reducing front end roll & spring rates

[brian in buddina]

A facebook market place advert for springs came up today. David Womer on 'Porsche Parts Group 944 951 968'. I contacted him to see where he was located and pricing for shipping. He is located in the San Francisco area. He does not have any progressive rate springs.

After reviewing Clark's Garage on suspension & specifically springs; it says that the average front spring rate is approximately 170lbs. Our cars, in a stock configuration,  have a tendency to roll more than more 'modern' cars. For street use a maximum of about 200 to 220lbs is recommended by Clark's. This is of course ignoring other changes to swaybars, tyres, camber adjustment, rear coilovers or torsion bars.

Does anyone have any more current information or recommendations for a street set up to reduce front end roll. Yes a bigger front swaybar would do it but also probably upset the my cars balance. Presently  mine is very neutral, under my limited testing. Is it possible to fix the front end roll with out messing everything else and still be a nice comfortable street car?

My Car is a 1988 944S with koni yellows on the softest setting, 16" staggered 7"' & 8" on Bridgestone Potenzas. No my car does not have the M030 option.

Any comments from the intelligentsia? 

[944s2cab]

Jon Mitchell from JMGarage is a transaxle expert in the UK, his advice is what I based my setup on,

Front, H&R progressive springs (exact rate not known but around the 200-220LBS rate) Bilstien B6,  stock 26.8mm roll bar

Rear, 26mm torsion bars, Bilstien B6, stock 16mm roll bar,

next step is to upgrade to 30mm/19mm roll bars

 

[brian in buddina]

Is this your current set up? What tyres are you running? 

I take it this is a road set up. How do you find the balance now over your original set up?  Any issues with wet roads, high or low speed corners? 

[Buchanan Automotive]

Unfortunately the standard hyper coil or Eibach springs won't fit on the standard collars on the 944. There are a few companies like weltmeister or H&R that do make springs but nearly every time we have installed them they are at incorrect heights and being that the 944S did not have adjustable perches you have to deal with the car being too high usually.

In my opinion the best way to firm up the car is with Paragons coil over kit and some sway bars.

https://www.paragon-products.com/Coil-Over-Kit-Koni-Cup-p/koni_cup_kit.htm

This is what we regard as the base level coil overs and they are pretty cheap compared with Motons or Motion Control Suspension coil overs. These are torsion bar delete so you can choose any spring rate you want. Our usual street setup is anywhere between 250#-350# front and 350#-450# rear. You will also need their helper springs to keep the front main springs in place when the car is on a lift and its best to fit some torsion release springs to the top of the springs to stop and spring bind (spring noises when turning)

Regards

Sean

[OzJustin]

I have the Paragon Koni kit (set at 75% firm) on my car and am very happy with it. My car also has the larger 968CS sway bars, larger torsion bars, KLA front strut brace, Racer’s Edge camber plates, 968 control arm bushes and lots of camber. For a street car it performs very well and is not too harsh. There is more body roll than I initially expected but it is still very enjoyable. After the initial roll it sets nicely into corners. Highly recommended. 😊

[944s2cab]

On 02/12/2019 at 08:12, brian in buddina said:

Is this your current set up? What tyres are you running? 

I take it this is a road set up. How do you find the balance now over your original set up?  Any issues with wet roads, high or low speed corners? 

yep current set up.

for road I use stock 205/55R16 and 225/50R16, for track I run semi slic Federal's, 215/50R17 and 235/45R17 (I believe)

It's not much difference from stock, you notice the harder rear torsion bars most, less weight transfer out of the corner, no issues in the wet.

I didn't go for coilovers on purpose, because I knew I'd be forever changing the settings and never know the best, this way I change my driving style to suit the suspension not the other way round,

[cyberpunky]

On 02/12/2019 at 08:45, Buchanan Automotive said:

Unfortunately the standard hyper coil or Eibach springs won't fit on the standard collars on the 944. There are a few companies like weltmeister or H&R that do make springs but nearly every time we have installed them they are at incorrect heights and being that the 944S did not have adjustable perches you have to deal with the car being too high usually.

In my opinion the best way to firm up the car is with Paragons coil over kit and some sway bars.

https://www.paragon-products.com/Coil-Over-Kit-Koni-Cup-p/koni_cup_kit.htm

This is what we regard as the base level coil overs and they are pretty cheap compared with Motons or Motion Control Suspension coil overs. These are torsion bar delete so you can choose any spring rate you want. Our usual street setup is anywhere between 250#-350# front and 350#-450# rear. You will also need their helper springs to keep the front main springs in place when the car is on a lift and its best to fit some torsion release springs to the top of the springs to stop and spring bind (spring noises when turning)

Regards

Sean

Hi Sean

When you say add helper springs and torsion release springs, are these both needed just for fronts or both? and are they something we could source locally? Any more info greatly appreciated

Bruce