stanuk964996
Trainee
- Joined
- 14 Jul 2015
- Messages
- 77
Thought I would post a little thread on my 'new to me' 997 C2S. I'm a long time Porsche owner and enthusiast and also own a heavily modified 964 running a 993 6sp transmission and Cup spec engine.
I have been looking for a 997 as I regretted selling my 3.4 996 a couple of years ago which was also nicely modified into a baby GT3 with aero kit, Bilstein PSS10's, full stainless exhaust setup and was featured in 911&PW compared to a GT3.
So this is my 997!
Yes, she has a little back story. Registered as a CAT S this year following the accident you see above. Have never owned a CAT car before so was a little leap into the unknown, especially as it had no service history to speak of!! All I got was one key and an MOT certificate with the car...
I got photos of the car being repaired and inspecting the inner wing, etc. there is no impact damage to the actual chassis of the car. The only parts affected are all bolt on/off parts, so with these replaced the car is effectively as it was but now just has this name tag of being a CAT S. Many other 997's will be driving around and would have had similar damage earlier in their lives and been repaired, possibly unknown to current owners as there is no record...
The actual spec of the car is exactly what I was looking for: C2S manual, non-sunroof, no parking sensors, sport seats and Sport chrono.
However, there was no structural damage to the car, despite the CAT S moniker. It seems chassis damage includes suspension damage, as all of the damage was to bolt on parts; wing, bumper, radiators, coolant pipes, suspension arms and shock absorber - most of which are nice to replace on 997's of this vintage now anyway! The car was repaired by the owner of a local bodyshop who bought if for his own use, so carried out a full respray in the original metallic basalt black, which is superb. He also refurbished all the wheels so that cosmetically the car was (almost) perfect.
This is my first shot on the driveway before the big clean:
Saturday morning I got all the wheels off and gave them a good clean and inspected the tyres - nearly new Michelin Pilot Sport N rated tyres all round and fully refurbished Sport Design wheels:
The wheel arches were pretty clean so didn't really need much work and as it is winter I just gave them a quick wipe down and coated the plastic arch liners. I did polish the calipers and touch up a few stone chips with touch up stick from my 964!
The wheel crests had been destroyed by acid from hand car wash centres, so I swapped these out for a spare set I had lying around:
The final step to make the exterior perfect was to sort out the rusty wheel bolts, so these were wire brushed and treated to 2 coats of primer, metallic silver and lacquer, which should last a few years I hope.
Nearly finished wheel, you can see the difference something so small makes:
Bodywork was washed and polished with Autoglym SRP. I will extra gloss it next time but I needed to move on to the interior this time around.
The interior received the same treatment with a full clean and feed of all the leather, which made a huge difference. The gear knob came off to clean the grime between the shift pattern and clean the gear boot.
I did do some background checks on the car and had a few clues about the cars history. The N rated tyres all round indicate a diligent previous owner and the car had Porsche Centre East London plates on. They couldn't tell me much about the car but it had been serviced in the dealer network up until 2015, when from the MOT history it had done around 73K miles. A friend of a friend at Porsche told me it had a VERY comprehensive history, although I have been unable to get a copy thus far. Hopefully if I can rebuild the history I am missing maybe two services which I will try and track down from independents locally to me.
I have a few parts arriving this week to start fixing all the little TLC jobs!
I have been looking for a 997 as I regretted selling my 3.4 996 a couple of years ago which was also nicely modified into a baby GT3 with aero kit, Bilstein PSS10's, full stainless exhaust setup and was featured in 911&PW compared to a GT3.
So this is my 997!
Yes, she has a little back story. Registered as a CAT S this year following the accident you see above. Have never owned a CAT car before so was a little leap into the unknown, especially as it had no service history to speak of!! All I got was one key and an MOT certificate with the car...
I got photos of the car being repaired and inspecting the inner wing, etc. there is no impact damage to the actual chassis of the car. The only parts affected are all bolt on/off parts, so with these replaced the car is effectively as it was but now just has this name tag of being a CAT S. Many other 997's will be driving around and would have had similar damage earlier in their lives and been repaired, possibly unknown to current owners as there is no record...
The actual spec of the car is exactly what I was looking for: C2S manual, non-sunroof, no parking sensors, sport seats and Sport chrono.
However, there was no structural damage to the car, despite the CAT S moniker. It seems chassis damage includes suspension damage, as all of the damage was to bolt on parts; wing, bumper, radiators, coolant pipes, suspension arms and shock absorber - most of which are nice to replace on 997's of this vintage now anyway! The car was repaired by the owner of a local bodyshop who bought if for his own use, so carried out a full respray in the original metallic basalt black, which is superb. He also refurbished all the wheels so that cosmetically the car was (almost) perfect.
This is my first shot on the driveway before the big clean:
Saturday morning I got all the wheels off and gave them a good clean and inspected the tyres - nearly new Michelin Pilot Sport N rated tyres all round and fully refurbished Sport Design wheels:
The wheel arches were pretty clean so didn't really need much work and as it is winter I just gave them a quick wipe down and coated the plastic arch liners. I did polish the calipers and touch up a few stone chips with touch up stick from my 964!
The wheel crests had been destroyed by acid from hand car wash centres, so I swapped these out for a spare set I had lying around:
The final step to make the exterior perfect was to sort out the rusty wheel bolts, so these were wire brushed and treated to 2 coats of primer, metallic silver and lacquer, which should last a few years I hope.
Nearly finished wheel, you can see the difference something so small makes:
Bodywork was washed and polished with Autoglym SRP. I will extra gloss it next time but I needed to move on to the interior this time around.
The interior received the same treatment with a full clean and feed of all the leather, which made a huge difference. The gear knob came off to clean the grime between the shift pattern and clean the gear boot.
I did do some background checks on the car and had a few clues about the cars history. The N rated tyres all round indicate a diligent previous owner and the car had Porsche Centre East London plates on. They couldn't tell me much about the car but it had been serviced in the dealer network up until 2015, when from the MOT history it had done around 73K miles. A friend of a friend at Porsche told me it had a VERY comprehensive history, although I have been unable to get a copy thus far. Hopefully if I can rebuild the history I am missing maybe two services which I will try and track down from independents locally to me.
I have a few parts arriving this week to start fixing all the little TLC jobs!
