[rl968]

I'm moving closer and closer to turning my 968 into a track car and need to drop weight. It's got 138k miles and I figure it will never really be worth much so might as well have as much fun as I can with it. Anyone have a list or some suggestions of what to start removing. I've removed trunk carpet and rear seat backs, which surprisingly feels like 25-30 lbs.



Thx

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[Cloud9...68]

Ah, a man after my own heart. I've gone down the same path, and have managed to remove a significant amount of unneeded (on the track) weight. Here are some of the things I've done:



- Removed rear seat, as you have

- Replaced seats with racing seats

- Removed passenger side air bag module

- Planning to install a lightweight, non-airbag steering wheel

- Removed the cruise control unit

- Removed the windshield washer reservoir (it was full of fluid, and weighted a whopping 12 pounds!)

- Replaced the hood with a fiberglass hood

- Removing hood struts, and looking into lightening the hinges

- Removed the front bumper

- RS Barn Motorsport 18-lb flywheel

- Lightweight Enkei NT-03 18" wheels (pretty sure they're lighter than the 17" 10-spokes I had before)

- Removed the fog lights (kept the lenses for now, but will eventually put brake duct scoops into the fog light openings)

- Lightweight cat back exhaust from RS Barn

- Removed the spare tire, tools, and pump

- And the crowning achievement (at least in terms of the amount of work involved), I'm in the process of replacing the pop-up headlights with fixed headlights



For now, I have a cheapo 27 lb conventional battery from Autozone, and am researching replacing it with something even lighter, but since I still need to drive the car on the street some, I need something that won't let me down on a cold morning. But here in Austin, it never gets much below 30F, so I might be able to get away with something smaller. And since I've managed to get so much weight out of the front of the car, I'm considering replacing the hatch glass with lexan. I will also probably do something with the sunroof - the power operation has never worked right, so I'd like to tear it all out, and replace it with some sort of manual operation, but I haven't gotten to that yet.



Is there anything you've thought of that isn't on my list? Good luck.

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[rl968]

A/C

Rear wiper motor

All carpeting and soundproofing.

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[Monstrous4Banger]

Sunroof motor. Convert to manual.

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[Cloud9...68]

Unfortunately, jettisoning the AC is not an option here in Texas as long as it will still be driven on the street (at least to and from the track), and the logistics of towing it to the track are prohibitive at the moment. So the AC stays, as tempting as it is to chuck all the dead weight that it adds. And I forgot to mention that I've already deleted the rear wiper motor. As far as the carpeting and sound deadening, again, for me, it will remain a dual purpose car, though with a definite bias toward being a track car, so I don't want to drive around town with deafening din of the road, tire, transmission, etc. noise coming through the cabin unabated. In fact, I kept the rear seat cushion, which I plan to keep in the car when I'm driving it on the street just for its sound deadening, and pull it out for trips to the track.



Monstrous, do you have any experience with converting the sunroof operation to manual? That's something I'd be very interested in. Thanks.

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[AJG]

You can take of your bra! That'll save a bit.

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[Rap]

Did your mum take you off the nip early?

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[craigawoodman]

Stereo and speakers. Surprising how much all of that weighs. All of the trim from the engine. Front engine covers under car (not sure what this does to air flow), spherical bushings all around (might weigh more, but better control), hollow sway bars (big $$), remove rear torsion bars and replace with heavier springs, air box and ducting, injector wiring cover in engine, smaller coolant reservior, oil catch can, heater and plumbing - it all depends just how close to the edge you want to go.



There was a 968 Club Sport over here (in QLD - Steve Tribaldi owned it - Red) that weighed in at 1,250kg complete with full roll cage, etc.



If you really are pedantic - remove the rear hatch lock barrel and a plexiglass rear hatch and windows. You can use fibreglass for nearly all panels, but not sure just how much weight you can save. Remove the front bonnet hinges and have a lift on/off bonnet/hood.



How far do you want to go?

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[rl968]

I'm at about 3100 lbs with me in it, I'd like to get down about 10% to 2800 or so,but don't want to do anything that is permanent, which makes the task that much harder. Stereo and front speakers will go. Trim from engine is maybe 2-3 lbs. lightweight battery might be good.

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[craigawoodman]

Rear seat belts and mounts are around 1kg each. The guy who built Steve's car for Tarmac rallying had a spreadsheet that listed all of the mods made to reduce weight. Underbody sealant is another large weight. Full door trims versus lightweight ones will also save weight. The rear hatch to plexiglass is a biggie, but be careful it is mounted properly as they can come off at speed. Mirror motors and cabling.

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[flash]

wiring harness is insanely heavy, but very difficult to deal with. in a race car, you would remove the jacketing and then surgically remove the unused wires. that would take out about 40lbs



a few other items would be:



door panels

bumpers

bumper shocks

airbags and all associated components

steering wheel changed to club sport wheel



i removed 240lbs from my car when i went through it. i added some back with the new stereo and bracing, but i am still a LOT lighter than before.



the headlights are surprisingly not a great place to lose weight, if you plan to use any sort of light that would work on the street. by the time you add back in the new lights and control unit, etc, plus add in the weight of the fender work, you only lose a few pounds. i was pretty disappointed at the lack of change when i was just looking at this. still, any loss is good, especially way up front, but it's a very expensive way to get there.

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[94SilverCab]

Sandblast all of the paint off...



Jay

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[flash]

lol - yup - that's good for another 25lbs minimum.



it's actually a very basic step in setting up any race car. the first thing you do is take the car apart to the bare chassis and then have it dipped. that usually removes about 75lbs of crap, gunk, dirt, paint, body filler, primer, etc.

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[savvas968]

any idea how to disconnect and remove the passenger airbag module?

sounds a good item to remove as i already removed the drivers steering wheel for a sparco one.

Is the module as heavy as the driver side?

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[flash]

as i remember, the passenger airbag is about 6lbs. it was a bear to get to some of the screws.



be absolutely sure the battery has been disconnected for long enough to discharge the voltage from the system!!!!

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[Monstrous4Banger]

Cloud: although I havent done it yet on my car, I have looked into what it entails. Just swap out the old latches, and lock plates with OEM ones for the older model 944's before they came with electric roofs.

http://944online.com/cgi-bin/ASI_Store.c...+body-9441

Ian has them new, I think pelican does too. Im sure you could pick them up on ebay for pretty cheap, and clean.

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[craigawoodman]

Coilovers instead of standard struts and springs.

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[Cloud9...68]

rl968-



The critical question here is, are you looking to convert your car to a dedicated track car (e.g. zero street driving), or are you still planning to drive it on the street? Until the following items magically appear: trailer, a vehicle to pull it, and a new house on a piece of land large enough to store all of the above (not happening this decade for sure), I'm stuck with a dual-purpose car. If you're in the same boat, than you will probably want to keep your HVAC, door panels, and stereo (although you already said you were planning to remove it).



Other than some of the more radical stuff Craig and others have mentioned, I've got most of the rest of the items covered. It's kind of depressing how little weight it's possible to take off considering some of the effort involved, until you really start getting into the serious stuff, like dipping the chassis, removing the HVAC, and completely gutting the interior.



Yes, removing the passenger air bag module is a chore, and I think it does weigh about 6 pounds. Don't bother with the control unit, though, as it only weighs a pound, and is a ROYAL PAIN to take out (they don't call 'em tamper-proof bolts for nothing...).

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[rl968]

I trailer car to track and it's only used for track, though it is registered as a street collectible car. The question for me is whether I want to give up the thought of this car ever being worth anything. If I can get past that, then I can be more aggressive with the weight removal. Something about removing a great working a/c system just doesn't seem right. Guess I'll probably start with things that can always be reversed, which is probably some of the lighter stuff.

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[Cloud9...68]

Ah, so you're a bit farther down the slippery slope than I am. Do you race it, or are you using it for DE's?

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