yupididit said:What makes these 944's a better buy than a 986 boxster base or S that is priced identically?
Box flares.
yupididit said:What makes these 944's a better buy than a 986 boxster base or S that is priced identically?
Box flares.
Tyler H said:yupididit said:What makes these 944's a better buy than a 986 boxster base or S that is priced identically?
Box flares.
That's not fair lol
I regretfully owned an '86 944 turbo and was, and still am, ecstatic that I sold it last year and bought a CRX to replace it. The 944 was ULTRA needy. Something was always broken. It never ran right, despite the motor being perfect in every way. Everything was new and the car was still never "right"
Some 944 cons:
Timing belt/BS belt replacement
Cooling systems are terrible
They sound awful
Working on them is beyond frustrating
Its like sitting in a sauna on a hot day
Not particularly fast in stock form(but don't MOD it because kaboom)
Very expensive to own and maintain. Both in Time and money
Some 944 Pros:
Timeless looks(pop up lights)
Great handling
Nice highway car(if running properly)
All in all a terrible car to own for me, your mileage may vary. I say run away from the turbo and get an S2, it's a MUCH nicer car.
Transplant a VW 1.8t into a 944 and be done.
(I want to, I want to, I want to)
Remove all the cons with a sawzall. Add things from other makes/models until the 944 runs again.
johnnytorque said:I regretfully owned an '86 944 turbo and was, and still am, ecstatic that I sold it last year and bought a CRX to replace it. The 944 was ULTRA needy. Something was always broken. It never ran right, despite the motor being perfect in every way. Everything was new and the car was still never "right"
Some 944 cons:
Timing belt/BS belt replacement
Cooling systems are terrible
They sound awful
Working on them is beyond frustrating
Its like sitting in a sauna on a hot day
Not particularly fast in stock form(but don't MOD it because kaboom)
Very expensive to own and maintain. Both in Time and money
Some 944 Pros:
Timeless looks(pop up lights)
Great handling
Nice highway car(if running properly)
All in all a terrible car to own for me, your mileage may vary. I say run away from the turbo and get an S2, it's a MUCH nicer car.
Agree on many of the points: The timing belt is irritating, but considering it was the first one Porsche had done and had to include the balance shafts (also a first for Porsche), it wasn't bad for the time (late seventies) compared to other engines that came out with rubber timing belts after that? Its just kinda dumb, especially when viewed from the standpoint of the 2.0L 924 or any of the other Audi/VW engines in use at the time.
The cooling system seems to work pretty well, its just a bit more complex than others. No worse than many of the BMW's that need to have ALL of their components replaced on a routine basis, the difference is that BMW sells a lot more cars so vendors provide those parts in handy packages at a reasonable cost. Porsche and the supporting vendors don't.
The engines are very truck like and not in a good way. Being so large (2.5L and up) doesn't help. It never struck me as a sports car motor, so much as a GT engine. Compared to the song from the flat six, its a huge let down. Even the 2.0 in the 924 sounds better in some cases.
Working on them requires understanding the service process that Porsche developed, any shortcuts or alternative methods simply leads to frustration. Since so few people actually pony up for the factory manuals, they suffer with Hayne's or various online sources where some are better than others.
I don't understand the sauna comment. Mine was perfectly comfortable, once I fixed the heater control valves, the window switches and charged the A/C. If you have an aftermarket glass sunroof panel, then it will be brutally hot and its why so many buy them, use them and sell them on fairly quickly or store them on a shelf.
For the time, they were quite quick, but time has marched on and left them behind and unlike other turbo cars from the time, throwing cheap turbo tricks at them isn't a great idea due to the costs involved in their repairs. Upping the boost on a FWD Turbo-Dodge may result in a new headgasket fairly quickly or maybe a new driveline, etc. Both of which you can grab and change out in a few hours for a under a hundred bucks.
Like I said, I agree with many of your points and there's a reason I sold my modded 944 Turbo S when my kids were on their way. It was a lot of fun (about 450bhp) and once I took care of the deferred maintenance it was actually fairly reliable until I popped the headgasket due to a blown coolant hose. I repaired that, replaced all of the cooling hoses and it was back to being reliable again and the new owner drove the wheels off of it at autocross and hillclimbs before the engine finally popped. Now he's built a 2.8L for it and its a monster that just ate second gear out of the transaxle (after decades of abuse, that's not bad).
For my 924, I'll probably swap something into it that's a bit newer with better parts availability since the rest of it is fairly cheap to deal with. I think if someone came up with a good non-v8 swap kit for the 924 and 944 series it could be a great product for those that buy these cars cheap.
I saw someone swapped a Mazda KL V6 with a turbo into a 944. How’s that for an odd non V8 swap?
(and yes, I’m aware this is a necro thread, sorry)
Stefan, time haven't moved on as much as one would think :) , there are several 951s still racing here in sweden and sets some very serious lap times, theres plenty of room for tyres, and how to get reliable horse power is also sorted since many years. So many of them have kept up, though the rising prices makes them less common as track cars, just as the prices killed of the air cooled 911s as enthusiast cars and put them all in garages. I can see many reasons of choosing one before a 986, depending on what you value qnd reasons not to :)
Though i prefer my 924 turbo, more raw and more fun :)
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