996.2 gt3 best b-road suspension

996.2 gt3 best b-road suspension

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Ducktales

Original Poster:

13 posts

27 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
Digga said:
take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
EXE-TC. by a country mile. 7 WRC wins.
Yes, for a passive damper set up, very possibly the best. Very expensive too.
4 to 5.5k... Is that expensive... Especially in the Porsche world.
Aren't they closer to 7k plus fitting? Which puts them in the same bracket as the tractives?

I really should have put a question mark in the title header rolleyes

take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey

5,071 posts

54 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
Ducktales said:
Aren't they closer to 7k plus fitting? Which puts them in the same bracket as the tractives?

I really should have put a question mark in the title header rolleyes
I had a quick look on their site which said 5.5 for gt3. Even at 7k they'd be worth every penny.

I have a set on my lancer. They really are very very good. Best way to describe it was it made the car feel a couple of hundred kilos lighter. They're beautifully supple down a b road. Similar to lotus in that softly sprung highly damped feel.

I take the view that suspension (and associated geo) is the best mod you can do to a car.. But then I've got just under 3ks worth of suspension on a mountain bike so probably biased.

Try a car fitted with one. They sell themselves.



TDT

4,910 posts

118 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
I take the view that suspension (and associated geo) is the best mod you can do to a car..
100% agree.

ttdan

1,091 posts

192 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
Tractive will have a controller where you program how the dampers react. I think? They actually use the DSC controller, or can do.

So if you’ve used DSC controller out of the box and liked it or not liked it you’ve possibly not programmed it to do what you’d like it to do. I’m led to understand that the Tractive damper will react faster to its electronic prompts from the controller than the factory dampers (stock or DDC) but again you need to set it for your requirements. In both scenarios there’s a LOT of adjustment available to get what you like.

isaldiri

18,407 posts

167 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
TDT said:
take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
I take the view that suspension (and associated geo) is the best mod you can do to a car..
100% agree.
Very much so but I guess the difference is that it typically needs a certain amount of skill to setup said suspension properly. I'm kind of the opinion most of the high end dampers are close enough (ttx is clearly the best though wink ) that it boils down much more to what's being done with them that translates down to the end user having a better experience.

My hope is that being lazy, the tractives can do a 'good enough' job in a wide enough range of circumstances that even if less good than some others, the electronic optimisation is sufficient to make up for that than fiddling with clicks on 3 way adjustables etc......

take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey

5,071 posts

54 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
isaldiri said:
Very much so but I guess the difference is that it typically needs a certain amount of skill to setup said suspension properly. I'm kind of the opinion most of the high end dampers are close enough (ttx is clearly the best though wink ) that it boils down much more to what's being done with them that translates down to the end user having a better experience.

My hope is that being lazy, the tractives can do a 'good enough' job in a wide enough range of circumstances that even if less good than some others, the electronic optimisation is sufficient to make up for that than fiddling with clicks on 3 way adjustables etc......
That's what I liked about EXE TC. Their setup is based on the car and not just a guess (why they sell for such a limited range of cars) . Mine came with a full geo suggestion + damping settings. It was right out of the box. Ex works WRC driver commented on how well the car went down a b road after driving it.

Never tracked it mind so that I can't comment on.

Slippydiff

14,742 posts

222 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
I take the view that suspension (and associated geo) is the best mod you can do to a car.. But then I've got just under 3ks worth of suspension on a mountain bike so probably biased.
yes

I wouldn’t say biased, just well informed.

Here’s what I said on this very forum in 2020 :


Slippydiff said:
As I said previously, really good, high end (for which read expensive) dampers are all too often under appreciated, most choose to spend their money on increasing the power output of their cars, rather than spending it on suspension components that enable them to actually use the power ...

and ...

Sadly, really good quality dampers are unappreciated by most, but they can transform an adequate chassis into something truly superlative.
I spent over an hour on the phone with EXE-TC a couple of months ago, it was a very illuminating conversation.

Those that know the company will know a large part of their development background was in the WRC, accordingly their ethos from the perspective of spring rates, is the polar opposite of most (though not all) high end damper manufacturers, and as you’ve said, they don’t build a one size fits all damper for a specific car, rather they want to know what you use the car for, it’s weight etc etc, so that they can build you a set of dampers tailored specifically to your car and your use.

I suspect you’d be pleasantly surprised just how good your road biased EXE-TC’s would be if you were to venture on track with them ...

And it’s also noteworthy that Singer chose EXE-TC over their usual TTX’s specified dampers for the DLS :



Suspension porn :


Nineexcellence1

41 posts

74 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
So we have been fitting these for a couple of years now but last 9 months we have pretty much a car in at all times having them fitted. We have covered all the main models, including recently 997 4L RS which was first in the world to have these.

Some basic points
- there is a Touring line version - don't let this put you off by the name because it is far from just Touring. Basically Julian at Tractive and Steve Bennett (UK distributer ) wanted to hit the market with a better price point. So these are one way adjustable with fixed spring rates. Price is approx £3500+Vat for the kit and then installation on top.
- There is not a choice of spring rates for the Touring line - it is designed to be plug and play.
- On the Touring line, the point is to use the stock top mounts, and regarding springs, these are not changed for the 991 GT3 range - we use the stock springs for those cars. The rest come with springs.
- Since we were early adopters of this in the UK, as the kits have progressed, we have determined the appropriate spring rates along with tractive. So for example we run 40/110nm for the 997 turbos etc, we matched the 50/120 for the 997 RS 4L.
- So generally speaking the Touring line has proper spring rates that allows for both road and track.

The ace version is almost twice the price, 3 way adjustable, and you can chose the spring rates. Frankly unless you are racing the Touring line is the right choice. We don't really do these (ace) , but have done in exceptional circumstances.

- The biggest advantage of the Tractive dampers is the valving - it is 10 times quicker than stock PASM
- it also has a wider range of dampening from full soft to full hard - as an example stock PASM is around 1500ma to 500ma, where as Tractive ( with a DSC controller ) can use the full range of 2000ma to 200ma.

It is quite hard to convince that a softer spring than stock springs will provide better performance - but it works because of the wider range and valving.

Regarding DSC - you can in PASM cars use the PASM controller as standard and not DSC. You will still see a marked improvement in dampening However, imo the DSC when programmed for Tractive, makes a massive jump over PASM. Setting aside what DSC does as stock, although we don't sell stock DSC controllers - we modify them now with different config files as the standard config file does not take into account different variances - for example a 991.2 T has softer springs than say a 991.2 GTS.

With pre PASM cars, DSC is not an option with Tractive. Instead Tractive has it own controller ( think of this as a DSC equal ) and a screen for the end user to have up to 5 preset settings for dampening, pitch and roll. The end user cannot change the Tractive controller, only the screen.

So, how does it work compared to other options. Well direct comparison to Bilstein PASM options such as B16 Damptronics etc, Tractive is way ahead. We used to like Ohlins etc for passive, but again back to back on 997, 991 the Tractive is so much better. In fact, we with tractive we don't need to be so aggressive on camber to achieve the same results.

As some have mentioned, we have done many 996 GT3s , 996 Turbos, 993RS and other non PASM cars. Installation time is approx another 6 hours on top of PASM cars to run the wiring and screen etc. The feedback has been amazing on both PASM and non PASM cars.

I think the difference here is the ability to program the DSC in the PASM cars with Tractive. Just a simple example of customer with 991.2 Turbo S, modified running 800ps, who uses it on track, and complained as expected, that the car just washes out in the corners, not surprising given the weight of the car. I was able to tell him we could sort that with Tractive and DSC. We installed that and I wrote a custom file first for him to use on a european trip so that he could get use to the changes - I didn't give the full range of dampening at that stage. When he came back, I changed the config to use the full range of dampening and gave it back to him with comment watch the turn in as it is like GT3 now. It is exactly like that now and on track he loves it. Those changes are instantly noticeable.

It is always hard to recommend without real world experience. Someone spending £5k-6k on upgraded dampers expects to see a noticeable difference. This is what Tractive does.

Tractive imo gives the best of both worlds - you can have that level of comfort on the road, but then a great damper for the track.

Ken

Digga

40,206 posts

282 months

Saturday 28th May 2022
quotequote all
take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
I take the view that suspension (and associated geo) is the best mod you can do to a car.. But then I've got just under 3ks worth of suspension on a mountain bike so probably biased.
Agree regarding car suspension.

As for mtb, both mine now run the superb Ohlins 36 air forks. Just sublime. Bothe have 4-way adjustable rear shocks, one Cane Creek, the other Ohlins TTX.

You do the maths. wink

take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey

5,071 posts

54 months

Saturday 28th May 2022
quotequote all
Digga said:
Agree regarding car suspension.

As for mtb, both mine now run the superb Ohlins 36 air forks. Just sublime. Bothe have 4-way adjustable rear shocks, one Cane Creek, the other Ohlins TTX.

You do the maths. wink
EXT for me... Funnily enough It was the WRC experience that sold me on them too.

Never tried Ohlins bike stuff... It's good they're getting this feedback now. Their shaky start put me off if I'm honest. Their car stuff is great.

ETA I'd like to try a car with some EXT dampers based on their bike stuff.

Digga

40,206 posts

282 months

Saturday 28th May 2022
quotequote all
take-good-care-of-the-forest-dewey said:
Digga said:
Agree regarding car suspension.

As for mtb, both mine now run the superb Ohlins 36 air forks. Just sublime. Bothe have 4-way adjustable rear shocks, one Cane Creek, the other Ohlins TTX.

You do the maths. wink
EXT for me... Funnily enough It was the WRC experience that sold me on them too.

Never tried Ohlins bike stuff... It's good they're getting this feedback now. Their shaky start put me off if I'm honest. Their car stuff is great.

ETA I'd like to try a car with some EXT dampers based on their bike stuff.
Latest Ohlins air forks (last couple of years) have been excellent. As you say, some problems initially, but they are super supple but have an uncanny knack of giving you enough support to avoid diving other forks can get. Deal with big hits too. Only once ever bottomed mine out, on a very steep drop, poorly executed.

isaldiri

18,407 posts

167 months

Monday 20th June 2022
quotequote all
TDT said:
Will be very interested to read your review on these, as I did see when 9e posted that they had recently done this.
So..... T if you're at all interested given the above -

at risk of indulging in some self justification obviously because one tends to want to validate splurging a reasonable chunk of cash.... but the tractives were I think bloody good at Silverstone today. Had thought at the ring in May that there was going to be plenty of grip available (which for various reasons I wasn going to try to explore in my first trackday there since 2018....) but much the same impression again today where I was a little happier to try to mess around.... Anyway to save on waffling and cut it short, thought the new damping made a significant difference I have to say and given the 'road' improvements I had already observed, it's actually quite a bit better over OEM on track as well. Much more settled and only when I (delibrately) provoked the car did it do anything funny (not withstanding a near final session red flag I caused by chucking the car into becketts on cold tyres and spinning but that was my own damned fault paperbag but did avoid the walk of shame as the car did restart after a few tries and the session even restarted 10 mins before 1700!). Can't say it's better than a friend's 997.1rs that I had tried years ago in germany on Ohlins TTX (which was absolutely mindblowingly good I might add) but it was almost a little reminiscient of that so am pretty happy with that. Will need to get Lasource a couple of laps in it to see what he thinks pronto as well but couldn't get things to work today as he's got more important things to do like ZV... tongue out .