I have a 87 944. Heres a pic. I hit a racoon goin like 90 and it destroyed the front end. I found This aftermarket piece that is very nice online and makes it look soooo much better without the black bumpers. I will this spring be doing a few things to the car to make it quicker. any suggestions?

 

Welcome.

Unfortunately, there is no realistic way, without spending boatloads of money, to add HP to your car. If you are interested in weight reduction techniques, you could gain some "quickness" by deleting some un-necessary weight on your car.

Honestly, these cars are not made for 0-60 sprints. They do shine when it comes to the twisties and fast corners though. I would suggest to learn the limits of your car at Autocross events and Drivers Ed events. After a year or two of these, if you feel you have overcome the ability of the car, then look to upgrades such as bigger brakes, weight reduction, etc.

Short of an engine swap to a 3.0 or 2.5turbo motor, and all that comes along with those, there is not a lot of HP to be gained.

Hope that makes sense! Good luck!

 

Fiberwerks front ends look nice, as does the rest of your car. I'd focus on suspension work and making your car lighter, if you want to make your car faster. Check out some of the other threads in this forum for more info, and be prepared to read past the BS of the guys that are talking about adding superchargers, turbos or "NAZZZ" to their 944's. It isn't gonna happen.

Welcome aboard!

Regards,

 

I know that one of the first things I want to do is new wheels with some nice wide low profile tires because the tires on this thing are larger profile than the stock tires on my grand am. This car was first my dads. I had talked him into buying it when I was I think 14 and I bought it from him. Since he just got a GTO so he wasnt driving the porsche much anymore.
Im thinking about a intake, header and catback exhaust system. Im also looking into the chip and throttlebody pully set. Then I want to focus on suspension lower it down just a little maybe if I can find some coil overs. sway bars and strut tower braces. maybe if I could find some stiffer engine and tranny mounts that would help to. If the car wasnt in as great of shape as it is I would gut it out and turn it into and autoX car. I would love to turbo the engine. But I figure if I did that I might as well just swap a turbo motor in there but I think im just going to stay N/A. Maybe later on get into buildig the motor and beefing up the tranny.

 

If that is your only car, don't go with stiffer engine and tranny mounts, as that will introduce a whole host of problems down the road for you. A lot of the suspension points will bear forces that they weren't designed to carry and will subsequently fail prematurely. The car will also ride poorly on the street, and you will get no real benefit to it. Race traces don't generally have potholes on them, therefore race only parts aren't designed for the transient spikes in load members that street parts usually have designed in them.

If you are talking a cone airfilter instead of the airfilter box designed by Porsche, it will probably decrease power, not add it as claimed by most of the "bling bling, yo!" companies that produce them and there are countless articles with dyno proof to that effect, if you look around. Porsches paper airfilter also does a much better job filtering than the popular K&N filters that everyone seems to like to use. If you are talking about replacing the intake manifold, you won't see any gains unless you also swap your cam and do some head work, and even then, you will either see a marginal top end hp gain at the expense of low end torque (which is what you really want on the street), same with most aftermarket headers.

I don't want to sound like I am throwing cold water on your plans, but there are a lot of folks, myself included, that thought they would do exactly what you are talking about doing, and all we did was waste a bunch of money and get nothing in return. If there was an easy way to get some power out of a NA car, trust me, some one would have found it by now. Like I said before, it ain't gonna happen. A set of chips and a throttle cam is about all I would recommend, aside from just making sure its really tuned properly (its amazing how much power you can lose with a bad set of plug wires, as an example). If you really feel the need to modify your car for more hp, you really need to sell that car and either buy a 951 to begin with or find a Mustang or RX-7 or Supra. However, a well sorted 944 NA can be an absolute blast to drive and offers a lot more car than most people ever learn to drive...

Suspension, on the other hand... LOTS of options there.... My advice would still be drive your car for a couple of years, do soime auto-x and DE's if you are old enough, and then start modding the suspension because you will know what you need. One other thing, on a NA, tire and wheel weight is ABSOLUTLEY critical... get the lightest set you can find, and stay away from 18" wheels, the control arms can't handle the forces transferred to them from 18" wheels. 17" wheels fit well, look nice and are lighter than 18's anyway... Heavy wheels on a NA will make your car feel like the slowest thing in the world.

Regards,

 

This is just a weekend fun car really. I would like to do a little autocross here and there. I know the car will never be "fast" but I can make it more peppy and nimble in the corners.
I seen a 944 with a sb chevy in it..anyone done that here? I'd rather keep my car all porsche though.. Is there any way to put the 928gts engine in a 944. cause I love the 944 look so much more than th 928. I doubt I would ever be able to do that swap. Maybe one day I'll just buy a built up 951 engine.

 

Not trying to beat a dead horse here, but don't waste your time trying to make a NA car into a turbo.... If you want a turbo, sell the NA and buy one, you will be WAY ahead, moneywise.

SB Chevy engines do fit, but you will lose the power booster for the brakes in the process. A couple of guys do these conversions, and while they can be pretty nice, its not my cup of tea, so I am not the guy to tell you "yes". 928 engines won't fit in the engine bay, you'll have to go to a custom tub chassis to make that work, and then you are talking about a non streetable car, most likely, not to mention major $'s.

Lighten the car and work the suspension, and you will probably be very happy with the car. If you are looking for a "street racin, fast off the line car", go buy a Mustang, you'll be MUCH happier. Thats not a slam on you for looking for that elusive hp out of an NA, there's not many of us that would turn down an extra 25hp for these cars. Its just VERY tough to do.

Regards,

 

no way I'd ever take a mustang over my porsche I dont car if it is faster. Im saying a mustang thats around the same price as my porsche not any mustang cause I know some saleen mustangs I would definately take. I just like my 944 alot. It handles great and is just one of the funnest cars I've driven. My car is in really really great shape. just had a new $3000 paint job done on her because someone ran into the back of be and messed up my rear bumper I just decided to go ahead and replace the front end that had been killed by a racoon and repaint. There is absolutely no flaws in this car. mainly because I have done all the preventative maintainance. even when my dad owned the car we replaced every bushing we could with high quality ones always made sure all the maintainance was done way ahead of time. Mainly because I knew I wanted to own the car one day so I wanted to make sure it was still in great shape by the time i got it. Although it does have 100,000miles on the odometer it still runs great. thanks to running mobile 1 full synthetic ever since I can remember. I would love to run a turbo motor in the car. would it be to difficult to run a 951 engine in the car? I dont want to sell this car and get a different one.

 

Installing a 951 (944turbo) engine in your car is certainly possible, but a LOT of work. If this is what you want to do, you at least have a decent base as your car is a post-85 model car. This means that most of the mounting points and tolerance areas are the same as turbo cars (ie: the "shell" is the same shell that was used on the production lines).

However, it's not just a simple engine drop-in. Firstly, it would be easier to do if you could source a complete 951 parts car. I say this because you will need all of the little bits that would nag you to death if you just purchased an engine. I am probably forgetting something here (as it is 6:00am and I haven't had my first cup of java yet), but just to do the engine swap you will need the complete engine, intercooler, intercooler piping, oil cooler and pipin, radiator, wiring harness, DME, KLR, bellhousing, clutch, and dash guage pod. You will need to do some work to make the intercooler fit in the proper place or move it down lower into that large opening that your fiberworks nose has.

Now, once the motor is done, there are other issues to consider. You should really consider installing the 951 transmission. Not only is the gearing better for your application, it will also not self-destruct under the additional strain of the higher HP. The stock 944 transmission is not the strongest piece of kit to begin with, the ring and pinion gears are notorious for failure (ask me how I know, LOL!). The 951 trans is much more robust. This will be a straight forward swap, and will bolt up to your torque tube and trans mounts. It even uses the same odometer/speedometer plug for the sensor.

After the trans is installed, the next point I would turn my attentiion to is the brakes. All of that additional horsepower is going to have you going faster in a shorter space of road. You'll want the ability to haul it down to slower speeds, and while the standard 944 brakes are very good, the 951 brakes are so much better it is like night and day. Porsche upgraded the brakes on the 951 to match the HP. The brakes are going to be an almost straight forward swap, especially if you purchase a 87-89 951 parts car.

While you are at it, if the body of the parts car is in good shape, you could rogue several of the 951 specific parts (front bumper assembly, rear undervalance, black sideskirts, etc). This would be a matter of preference for you. However, the 951 front bumper assembly does make proper location of the intercooler much easier.

In the end, if you are mechanically adept, have the time and the tools, and can source a parts car for decent money, it's not a bad idea. However, if you can't do your own work, or have to source the parts bit by bit, it's a daunting and rather expensive endeavour. At that point, it would be better to consider selling your car and buying a decent 951 outright.

Good luck!

 

wow, thanks for the long responses. It does seem like alot of work. I have accually seen doing a little research. and I am looking at superchargers. I am quite familiar with turbo and supercharging cars. and I can see how doing a custom centrifigul style supercharger. Thats the style that has the compessor side that looks like a turbo. the other side is the pully. I can see how boosting my N/A 944 with this style supercharger would be alot easier than running turbo. As With a supercharger I will not have any lag. and I will have a more flat power band and have more low end power which is really what im looking for. I just want to run maybe 6psi. just a little something extra ya know.I also have experience in a custom machine shop so fabing up and brackets and what not will be no problem for me. and I know most superchargers are ran on n/a built engines I figure this would be a very cost effecting project. whats your opinion