GT4 strut top failure

[GT4RS]

bigmowley said:

Picture from social media. Apparently on track and kerb hopping!!!!!!! Not that we would ever do that obviously .
More info please

Am I correct in thinking the strut top design and materials used is the same on the 991.2 gt3 and 981 gt4 ?

It’s rather scary how many of these are failing now, even if you did hit a pot hole you wouldn’t expect this to happen.

They are all failing in the same way and appear to tear away from the body in a similar manor, this would appear that before failure there must of been cracks or week areas in this part of the chassis.

Is anyone aware of Porsche UK comments on the matter?



How come we

[jimPH]

Wow, this seems to be becoming more common. I hit a pot hole in Leeds back in the day and cracked my alloy wheel, but that is not something you expect from a high quality sports car at less than 5k miles.

I can see this becoming a serious recall.

[fridaypassion]

It needs to be. My yearning for a 991 gt3 is on hold until I know Porsche have your back with this. 110k on a car that explodes when you drive over a pebble? Nah.

[TDT]

Looks like the Vehicle Villians GT4 has been fixed and is back up and running with no ill effects.
Happened to be watching some CarFrietag/EasterWeekend Ring footage and it popped up on a lap.

https://youtu.be/L3x0oDmsu94 from about 1m40s

Guess there will be a vid from them soon.

[JayK12]

TDT said:

Looks like the Vehicle Villians GT4 has been fixed and is back up and running with no ill effects.
Happened to be watching some CarFrietag/EasterWeekend Ring footage and it popped up on a lap.

https://youtu.be/L3x0oDmsu94 from about 1m40s

Guess there will be a vid from them soon.

See the mental crash from this weekend?!

[TDT]

JayK12 said:

TDT said:

Looks like the Vehicle Villians GT4 has been fixed and is back up and running with no ill effects.
Happened to be watching some CarFrietag/EasterWeekend Ring footage and it popped up on a lap.

https://youtu.be/L3x0oDmsu94 from about 1m40s

Guess there will be a vid from them soon.

See the mental crash from this weekend?!

I heard about it.. but haven't seen the footage... link?

[JayK12]

TDT said:

JayK12 said:

TDT said:

Looks like the Vehicle Villians GT4 has been fixed and is back up and running with no ill effects.
Happened to be watching some CarFrietag/EasterWeekend Ring footage and it popped up on a lap.

https://youtu.be/L3x0oDmsu94 from about 1m40s

Guess there will be a vid from them soon.

See the mental crash from this weekend?!

I heard about it.. but haven't seen the footage... link?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ze7RF393zfM

[TDT]

TDT said:

Looks like the Vehicle Villians GT4 has been fixed and is back up and running with no ill effects.
Happened to be watching some CarFrietag/EasterWeekend Ring footage and it popped up on a lap.

https://youtu.be/L3x0oDmsu94 from about 1m40s

Guess there will be a vid from them soon.

Fixed....

https://youtu.be/-c4xDP7wSGo

[gtsralph]

There are several threads on rennlist about these failures, this being perhaps the most informative:

https://rennlist.com/forums/gt4/948382-strut-tower...

The conclusion seems to be that the SP Racing support bracket referred to in the video will stop the strut breaking through to the bonnet (yikes) but not stop failure and that the OEM strut tower part is common to GT and some cooking models.

https://www.spmsracing.com/shop/strut-tower-suppor...

Edit note: The SP Racing part is a Cup Car part as shown on that model's PET file, handed part numbers 991.504.283.8A and 991.504.284.8A

Edited by gtsralph on Wednesday 1st May 20:40

[Oilchange]

Am I right in understanding that Porsche designed this part of the chassis in aluminium?

[TDT]

Oilchange said:

Am I right in understanding that Porsche designed this part of the chassis in aluminium?

Correct. Part of the weight saving optimisation for 9x1 gen platform and beyond.

[Oilchange]

TDT said:

Oilchange said:

Am I right in understanding that Porsche designed this part of the chassis in aluminium?

Correct. Part of the weight saving optimisation for 9x1 gen platform and beyond.

Clearly an engineering/design failure.
Who else makes these from aluminium? Nobody.

[BrotherMouzone]

Oilchange said:

Clearly an engineering/design failure.
Who else makes these from aluminium? Nobody.

Didn’t Audi make them for the R8 and they failed too?

[Huskyman]

Oilchange said:

Clearly an engineering/design failure.
Who else makes these from aluminium? Nobody.

Err..
Jaguar
Mercedes
BMW
Audi

The whole front end of my E61 BMW was made from aluminium with cast towers, and the front strut towers in my F11 are made of aluminium alloy.
Porsche are not alone in this type of body manufacture, it’s all driven by weight, but it looks like they got it wrong here. I wonder if a strengthened item could be made?

[Oilchange]

Huskyman said:

Err..
Jaguar
Mercedes
BMW
Audi

The whole front end of my E61 BMW was made from aluminium with cast towers, and the front strut towers in my F11 are made of aluminium alloy.
Porsche are not alone in this type of body manufacture, it’s all driven by weight, but it looks like they got it wrong here. I wonder if a strengthened item could be made?

Well blow me down with a feather! Sounds like lots more disasters waiting to happen...

[Slippydiff]

Oilchange said:

Well blow me down with a feather! Sounds like lots more disasters waiting to happen...

Not really, Audi had a few issues with the early R8 chassis cracking. They supplied some weld in reinforcement plates to address the issue. I'm not aware of any issues with Mercedes or BMW experiencing similar issues.
This issue looks to be going the same way as 996/997 engine issues, that being the manufacturer will (more often than not) bury their head in the sand and let the owner pick the tab up, until there's a fatality/serious injury as a result of a failure. Should that happen in the good old US of A, the floodgates will open ...

[Huskyman]

Oilchange said:

Well blow me down with a feather! Sounds like lots more disasters waiting to happen...

Not really. The ring taxi M5 never suffered this type of failure AFAIK. Like others have said the R8 suffered from this and they did make a strengthening kit. Porsche needs to nip this in the bud if it starts happening on other 9x1 chassis cars.

[TDT]

Slippydiff said:

Oilchange said:

Well blow me down with a feather! Sounds like lots more disasters waiting to happen...

Not really, Audi had a few issues with the early R8 chassis cracking. They supplied some weld in reinforcement plates to address the issue. I'm not aware of any issues with Mercedes or BMW experiencing similar issues.
This issue looks to be going the same way as 996/997 engine issues, that being the manufacturer will (more often than not) bury their head in the sand and let the owner pick the tab up, until there's a fatality/serious injury as a result of a failure. Should that happen in the good old US of A, the floodgates will open ...

Porsche has clearly determined this as an acceptable risk vs the reward in performance benefits they have been able to make wrt profit margins, weight saving, dynamics. If we think about the total number of 9x1 architecture cars that have been produced vs the number of reported failures - this is still negligible and Porsche won't say anything about it, unless there is a major case - and maybe not even in that case dependant on the circumstances. Ideally you'd want Porsche to just underwrite these items and the repair in the case of a failure or provide a strengthening kit as has been mentioned above.

I mean, are we really saying that all 9x1 cars are now untenable as a ownership proposition because of this? Absurd really.

[Slippydiff]

TDT said:

Porsche has clearly determined this as an acceptable risk vs the reward in performance benefits they have been able to make wrt profit margins, weight saving, dynamics. If we think about the total number of 9x1 architecture cars that have been produced vs the number of reported failures - this is still negligible and Porsche won't say anything about it, unless there is a major case - and maybe not even in that case dependant on the circumstances. Ideally you'd want Porsche to just underwrite these items and the repair in the case of a failure or provide a strengthening kit as has been mentioned above.

I mean, are we really saying that all 9x1 cars are now untenable as a ownership proposition because of this? Absurd really.

It wouldn’t stop me buying one, but then I make conscious decision to avoid dropping ANY of my cars into large potholes, or indeed driving over kerbs (be they on the road or on a race track)
If the repair bill for the Vehicle Villain’s GT4 was £10k, I think Porsche should have made a contribution of some sort.
Cars really shouldn’t fail in this manner, I’ve never seen a steel shelled car fail thus (and I clattered a Nova SR straight up a 5” kerb at 40-50 mph as a lad. It trashed the steel wheel, the strut, the driveshaft, the wishbone (bent like a banana) but NOT the turret).
It’s a flaw in the design that shouldn’t have got past the R&D stage.

[boxsey]

Slippydiff said:

It wouldn’t stop me buying one, but then I make conscious decision to avoid dropping ANY of my cars into large potholes, or indeed driving over kerbs (be they on the road or on a race track)
If the repair bill for the Vehicle Villain’s GT4 was £10k, I think Porsche should have made a contribution of some sort.
Cars really shouldn’t fail in this manner, I’ve never seen a steel shelled car fail thus (and I clattered a Nova SR straight up a 5” kerb at 40-50 mph as a lad. It trashed the steel wheel, the strut, the driveshaft, the wishbone (bent like a banana) but NOT the turret).
It’s a flaw in the design that shouldn’t have got past the R&D stage.

Whilst I agree that the few failures are of concern and ideally it should not happen, I can't help thinking we don't know the full story of when the VV GT4 suffered the failure. The first time they bring it up is in the video where they take it to the OPC. They don't say when and where it happened. Surely if it had happened at the knockhill trackday, it would have formed part of that video. Yet GT4s (and 991 GT3s) have now done thousands of track miles and they're clearly not dropping like flies. There were six of us on a 2 day Spa trip at the start of this month. No failures. More of us at the RS day. No failures. Lots of trackdays last year and no failures. Plenty of track kerbs were hopped on those days. This makes me believe that the failures occur in exceptional circumstances rather than normal road and track use. So I can see why Porsche is taking the stand point that it's user abuse rather than normal use.