What's your opinion on Ruf Tuning? When exploring my options I made a call to Ruf, spoke with a rep and good some info. They have a 550 kit, which costs something in the neighbourhood of $30K. It produces approx 550hp and 570 lb/ft of torque. The person I spoke with said this should give the car a top speed over 200 mph with no body modifications (I seem to recall 208) and a 0-60 mph comfortably under 4s. Being Ruf, I didn't doubt these claims. Should I?

The other thing is that there appear to be other tuning options in the market that for less than $10K would provide the same (maybe better) results in hp/tq. Do these kits also make the car's performance increase in top speed (>200mph) and acceleration 0-60 (3.7,3.8s) or does Ruf have some sort of "magic" formula that makes their cars perform better?

 

wow. 550kit for 30k. they do have an amazing reputation. im sure the work they do is great + excellent components. + the warranty is always a plus as well.

however unless you just have alot of money to burn, or are just dying to have a ruf badge on your car, id opt for something else. id go for for a 650 or 700 kit + have money for wheels and suspension, and most likely even money left over. 30k is rediculus. k24's + flash + exhaust yield 550.

 

Check out the GT660 kit at www.EVOMS.COM. It is one of those reasonabily priced.

 

Ruf is the world's best at building all around drivabiltiy performance packages.
They happen to cost too much (my opinion) because you can do so much more now
for less.

MK

 

Ruf is very very good, however there is no way in hell I would drop 30 K on a 550 kit.Some very good tuners out there that will give you more for less. Try: Vivid racing, Protomotive, EVO, IA, Sharkwerks, RPM and many more.

 

I agree with you. But for the original poster, I'm quite sure that a Ruf 550 car is faster than some "stage 4 600hp" that comes with like only K24's, chip and exhaust...I have personal experience about these things.

Many European kits might be too pricey but their power is like their stats show. Due to different dyno measures people should more look at the parts being changed. I won't mention these big companies but here's some thoughts.

An example: Would you go for 542hp kit from Germany, another German 600hp kit or a 615hp kit from the US?

Sounds easy to answer?

Well I make a few points:

European tuner 1: K24 + Chip + Exhaust + Filter = 542hp
European tuner 2: K24/26 + Chip + Exhaust + Intake + Headers + Plugs + IC's + FPR + Clutch = 600hp
US Tuner: K24 + Chip + Exhaust + Intake + Headers + Plugs = 615hp

My educated guess is that these "542hp" and "615hp" cars are similarly fast while the second "600hp" car is bit faster than both.

So don't let the numbers alone fool you...

 

I can agree on some points, i must disagree on others. I went with FVD, ( They are European and American) I love my tuner, but there is no way anyone could convince me to spend 30 K even on a 600 Kit...Europeon or America.

 

Kaizu,

I agree that it is difficult to make 600+ with K24's.
These dyno games get fun...I have a realistic 650-675 HP at crank even
though I pulled 628 on a dynapack (reads high), and some people call my car a PE700
(It is not 700 Hp of any kind, but it does go "pretty well")

MK

 

For anyone interested here are the specs of the kits. I've include the 590 kit also:



Engine Kit 996 Rturbo 550 bhp, an addition of
130 PS / 96 KW, consisting of two turbos, sports
exhaust with catalytic converters, air filters and fine tuned
engine electronics. Please note that the engine
enhancements can only be performed by the Ruf Team
Power Output (DIN) 405 kW (550 bhp) at 6.000 rpm
Specific Output 113 kW/L (153 bhp/L)
Maximum Torque 780 Nm (575 lb.ft) at 4.000 rpm
Displacement 3.600 cm
Compression Ratio 9.4:1

Turbo/ GT2

Nr.: R96 100 100 51

Engine Kit 996 Rturbo 590 bhp, an addition of
170 PS / 125 KW, consisting of two turbos, sports
exhaust with catalytic converters, air filters and fine tuned
engine electronics. Please note that the engine
enhancements can only be performed by the Ruf Team
Power Output (DIN) 433 kW (590 bhp) at 6.500 rpm
Specific Output 120 kW/L (164 bhp/L)
Maximum Torque 830 Nm (612 lb.ft) at 4.200 rpm
Displacement 3.600 cm
Compression Ratio 9.4:1

Turbo/ GT2

Nr.: R96 100 100 55

 

Kaizu - The gentleman at Ruf also mentioned that the hp/tq estimates are pretty conservative. I'm just curious as to how exactly this kit is better - is it better programming, better turbos, more upgrades of other supporting mechanicals?

As a way of comparison - is a 550/600 kit from any of the other vendors able to reliably claim a top speed of 207/208 mph and a 0-60 time of 3.8s?

 

if you the money for ruf go for it !
but you are paying at least 15k for the ruf logo

 

Just out of curiosity, I would like to run a Ruf with my 24/18 proto GT2. What do you think Marty?

 

Dreamtripper,

To get a good idea of the power and speed of the RUF 996TT cars, one can simply review the 1/4 mile times in the top thread on this forum. Below is a partial list, showing the RUF 520 and RUF 590, as well as some other kits that ran similar times - but there is no RUF 550, you would have to figure it is something between the 520 and 590. IMO, you are paying a lot of money for the performance you are getting. For instance, my Speed Gallery modified 996TT with K16/24 hybrids ran 11.51 @ 127.25mph in the quarter mile - faster in both ET and trap speed than the $70,000 RUF 590 Nardo. My SG set-up cost approximately $10,000 installed. That is a huge difference in cost. Now with all that said, the RUF family is a very special group and I like their cars a lot. Their customer service is legendary and I can attest to that - Alois dispatched a RUF factory technician to my house to repair a RUF PSS-9 suspension error in one of the early kits. I have met and spoken to Alois Ruf and his wife and they are very nice people. I also had a RUF exhaust (still do in storage), so I like their products. The problem is that early on, they were one of the only games in town, but now the Porsche tuning market has really opened up and there are numerous cost effective options. At this point in time, I do not believe the RUF 550 is any better or more reliable than many other similar HP kits for a lot less money. If you are looking for that level of HP and you find a RUF at the right price, then I would say by all means "buy it" and join the RUF club, but I would not pay list price for the kit with the numerous cost effective and potentially superior options out there today.

Here are the 1/4 mile figures:

11.51 @ 127.2 - John D (AWD K16/24 hybrids)
11.5x @ 126.5 - RUF R Turbo 590 HP TT (AWD)
11.60 @ 124.7 - RenntechV12 / AWD
11.64 @ 129.5 - Dr. Joe / GT2
11.64 @ 124.2 - Hartmann / AWD
11.65 @ 123.3 - Jimmer / AWD (stock K16's)
11.65 @ 126.0 - Divexxtreme / AWD (stock K16's)
11.7x @ 120.7 - Indykid / AWD
11.73 @ 124.6 - Heavychevy / AWD
11.82 @ 126.9 - TX Turbo / AWD
11.84 @ 118.7 - Powell / AWD (stock K16's)
11.86 @ 119.9 - Motor Trend / Stock 996TT X50
11.89 @ 118.8 - Cohare / AWD
11.91 @ 119.9 - Silver / AWD
11.9x @ 122.7 - RUF R Turbo 520 HP TT (RWD)

 

Ding, ding, ding...we have a winner!

RUF makes a great product, Dreamtripper. But don't believe the hype. They aren't any faster than any other P-car making the same power.

 

It is going to take more than 550 to break 200 mph