I had a good day yesterday, getting down to TPC, spending time with them and even getting home to the Boston area, all in 18 hours.

I started my trip from Cape Cod early (3:30 AM) to beat NYC rush hour traffic. The trip was event free and I arrived at TPC around noon time with several pit stops for food, bathroom and a little leg stretching.

Unfortunately I missed Casey by 5 minutes, but was warmly met by Tom Chan, the Shop Manager. I also met Josh, Wes(thanks for the lift to the airport!), Mike Levitas and others.

The team at TPC is strong. Many of the people I had met had been with Mike for > 10 years and the newer guys talked about what a great place it was. Enthusiasm and loyalty I think are indicative of a good company and positive customer experiences.

With great conversations about Porsche tuning, racing and being surrounded by a bunch of fantastic P-cars, you'll want to personally deliver your car if possible.

I was fortunate to go for several drives with Mike in both a newly turboed car and in my own. I held Mike's laptop(connected to the OBD port for in-flight tuning) for a run when he was tuning one of the cars and it was amazing. Mike's a world class Porsche racer and the ride left me a little weak in knees when I got out (4 hours sleep and a 450 mile road trip probably didn't help). Mike also drove my stock 997 C4 and offered insights on its peformance and potential improvements. Pretty cool.

I had an opportunity to inspect the turbo system and I was impressed. The parts were of high quality, either cast alluminum (intercooler) or stainless (exhaust components). Everything looked great and I was fortunate to see the parts with the bumper off - when it's back on, much of these parts will be hidden!

The driving experience was faster than anything I had experienced - so much so that I could feel my skin pull back tightly when accelerating - kind of like the pics of the NASA test pilots! Yikes!

There's been some discussion about the exhaust sounds and I must say it was perfect. At idle, it had a deep bass sound to it. Not obnoxious but sounding very powerful. Similarly when driving you could hear a deep and powerful sound but it wasn't overwhelming and didn't impact conversation, even on a cell phone. However.... mash the throttle and the world changes. Everything passes by at an insane rate and you have the physical sensation of being strapped to a rocket with the physical sensation of being pushed back into your seat and a fantastic roar. So... I think this system is attractive for both daily driving and for those occasional all out fun sessions. Of course another benefit of the turbo is you get a cool exhaust in the bundled price.

I'll be picking up my car in another month or so and I'm excited about it already. I have no regrets about my decision and think it's one of the best mods for your Porsche.

 

Hi Bob congratulation. I thing you made very good decision. I am also having my turbo install with them,I will be there next wednesday. My car is 2000 Carrera 4 with 3.4 engine .Maybe we will meet one day this summer .

 

I'm pumped to see the car when its done. Let me know when you get it back to mass.

 

Wow, what a great review, Bob. I must admit, it makes me jealous that you had such a wonderful experience at TPC (I'm sure it will be 1000x better when you return to pick up your Turbo C2. Did you take any pictures by any chance? Otherwise, I may have make the 4 hr drive up to visit their shop personally.

 

Bob,

Did you have ride in C4S? or C2S?

if it is C4S, it is MY CAR!

I have not ridden in the car YET! LOL I am glad that you enjoy the trip.
thats how I feel everytime I go to TPC (about twice a month).

Way to go Bob and TPC!

 

Casey, good chance you will see my car next winter for the turbo kit.

My question is do you have any performance data aside from the hp/torque numbers? Thinking about acceleration runs from 5-60 or 50-90 versus what the stock cars are.

Thanks.

 

Once all of the tuning is accomplished and final dyno numbers are established...(remember, most cars will have different performance numbers as we add options for tuning and boost levels) we will pass our drift box along to a number of clients to do the runs. As we dont have a shop car to install this on, our preference is to let the clients do the runs.

 

Where do you measure boost level from?

 

Aznevovii - I think it may have been your car we drove. There were 2 997's in the shop for the turbo, one of them which previously had a supercharger (that was on the lift) and then the other that I drove - I presume that's yours. Interesting that all 3 cars looked identical which I'll presume is indicative of our good taste!

I didn't take any pics but Casey indicated he would be taking many pictures of the process.

I am considering another option, the sway bars and possibly springs. I've had this done on my BMW coupe and it made a big difference in handling. When we took a test drive with both my car and the turboed car at all out speeds on winding roads, the cars pitched and floated more than I'd prefer which of course added to the terror!

For the folks in Boston, when I get the car back we'll surely get together for a beer to show the goods.

 

Upgrading suspension to complement the power upgrade would be ideal. If you can swing it, brake upgrade might be a good idea as well.

 

Yes, most important to upgrade your brake else you won't be able to stop in time !! I upgraded to Performance Fraction floating rotors when I installed supercharger.
Will TPC give a group sale discount ? The supercharger air filter design is really stupid- impossible to clean to without removing half of the parts installed !! All these maintenance facts were not known when I bought this system :-(

 

There is no reason to upgrade the brakes regardless of how much power you add to a car. If they are good with 100 hp, they will be just as good and stop you just as fast with 1000 hp. Whether you get to 100 mph in 10 seconds or 5 seconds, the brakes will stop the car exactly the same.

 

MarathonBob, good to hear the trip went smoothly. Hope the rest of the install goes equally well. Keep us posted!

-Alex

 

The most accurate place to tap for boost levels is the turbo compressor cover.

 

The you have no way of know how much boost is getting to the engine?