will try and charge £250 for a KDS alignment.
J4CKO said:
What are the Tiptronic ones like ?
Got me looking but prices are all over the place, from late twenties looking on eBay to one thats up for £51,950 despite not being super low miles and a bit fiddled with.
What are the major issues with them, no IMS/RMS but imagine it can still throw big bills up, dont seem to rust, brakes and tyres dont seem that expensive but guessing some items are eye watering.
Whilst rare, the RMS does occasionally need replacing.Got me looking but prices are all over the place, from late twenties looking on eBay to one thats up for £51,950 despite not being super low miles and a bit fiddled with.
What are the major issues with them, no IMS/RMS but imagine it can still throw big bills up, dont seem to rust, brakes and tyres dont seem that expensive but guessing some items are eye watering.
Mine did at around 30k miles (the car I linked to further up the thread).
The rads were a weak point - no stone protection from the factory, and I had to eventually have all 5 replaced ( 2 a/c and 3 coolant).
They also caught leaves that would rot and cause corrosion, and then leak..
Also, quite common is the rear spoiler malfunction- either doesn’t rise or rises wonky due to the lifters failing.
They didn’t used to be repairable so new lifters were needed at quite considerable cost.
Cheers, saw one advertised saying it had a new spoiler mechanism.
The performance figures are interesting and backs up what MarkCosNottz was saying,
The 0-60 and 0-100 mph are still fast but stuff has caught up, but 0-150 mph in 22.1 is a lot faster than the faster hot hatches which are nearer to 30 seconds.
Got me looking at 0-150 mph figures, Mustang GT is 23 seconds, its my favourite new performance metric, funny how the Mustang is regarded as not being perhaps that fast but it blitzes most hot hatches if thats accurate.
Not sure how useful performance above 100 mph is, unless you are LLF
996TT02 said:
Having owned mine for 9 years now - I understand both POV's.
Have had mixed feelings about mine.
The reality is that a 996TT is not a "hooligan" car, and that is not meant to disparage such cars. It just is not a car to kick the rear out at your nearest roundabout while doing barely 20mph.
Rather, the TT is a fine wine, compared to cheap supermarket lager. A wine, nonetheless, with a high alcohol content.
There is a place for both, but it is on rarer occasions that one can appreciate the wine, and therein lies the "problem".
The TT is a car for somewhat particular roads, where, perhaps, it is not mainly about the performance. Rather it is the savouring of the steering feel, the handling, the hustling through innumerable medium speed bends at 9/10ths, the car giving tons of feedback as to road surface, grip, what each individual wheel is doing. You can do this for hours on end, and it just gets more enjoyable as you get into the groove. You can then lay off, and pootle home. On the way home, you find some slower traffic with not too many safe gaps. This is no problem. You summon the second character of the car, the high "alcohol content" and the overtaking gaps suddenly become more than adequate. That too is fun.
Until you have owned a 996TT for long enough, and have discovered both the ideal place and method in which it is to be enjoyed, and obviously have regular access to using it in such places, you may very rightly consider it to be deficient, ironically perhaps because of it's competence, and call it too good for it's own good. Just as you would not take the best French wine to a football match. You would not even know what you were drinking.
I’ve owned a 997.2 turbo for three years now and that’s a lovely description of the car. I love mine to bits and every time I think of selling and moving on I take it out for a spin and fall in love all over again. I can understand some of the ‘boring’ critiques. The modern turbo (and I’m including the 996 here) seems to fall through the gap between a supercar and sports car. It does everything exceptionally well but doesn’t have the rawness of other more exciting cars. However, I do think it does get under your skin the longer you own one and you understand the nature of the thing. I took mine up to the highlands a couple of years ago and it was the perfect car for doing everything I wanted to do up there - including the many motorway miles to get up there. Have had mixed feelings about mine.
The reality is that a 996TT is not a "hooligan" car, and that is not meant to disparage such cars. It just is not a car to kick the rear out at your nearest roundabout while doing barely 20mph.
Rather, the TT is a fine wine, compared to cheap supermarket lager. A wine, nonetheless, with a high alcohol content.
There is a place for both, but it is on rarer occasions that one can appreciate the wine, and therein lies the "problem".
The TT is a car for somewhat particular roads, where, perhaps, it is not mainly about the performance. Rather it is the savouring of the steering feel, the handling, the hustling through innumerable medium speed bends at 9/10ths, the car giving tons of feedback as to road surface, grip, what each individual wheel is doing. You can do this for hours on end, and it just gets more enjoyable as you get into the groove. You can then lay off, and pootle home. On the way home, you find some slower traffic with not too many safe gaps. This is no problem. You summon the second character of the car, the high "alcohol content" and the overtaking gaps suddenly become more than adequate. That too is fun.
Until you have owned a 996TT for long enough, and have discovered both the ideal place and method in which it is to be enjoyed, and obviously have regular access to using it in such places, you may very rightly consider it to be deficient, ironically perhaps because of it's competence, and call it too good for it's own good. Just as you would not take the best French wine to a football match. You would not even know what you were drinking.
Here’s to the fine wine turbo!
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