993 rear PU (bumper) supports/stays in stainless steel....

[996ttalot]

It is common for most models. In fact a lot of people remove them - you save nearly 30lb in weight front and rear.

Edited - just to add they are not structural - are going to have no impact in a car crash. They are there for minor knock e.g. less than 5 mph. So if you live in London then maybe don't remove given some peoples way of getting into a space. There are separate impact pipes (absorber) depending on model and these are at both front and rear. I don't know how much they weigh new, but rusty ones were nearly 30lbs in weight.

Edited by 996ttalot on Wednesday 2nd June 22:35

[Orangecurry]

996ttalot said:

It is common for most models. In fact a lot of people remove them - you save nearly 30lb in weight front and rear.

Edited - just to add they are not structural - are going to have no impact in a car crash. They are there for minor knock e.g. less than 5 mph. So if you live in London then maybe don't remove given some peoples way of getting into a space. There are separate impact pipes (absorber) depending on model and these are at both front and rear. I don't know how much they weigh new, but rusty ones were nearly 30lbs in weight.

Edited by 996ttalot on Wednesday 2nd June 22:35

30lb? Really? - I'll weigh the old ones.

More importantly, they are NOT there just for minor bumps. The rear PU on a 993 is HELD on by
- three 8mm bolt-headed screws on each side, where it joins each wing
- five big screws across the back at the top (under the reflector and black plastic cover)
- four big screws at the back along the bottom, but only 2 of these fasten onto anything 'solid' (two Z-shaped brackets), the other 2 go into just the heat-shield.

Porsche also introduced the four brackets, two each side, to hold the lower sides of the PU.

When the car is moving, airflow under the car will cause the PU to distort if it is not affixed at the lower-sides.

So what? I hear you say.
1) the aerodynamics at the rear of a 911 might be considered to be important, at speed
2) the four fixing points across the lower-rear of the PU will be put under strain; the big rear heatshield attaches on these four points, and we all know how expensive that is. The area of the heatshield AROUND the fixing point gets torn out, and it flaps about, now held securely at the top only.

You can just see this on mine.



Giles - I've been progressing this on 911uk.com

http://www.911uk.com/viewtopic.php?t=54073

The bottom line is that the engineer doesn't want to do the complex bracket - it takes a lot of time. I'm working on changing his mind, but it's softly softly.

BUT you can have a rear pair.

Why bother?

1) cheaper than OE

2) my ORIGINAL rear (simple) brackets were slightly rustier than the front (complex) brackets.... so you could suppose that the rear ones fail sooner, hence SS has a more important role here. After all, they are more exposed to everything the rear-wheels throw-up.

3) there is a very good chance that the 'simple' rear brackets are the same for all NB cars.

4) Once the 'simple' rear pair is fitted, you never need to take the rear PU off again.... well not for the brackets anyway, only for heatshields (by this I mean you can change the 'complex' front brackets just by removing the plastic wheel-arch protector to allow full access.)

5) postage will be less

Edited by Orangecurry on Thursday 3rd June 11:29

[996ttalot]

Mine is on a 996 tt so it looks like they have changed the design again somewhat. On the 996tt they are precisely for what I said.

Don't get me wrong, I am not knocking your idea. I think it is very good so apologies if it came across that way.

If you look at the rear pu, you will see that part 14 are the rear supports. It is actually part 33 in the diagram that is the impact pipe.

Edited by 996ttalot on Thursday 3rd June 12:09

[Orangecurry]

ahhh no - if you look at my photo, the 993 has the equivalent of your part 14 as well - it's the z-shaped bracket I referred to; there's only one in the photo, on the RHS in a sort of goldy-colour.

The PU side-supports are in this photo. I have no idea if the 996 has them or not.



Note that three out of four have rusted through on my low-mileage car. In fact only two had rusted through, the third was so rusty I broke it on disassembly