Tom O'Kelly's Porsche 997 Carrera 2S 3.8 | Testimonial & Pictures | Stage 2

CONTENTS

Tom's Car - Stage 1
- Milltek stainless steel exhaust system, Revo mapping & modified 997 intake system
Tom's Car - Stage 2
- GT3 brake conversion, K&N induction kit, wheel spacer shims & colour-coded Aero kit with GT3 intakes & grills
Tom's Car - Stage 3
- GT3 sway bar, 997 Turbo Design wheels with Michelin tyres & Turbo style Titanium look chrome tailpipes
Tom's Car - Stage 4
- Sachs sprung clutch, Single Mass flywheel, Eurocup induction system, Bilstein B16 dampers & EuroCupGT Remap
A gallery with all of the pictures and a full list of modifications

Tom's Testimonial - Stage 2 Modifications (list of modifications - pictures)

Tom O'Kelly's Porsche 911 997 Stage 2 Modifications

“Fitted the 997.1 GT3 brakes - 350mm Front with 6 pot calipers and 340mm rears with 4 pot calipers. Also fitted the EBC Yellow Brake Pads.”

“Those helpful people at Porsche shop also came up with a possible remedy for the air intake issue - swapping out the carbon in take box for a K&N Intake.”

“So I toddled off to Halesowen last Thursday to get these new bits fitted.”

“We had a good look at the bespoke air holes in the x51 boot lid and discovered that the rubber fittings were huge and talking them out, we could put a standard 996/997 rubber intake in. So that ran into a standard K&N pipe to the air filter. The filter we positioned just under the engine bay fan, making sure that we maximized any air flow over the filter. The 2nd hole we removed the rubber and left open to aid general airflow into the engine bay and cooling”

“The Results”

“Just happened to be off with the better half to see her parents in Cheshire on Thur evening and then dropping over to Yorkshire for a long weekend on the Friday. Perfect way to bed in the new brakes and try out the changes”

“The brakes - are hugely confidence inspiring - I haven't really braked hard at all yet but even under fairly light pressure they pull the car up very consistently and very firmly. There were a couple of times braking gently from 70 to junctions I nearly needed up stopping quite a way short. Great feel huge reserves of stopping power even with some pretty enthusiastic driving”

“The Intake - first and most overriding impression; - the noise, its stunning. gone is the reedy sound at higher revs.This thing really barks From about 3k (variaocam change over) it starts to emit a very pleasing growly gurgle.”

“The power - noticeably more, I took a while getting used to it but my Wife said she noticed it had far more grunt and acceleration from the first time I put my foot down. For me it was harder to spot as I was not familiar with the roads and bedding in the brakes I was concentrating on lots of other things as well.”

“There has been a change in some of the character of the car. As the engineer indicated, getting more air in takes a bit of the edge off the initial torque but fills it out more over the range.”

“So initially at 3k revs where previously it started pulling very hard, its merely brisk - Now it kicks very hard from about 3.5k and keeps pulling harder and harder round the rev range. even after extended driving. Where previously when the engine had been warm for some time how hard the engine pulled would drop off at high revs.”

“The more I drove the car over the weekend the more I noticed the extra grunt. Both the better half and I think its created a least as much extra grunt as the previous change (Revo stage 2 and Miltek exhaust).”

“A couple of the mechanics at the garage guesstimated that I should see approx another 30bhp (basically halfway between the claimed dyno gains for the 996 and the 997GT3). The previous upgrade got me around 22bhp so this seems about right based on how the car feels.”

“As a by product by removing the restrictive rubber around the engine bay intakes the engine temp was slightly lower even under reasonably enthusiastic use”

“Having fitted the K&N induction system, some time ago and then upgrading the filter to a BMC one. I did a comparative test to last time i was down there:
+23.2 PS
+16.2 NM torque
The view was that on the open road with the better induction and the ram effect of the aero kit air intake I'd get another 20hp”

“Adjusting the figures to a like for like comparison to manufactures claims (about 12.5% loss in car versus figures with the engine on a dyno) this gives the beast approx 440hp and 500nm torque.”

“This seems ever so slightly obscene, especially as peak torque arrives at about 3800rpm, for a normally aspirated car that's pretty good ”

“This matches the relative difference of the beast with x51 kit, intake etc but with the Milltek exhaust with the revo turned off was approx 53 hp down on the current reading. Given a manufacturers claim of 381bhp plus a few for the exhaust we're back to a manufactures equivalent of approx 440 hp”

“More conservatively its 411.5hp on the road, which doesn't sound much until you apply the same losses to a stock C2S which will typically get around 310 - 330.”

“The engineer was very impressed with the overall figures especially the torque.”

“I now just have to improve my speed through the corners”