Part Weights
- Thread starter Neil Haughey
- Start date
Tam Lin
New member
Carbon brake disks anyone [
]My 924S with the 8V motor still in, but with no rear seats, driver's Recaro SPG shell seat, no headlining, sunroof replaced by f/g panel, f/g bonnet and polycarbon hatch, interior stripped and with (then) a lightweight battery weighed in at 1180 kg. These things are really not leightweights.
Peter Empson
PCGB Member
Simon, in another thread you said (IIRC) that you found your 924S weighed more than a 944. Can you remember what the difference was?
I've given up trying to estimate the weight of my car, but I'll be taking it to a weighbridge as soon as its back on the road (preferably with the 944S in tow to do a comparison).
I've given up trying to estimate the weight of my car, but I'll be taking it to a weighbridge as soon as its back on the road (preferably with the 944S in tow to do a comparison).
944 man
Active member
I believe that it does Pete. The rationale being that it is identical to the 944 in every respect (other than the wider wings, which weigh very little extra), but it has an electrically operated sunroof. I havent weighed it properly yet, but I will try to before I fit the series two-type electric seats.
Tam Lin
New member
Another difference might be the tank. The tank we took out of the 924S was pig iron, capacity 69 litres, and fairly heavy. 944 used either the 924T 80 l tank, or the later plastic tanks, both of which are lighter. Other than that, the only differences are the late vs early (unbraced) doors and the steel front wishbones.
944 man
Active member
Im not sure about the capacities there Sean. The metal tanks have always corroded though, so its quite possible that tanks have been changed on many series one cars. The doors are similar on all 944s: the 924 gained impact bars from, I think, the 1980 model year when they also gained plastic switchgear. Off the top of my head the series one metal had a nominal capacity of 66 litres and the series two plastic tank 80 litres.
Simon
Simon
Neil Haughey
New member
I need to get to the bottom of exactly the weight difference from a dipped shell, an option I have at the moment is to rebuild my car into an EMC motorsport shell (brother has offered to do transfer for free).
Kevin gave me a figure but ISTR we may have been talking at cross purposes because the difference seemed incredible.
I don't think there is as much wiring in the car as many ppl think, I don't know maybe because I have been under the dash so many times now it really doesn't look much. I already of course have a lot of redundant wiring which I would do well to strip out prior to doing a re-shell. I estimate that about 1/2 the loom can be done away with and there are a few connectors under the dash for things the car never had.
No doubt about it though when you get to see what Kevin does to a shell it puts things into perspective, its like building a new car and is definitely something I would like to do. The ultimate modification really.
Neil Haughey
New member
I forgot to add the rear wiper, mine broke a few years ago so has been running with a hatch bung from Jon Mitchell. ISTR the weight of the wiper and mech was sadly not very much, something like 1 and a bit Kg. It really does seem that the weight in these cars is in the body with sound deadening + seats + glass hatch. The rear quarter panels for example weigh practically nothing.
Neil Haughey
New member
Just an update to show some of what we have been talking about and what the car looks like when you remove all this stuff.
First up this a carpet set laid out
and..
Apart from thin vinyl this is all you have in the roof as trim (sunroof excepted)
The 2 pieces at the bottom are a sort of rubbery padding, the top bit in that picture is the cover for the sunroof elements and the middle part is a metal backed piece that sits at the top of the windscreen. With that lot removed but the roof back in this is what your roof looks like
and..
Note the now visible drain tubes. I had to put some bits back in order to retain the sunroof for now, in the new shell the panel will be bonded in.
Now for some scary pictures of the inside of my car, from the boot..
ignore the footplate and foot rest, those are going back in place Sunday afternoon.
Passenger footwell, note the rock hard sound deadening pads still on the car and the 2 painted colours black and red..
Drivers side, peeled back some sound deadening in front of throttle peddle and there is a little rust there
and lastly rear seat area
First up this a carpet set laid out
and..
Apart from thin vinyl this is all you have in the roof as trim (sunroof excepted)
The 2 pieces at the bottom are a sort of rubbery padding, the top bit in that picture is the cover for the sunroof elements and the middle part is a metal backed piece that sits at the top of the windscreen. With that lot removed but the roof back in this is what your roof looks like
and..
Note the now visible drain tubes. I had to put some bits back in order to retain the sunroof for now, in the new shell the panel will be bonded in.
Now for some scary pictures of the inside of my car, from the boot..
ignore the footplate and foot rest, those are going back in place Sunday afternoon.
Passenger footwell, note the rock hard sound deadening pads still on the car and the 2 painted colours black and red..
Drivers side, peeled back some sound deadening in front of throttle peddle and there is a little rust there
and lastly rear seat area
Hilux
New member
If its the thick hard/brittle stuff then a heat gun, scraper and finally thinners will remove it. 20% of the effort is with the heat gun but soften it dont melt it and it`ll peel off taking most with it then use industrial thinners (not cellulose thinners) to remove the residue (the other 80% of the work). It took me just under two days to do the whole of the inside.
I have just completed this on my Mk 1 Golf project and the MOT tester on Friday had all of the inspectors under the car muttering and murmuring, finally they surfaced and one came over scratching his head and asked " We cant figure it out. Underneath the old floor is solid so why did you weld in a new floorpan over the old one [
]" They were amazed when I told them it was the original floor.I painted it satin black and it does look factory [8D]
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Neil Haughey
New member
Great work Paul, you did a top job spraying the floor pan. You are right some heat does start to take them off. However its not worth me putting the effort in to strip any more of that stuff because once the car is fully stripped to a shell it will be of to EMC in exchange for the motorsport shell I am buying, they will just acid dip it and start over for the next guy. Long road ahead still to go along.
Dave I will be driving it this year and if I go through with racing it next year the headlights will come out, some extra fibreglass, fire extinguisher, battery cutoff, battery box etc. to complete it as a race car. For now I want to keep it road legal, basically very similar to Lali's 968 even down to colour (fallen for Maritime Blue). Given how many new and refurbed bits I have done over the past few years with a newly built up freshly painted shell it will be almost like a new car.
The car looks almost normal again now because I have put the front carpet, centre console and drivers seat back in. Thank God everything still works because I need to get an MOT []. Its not that noisy really but man the extra noise does an'half make the car feel and sound fast, the extra transmission noise sounds especially race car [] (I drove around in a mini for a few years so have been conditioned to rock hard ride and unbelievable noise [])
Dave I will be driving it this year and if I go through with racing it next year the headlights will come out, some extra fibreglass, fire extinguisher, battery cutoff, battery box etc. to complete it as a race car. For now I want to keep it road legal, basically very similar to Lali's 968 even down to colour (fallen for Maritime Blue). Given how many new and refurbed bits I have done over the past few years with a newly built up freshly painted shell it will be almost like a new car.
The car looks almost normal again now because I have put the front carpet, centre console and drivers seat back in. Thank God everything still works because I need to get an MOT [
]. Its not that noisy really but man the extra noise does an'half make the car feel and sound fast, the extra transmission noise sounds especially race car [] (I drove around in a mini for a few years so have been conditioned to rock hard ride and unbelievable noise [])
944 man
Active member
If you dont keep your existing bodyshell then youre going to have 'registration' issues. If you have anything other than your original body, or a new replacement (with a receipt from Porsche, which isnt available and hasnt been for 15+ years), then the car cant keep its original registered number.
Simon
Simon
Hilux
New member
So what do they do to it then Neil?
I assume acid dipping is to remove all paint sealer etc but keep the paint and sealer and then seam welding, bracing and a roll cage could be done by many people. Cant you get yours done without a replacement? In that way you keep the chassis plate and the stamped chassis. However if its purely for track and certificated then no problem I suppose.
When its done make sure they weld in provision (mounts) for a second seat so can I have first dibs on a passenger ride [8D][8D]
Definitely keep us posted and keep the piccies coming [
]Neil Haughey
New member
Pretty much what you said Paul except that the dip takes the shell back to metal, the benefit of the EMC motorsport shell route is down to costs really, I was adding up the other day how much it would cost to fix, paint and weld in roll cage my car as is and it came to almost as much as starting from scratch with a dipped shell + of course you can't get anywhere near the weight of an acid dipped shell by re-working an existing shell. Stuff like the painting costs practically nothing in comparison to painting a complete car for example. I am very excited about all this, it should be awesome.
The shell will have 2x sets of harness mounts/eyes in the correct locations, part of the package.
The shell will have 2x sets of harness mounts/eyes in the correct locations, part of the package.
sawood12
New member
Nice project Neil. Interesting to see where all the weight in the car is. Just a thought - with these things I suspect a large part of it is about the mirriad of small weight savings here and there. You're talking about a CF door card, but do you need a door card at all? Why not just tape thickish polythene over the aperture to waterproof it? And also there is a real load of rubbish behind the dash as i'm sure you've spotted. Are you removing all the redundant wiring and switches once you've removed all the gadgets? And another one is to cut out the spare wheel well and weld over a flat metal panel. No point in having it if you're not using it and it will free up some room under the car and allow a bit more air to flow over the under bumper rear spoiler thing.
Neil Haughey
New member
Eventually Scott I may just do my own door card mod like the one Lali posted on here sometime ago, short term the standard door card minus the arm rest/stowage bin will do the job. The interesting bit about weight and weight loss with these cars is that EMC have assured me that with a dipped shell and fibreglass front I will have no problem meeting the minimum weight limit for PCGB racing for example. Of course anyone going some other route can do what they like and of course a car not raced in a particular series could have what ever you want done to it.
Once the sound deadening pads are pulled out from behind the dash there really isn't anything left apart from cabling, levers and heater gubbins. I was surprised how cleanly and easily that part of the cars sound deadening comes out. In fact I would recommend for easy weight saving to pull that stuff and the 2 pads in the front footwells. The same stuff on the trans tunnel was a bit of a nightmare because most of it had gone brittle and didn't come of the panels easily. Same story for the rear floor carpet that goes over the tunnel. In my car it was stuck down very very hard, took me about 2 hrs to peel out. The stuff in the rear of the car comes out easilly as well but as the pictures show you are left with a lot of remnants around the rear seats.
Once the sound deadening pads are pulled out from behind the dash there really isn't anything left apart from cabling, levers and heater gubbins. I was surprised how cleanly and easily that part of the cars sound deadening comes out. In fact I would recommend for easy weight saving to pull that stuff and the 2 pads in the front footwells. The same stuff on the trans tunnel was a bit of a nightmare because most of it had gone brittle and didn't come of the panels easily. Same story for the rear floor carpet that goes over the tunnel. In my car it was stuck down very very hard, took me about 2 hrs to peel out. The stuff in the rear of the car comes out easilly as well but as the pictures show you are left with a lot of remnants around the rear seats.
Peter Empson
PCGB Member
Great progress Neil, can't wait to see the end result.
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