Agreed, setting up the suspension properly is paramount, especially 2/3 ways of any branding. KW V3 is a very good option if you don’t want to mess around with all the settings and want a ready to go kit.
Not sure what you need as support, I’m guess maybe someone to help dial it in correctly, but with a good suspension place and over the phone support to KW in either Germany or the States, you will get everything you need. I don’t recall the guys name (maybe Joe) from KW’s CA office, but he was very knowledgeable, so I don’t think that phone support is going to be an issue.
What I have learnt with the V3 and now the 3 ways just installed is the most important factor to consider when choosing a kit is qualty of materials used, and KW are the goods, the KWs V3 i have on the M3 have been tracked now for the past 2 years and driven a lot on the street and to date they have performed flawlessly.

 

Thanks, enjoyed posting it , hope it helps a few guys who are deciding on what to buy.

 

+1, Just for the record, I would not have done anything to my suspension (above stock GT2) if it was not for two reasons;

1. Extra HP, I have now (just too floaty at high speed)
2. I wanted to seriously track the car, but still drive on the street 70T/30S

Outside of that, the stock set-up was more than adequate and will be more than fine for any occasional tracker. But I do believe that you should always get the best you can afford, but never buy poor quality, if you don’t have the cash……SAVE SAVE SAVE

 

I'm not talking about just phone support, Lex from Moton and Brian from JRZ are regulars at major track events and races around the country. They are also quick to support needed rebuilds and parts to customers etc. which is really neccessary when dealing with suspensions of this caliber, they are fairly high maintenance.

Sound like the KW's are right up there in price too with the others. Was that price you almost mentioned including all of the tender/helper springs and mounts as well? If that is the case ,they have the upper hand in terms of cost on the competition.

If they also take the time to allow you to determine proper spring rates and tender/helper springs before building, that is another plus when they send them already assembled, others do that too, but most people don't get everything from one place, they piece it together.

Anyways, I'm looking forward to some impressions. VERY few people have the opportunity to test these types of suspensions on the same car to make a direct comparison so it's really like shooting in the dark because everyone seems to like what they have.

 

Cheers, thanks, looking forward to enjoying it.

Ride height is 105mm Front and 128 Rear, can go lower was set at 95mm Front and 118mm when it first went in. Everything was okay, it cleared the wheel arches (full lock) and looked awesome, but was not practical and wouldn't get out of the driveway without scrapping (the front brake ducting was only 15mm from the ground). So we decided to go with 10mm lower from what we had before (before the KW’s went in) and left the rake at approx. 25mm difference front to back (as was set from Porsche) when I bought the car. Yet to do a corner balance, this will make a big difference in the set-up, will play with the heights once I get some track times, think I will go a little lower, but we'll see

I would like to know from other 6speeders, what the best difference (mm) in height is from front to rears is for the track and for the street and what the reasons for this are?

 

Yes, your right, that kind of support is going to be helpful, there is no rep in OZ for KW that can support this, however I am lucky enough to have a friend here that use to be the head guy for KW and has one on one contact with the right people, called him maybe five times during the install and set-up . You need someone that you can call on with this set-up.

To answer your questions;
1. The kit came with everything to just bolt on and drive the car (direct replacement of stock). It was an easy install, any mechanical minded person/s could do. The only tricky part was the fitting of the sway bar drop linkage mount. That required undoing the strut and sliding and screwing on the bracket. I ordered the top mounts also, anything you want and any application you require will be made to your specs you give them. Just need to ask.
2. Spring rates were recommended by KW as per their experience with 996 cars in Europe Racing (24h race Nurburgring and 24h-racen Le Mans) mine were approx. 470F and 970R, they feel right so far, but very stiff.
3. Motons were more expensive than this kit, and I felt the extra money for them was not going to get me a better kit, plus there is no one in OZ with any Moton experience.
4. Definitely will be giving an update on lap times before and after the install and also will be dialing in my old HP tune to ensure the extra power I have now will not be in the equation for testing purposes.

Should be very interesting.

 

I have shared this data with a few guy's on 6speed, this took me a long time to setup, can be an all out track setup to work with for someone, or a baseline, whatever.. Depends on the person and their car/setup, all I know is my car is finally RIGHT after 2 years of tuning!

I will put this up here for everyone to see. All of this info was sent to me after opinions from Vic (VA122) on rennlist, Lex at Moton and Vic I believe spoke to Sofronas at GMG! It transformed my car..... Hope it helps!

"I'm still waiting for Lex at moton to call me back, he was racing.

Here goes
-center steering wheel first and lock in place (seriously no one does this for some reason.)
-Camber for DOT-Rs 2.6/2.4 f/r with shims or you'll lose your caster
-Caster 8.5
-toe 0/-2mm (toe in) per side f/r
-bar middle/1 from full soft f/r
-adjust rear dog bones for kinematic toe in (not out) if they don't know what i'm talking about leave go somewhere else.
-adjust rear toe links for 0 bump as above if they don't know what i'm talking about leave go somewhere else.
-springs 6in with 3 in helper (0-150 weight) visually it should be completely compressed when wheels are on the ground.
-600/800 or 600/900 up to 800/1000 more and you'll need slicks.
-rear locking plate for toe links help depending on what brand you have.
-re-corner balance the car with your weight in the drivers seat with sand bags. ( a LOT of shops forget the weight part)
-front bump kit is a must if you lower more then 20mm from stock
-rake/chassis height- 100/120 f/r or that ratio if you want to go lower, but too low you need the cup uprights
-canister pressure 150/175 f/r

you should be good to go from there and the rest is shock tuning. I'll get you the baseline from lex, depends on the springs you use (eibach)



BTW, that is a big difference front to rear spring rate wise, wtf?! I know in Germany those guys like it STIFF, but they usually have a 900-1000 setup or more.. I was told to have a 200lb difference front to rear, not mandatory but it was recommended to me that way.. Interesting!

 

Thanks for sharing with me this in depth advice, I would believe it took 2 years+ to get your car right, took me 3 years for the M3. Can you tell me what suspension parts you are using above your current coilovers and what differences each made to the car's handling? Who advised you on the rake??

I agree, when I was first told what spring rates to use I questioned it (I thought that 600/900 would be closer to the right figure), but Michael, who does the set-up for Porsches in KW Germany said this is the way to go and matches the car perfectly. At this stage, I'm not going to argue and it feels right so far, only track time will tell who's right.

But one thing I will say is that there are so much advise and options out there across all forums, brands and so called experts (some right others not so), so I don't expect to get it right the first time, but it helps to have others drivers opinions and experiences to learn from, your own driving style and ability has alot to do with overall final set-up, what's fast for one driver might be slow for another

 

That is a big difference (front to rear) in spring rates Saint.... normally when when you are getting up to and beyond 1000lb on the rear you would be min of around 700 on the front... I suppose you could raise the pressure slightly on the front canisters, they can cope with this no problem, I would agree with iLLM3 that difference should be between 200/300lb in Spring rate especially when so stiff on rear.

Great set up Saint, well done on install Saint

 

Thanks Stevo, much appreciated.

Here is KW race departments in Germany response to spring rates when I asked them to clarify for me.

"Well, the thing with the spring rates- if you see a Porsche, you will agree with me that there is nothing in the front! The engine + gearbox in the rear (even behind the rear axle). Therefore- why?? should there be only a small difference between the front and the rear. In the street cars we go with 40N front and 170N rear, in your car we increased the front because of tyres and purpose of use.
The original GT2 kit goes with 50 front and 110N rear.
The springs are linear- high performance race springs."

I would have to agree with him, as the car feels perfect, any stiffer in front would be non-beneficial. However the best thing with springs is that they can be replaced very simply with very little time/cost later on (if needed).

Interested to hear other's thoughts on this (based on real life track time, not just opinions)

First Track day on the 31st so I will be able to post some numbers for comparison and comments.

 

That's a good argument from KW. However once you go to sticky tires I think 470 is too soft. I'd probably feel better at > 300 but < 400 difference between front and back. There isn't much in the front of the car but the front of the car is still 2/3rds the weight of the rear (66%). Your front springs are only (48%) of the rear. Once you track it, you'll know for sure.

Good thing that changing springs is not a big ordeal. Seems like they tuned it more for street comfort than track. 470 lbs does not sound like enough rate to control 3200-3300 (with driver) lbs under braking and hard cornering with very sticky tires.

 

This might be the case but as you start stiffening the chassis up the difference should decrease... as an example, if you look at a Cup Car the spring rate is 1500lb all round... this might not be to driver/teams liking, but the only difference I have seen is 200lb max changed out between front and rear spring rates.

 

Thats some good info thanks.....Seems like you guys have some great experience here, I look forward to testing.

Do you know what ride height the cup cars use and rake?

 

Don't even go there... lol... no point as it's a very, very different set up altogether.

 

Understand that…… curious that’s all........ most of the competition guys are very secretive (for good reasons) about their specs, given your feedback on this forum, I'm interested to see if you knew.

There must be a exact height and rake that is BEST for this car that will improve track handling, once a High end coilovers has been installed. As the Porsche is rear engine, I would have thought that for performance a rake of between 20-30mm would be best, with the rear higher.