Marky''s 996.2 GT3 thread.

[The return of Marty Wild]

Need to bring my missus up that way, she's constantly badgering me to see Wales, Lake D and Scotland. Happy days re. the roads.

My mate's 996.2 GT3 used to almost scare me when high up in the Rev ranges, loved the sound and that was standard then.

 

[jezgreen911]

Looking good Marky and loving the drive out pics :thumb:

 

[mikem7709]

Looks fantastic Mark, history file to match my MK1 I parted with and identical mods too - tunnels in the Alps never sounded soo good 😎

Dealer is collecting my V6 Exige next week, then I'm going shopping 😄

 

[Y2K]

Great history & specs Marky.

I'm glad mine is modified with all the right bits rather than a standard car........ save me £££ in the long run.

 

[freddie44]

Brilliant. Enjoy :thumb:

 

[Slippydiff]

Great history & specs Marky.

I'm glad mine is modified with all the right bits rather than a standard car........ save me £££ in the long run.

True, but modding/fettling to your own specs/standards is all part of the long term bonding process, as Mark knows all too well !!

Lovely to see you back in a 996 GT3 Mark. I'll never forget your face as I drove off in the Mk1 CS the day I collected it off you. The pleasure of knowing you had £**K in the bank and could continue with the restoration of the house, but the pain of knowing that you'd just sold your rare P&J.

The conversations we had in the week proceeding that collection indicated you thought you'd never get back into one, so congratulations on finally doing it, all the more so after what sounds like a pretty testing and torrid couple of years for you and your good lady.

I look forward to regular updates and and I hope you derive a lot of pleasure from it's long term ownership

 

[Diggermeister]

It's certainly true - the OP being proof - that these Mezger-engined GT3's really do get under your skin.

I can see the mods both ways - Slippy is right that adding them makes for a feeling of greater 'personalisation' of the car, but then Y2K is right that, financially, the costs of these frivolities are rarely recovered at re-sale and represent a good deal for the buyer.

As I remember the XJS (this was the third of three my dad owned, on the bounce) it was actually a very good GT car and worked nicely on those (then) speed camera-free borders roads.

 

[Y2K]

I can see the mods both ways - Slippy is right that adding them makes for a feeling of greater 'personalisation' of the car, but then Y2K is right that, financially, the costs of these frivolities are rarely recovered at re-sale and represent a good deal for the buyer.

Yes, I don't disagree with Slippy at all if money's no object.

 

[BHZ661]

Great looking car Marky , cars look good all together :thumbs:

 

[LaurasOtherHalf]

Spotted this thread the other day and needed a free night to enjoy the read (another new human in the family does sap you browsing time!).

Good story, great car.

Interesting to see the Blu de Islands car is scrubbed up well these days, it was a bit neglected to say the least when I inspected it all those years ago. No, I'm not tempted, not at all. Honest :?:

 

[DJones]

Congratulations, great write up too.

Whilst the blue is nice (slightly biased) I do prefer the one you purchased.

Looks and sounds like you're enjoying the car too..

Darren

 

[Marky911]

Get it booked for you and the wife Marty. You only live once.
And yes revving a GT3 out is one of life's little pleasures. Mind you a Carrera with a cone filter on is still a lovely thing.

Cheers Jez, nice to see a few 996 names popping in to say hello. It's a bit slower moving this forum. I still spend most my time in the 996 forum to be honest. :thumb:

Cheers Mike, we've spoken via PM now obviously but enjoy the search. My search would have been more enjoyable had I been armed with an extra £10k. :grin:
As it was I was limited to a certain few cars. :wink:

Hi YK, yep I can see both sides of the 'modify" or 'buy modified" argument. I enjoy the journey but given the big spend to actually buy the car I'm glad it's got the bulk of the parts I want. There's still enough to tinker with over time.

Cheers Freddie, that's a lovely 997. 8)
My mate had a one very similar a few years ago from 911V. I think it went back to 911V too. Lovely thing.

Hi Henry, thanks for the comments. A PM will be heading your way anyway in due course.
Yes its great being back in one. Every bit as good as I remember. I hope to have a lot of adventures with this one as I didn't use the Mk1 nearly enough, due to other things obviously. Anyway I hope all is good at your end. :thumb:

Hi Digger, yep I agree with all of that plus I don't want a summer of crawling around the garage floor so that's the other good thing about it being somewhere near 'done".
The front shocks will need rebuilding and the car is going to my Indy next month for a thorough going over before my holiday in it.

I imagine an XJS would have made for a cool trip for you and I can think of worse cars to cover ground in. I think they've aged well too. :thumb:

Thanks BHZ and yep it always adds to the enjoyment when there's a few mates out. My roadtrip should be good too as it's 3 couples in 3 cars. Can't wait.

Hi Craig, congrats on the new addition to the family. Good stuff. :thumb:
Yes I've had one or two people comment on the Blu one. It certainly seems nice now but I never checked anything on it like under-bonnet sticker or originality, etc.
At the end of the day most of these cars were driven in anger and enjoyed. It's the investment brigade who come along asking daft questions like 'Has it been on track?" that make me laugh.

Cheers DJ. Yes I'm happy with my choice now. I set out to buy a mk2 and the blue Mk1 is a distant memory now. I'm loving mine, there's just a few things to do before I can get on with using it.

Cheers lads. :thumb:

 

[Marky911]

Boring post alert, sorry.

So Craig popped up last Saturday and we had a few hours on the car, carrying out some very similar jobs that we did to the C2 when I bought it. Boring stuff like battery charger lead fitted, etc.

I've mentioned on my threads before that I hate LED bulbs in cars that didn't have them as standard. Well typically a previous owner of my car had swapped every bulb for cheapie eBay LEDs.
They give off a horrible bluey white light and one or two weren't even working.




So first job was to ditch them all and fit original style ones for a healthy old skool yellow glow. :grin:
That includes front luggage compartment and engine lid lights as well.






Much better.

After that I removed some of the tacky stickers.






I'll be removing some of the side window ones too.

Then it was onto stripping out the interior for a couple of reasons. Firstly to chase one or two minor rattles (I just can't live with interior rattles) and secondly to provide access for a good clean, in particular the rear windows, which are a nightmare to get to with the cage in and I also want to wet vac the carpets and treat all the leather surfaces.

So it was out with cage and seats.




Leaving us with this.




The first job was an easy one. Sorting the worst rattle, which still wasn't bad to be honest, just a metallic buzzing from the rear shelf area. I had an idea what it would be and it was exactly that.

Basically the metal trays the ECUs mount to obviously had to be accessed for the remap in the past. The two edges of the shelves were vibrating together where there wasn't a fixing. We just disassembled and reassembled a bit more thoroughly.

So we removed the carpet section and inspected the ECU shelf.




One other thing that could have caused a rattle (although the main one was definitely the metal shelves) were the 2 empty relay sockets that were rattling around in the housing.




We added a cable tie to cure that.




Then I gave things a quick wipe down with some quick detailer before reassembling it.




As I say we built it back up carefully and I'm pretty sure it'll be cured now.

I also had a tiny buzz from the passenger door area. We stripped the door card off but couldn't find anything obvious.
There wasn't even a snapped clip or anything.
I had some new anti rattle clips but decided to just take the foam washers off them and fit them to the Porsche clips as they were perfect.

Kept these as they're original -




Used the washers off these for good measure -




We didn't go into the door as it's still factory fresh with the membrane having never been disturbed, so we left it alone.




The buzz was minor anyway so I'll see what it's like when I next use the car.

Another source of rattles could be the comfort seat wiring plugs which were just lying loose under each seat. I'll wrap these up and tape them to the floor before refitting the seats.

I'll crack on with the interior clean next weekend.
One pleasant surprise was that when we removed the rear speakers to take out the rear door cards, we were greeted by these -




Exactly the speakers I was going to buy for the car in time for my roadtrip.
Mind you they still sound pretty poor. No bass at all. To be expected from 4 inch drivers I suppose. I'm not going to add an amp and subs though. It's against the ethos of the car and I will only listen to music on my trip. It's mainly for Mrs Marky. Whenever I'm out for a blast the stereo is never on.

One more small job was to trim an area of plastic sill trim away. When JZM fitted the cage they left the trim really tight fitting around the bottom of the cage. That's great in theory but there isn't enough carpet to follow that U-shaped profile, so what happens is the sill carpet pulls forward to leave a gap where it meets the rear section in the rear foot wells.

We did this when fitting Craig's cage so it was a quick job.
Here's how it was when we stripped it.




Then after a bit of trimming with the Dremel.




Not the prettiest but you don't see it once the carpet is down and it actually makes the things you do see look much better.
No finished pics obviously as it's still in bits.

So once I've cleaned the interior I'll fit it all back together. I was going to leave the cage out as I'll want it out for luggage space for my trip but I think I'll refit it and take it back out before I go in a couple of months.
I may well fit different seats for the trip too. Now I know there's electric under there I can use my old C2 sports seats that recline if I want.

Anyway, all pretty mundane but as ever I'll record it here anyway. :wink:

 

[Y2K]

Another good update Mark, you don't hang about, do you?

Can I drop mine off at yours for a couple of weeks so you can tidy it up please? You can even update my 'neglected' thread. Ha ha :lol:

 

[stichill99]

Congrats

Congratulations on the new car Mark! Looks very nice and well specced with extras. Where did you go in the Borders after the photo's at the Carter Bar? Lots of good roads up here but have to be wary of cyclists,they seem to be everywhere. Andy