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My 996 turbo, the story so far.....

Love the gaitor and air bag, looks great, that film on the lights too, very neat and subtle. Some great ideas, keep them coming
 
Nice Turbo, really like some of the changes you have done, who did the steering wheel and gator etc? i fancy getting mine done at some point.

Jealous of the roads you get to use

8)
 
sim996 - Thanks very much, I really appreciate that.

JM30 - Thanks mate, glad you like it. I had all the alcantara parts done by a company called Tiggy Design in London. They were very reasonably priced and they did a great job.
 
Coming from a TVR Tuscan, one of the areas I found lacking on my 996 turbo was the noise it made. An aftermarket exhaust was next on the list.

The exhaust I bought was a Top Gear system with 200 cell cats. I'm not sure what this version was called, but the system came with its own exhaust tips as appose to reusing the originals. It was one of their earlier models that doesn't join up in the centre. I'm not sure how much it weighs, but it felt a lot lighter than the standard system which felt really heavy by comparison.

I'm really happy with the noise it makes now, it's not too loud but sounds a lot more aggressive than the standard set up. It's not too intrusive on the motorway either. I personally preferred the style of the standard exhaust tips as they were, but I was happy enough with the new ones. They didn't want to line up perfectly in the bumper recesses but I managed to line them up as best as I could and was happy with the results.

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr
 
Another small modification I've done was to remove the rear wiper. It was fairly simple to remove the wiper arm and the motor from inside the car. To cover the hole that was left I purchased a rear wiper delete plug from eBay and had it painted to match. I think the rear end looks a little bit cleaner now without the wiper arm.

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr
 
Inspired by the 991 GT3 and the 991 GTS, I decided I wanted to try and replicate the look of their black exhaust tips on my 996. I really liked the way the factory cars black exhaust tips had a satin/gloss finish. However, I couldn't find a company that could offer a gloss black finish and still be confident it would be able to handle the high temperatures. My only option at the time seemed to be ceramic coating. This process gave a matte black finish, rather than gloss, but would be up to the job.

I'd read on different forums about a diy method of doing this using VHT paint. Feeling brave, I decided to do it myself with spray cans of VHT ceramic coating. I figured if it didn't come out to a standard I was happy with, I could always just get them professionally coated instead. It's available as a primer, colour coat and as a satin finish lacquer.

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

I masked up the bottom part of the exhaust tips to keep a clean edge and built a pair of wooden clamps to hold the tips in the right place for painting.

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

After the satin clear coat had dried there was more of a glossy finish than I'd expected, but it didn't last long. The next stage was to bake the tips in an oven to heat cure the coating. After about three sessions at progressively higher temperatures they were ready and should now be able to stand up to the exhaust temperatures. Once cured, the shine of the satin lacquer had turned into a fully matte but uniform finish. I fitted them back to the car once they had cooled down and was very pleased with the results.

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr
 
Lovely car!

I like the exhaust tips in black. Goes really well with the rear badge.

Good work. :thumb:
 
Marky911 said:
Lovely car!

I like the exhaust tips in black. Goes really well with the rear badge.

Good work. :thumb:

:worship:

Hell Y33eah!!!!!!!!!!! Me likey :grin:

:thumb:
 
Something I still wanted to do to the car was change the way the standard headlights looked. I liked the shape of the lights, but I'm not a fan of the chrome. I'd tried the tint film, but wasn't happy with how it looked. I'd been considering opening the headlights and painting the insides for a long time. I'd never been able to quite build up the courage to do it, as if I did, there'd be no going back to standard without completely replacing them and also....... what if it went wrong.

I wanted to paint the plastic moulding inside matte black, but leave the reflectors housing the bulbs in chrome. I'd done this modification to a lot of my cars in the past without any problems. I'd also seen several DIY guides, so had a pretty good idea of what was involved. Despite all of this I still decided to get it done by a professional instead.

I managed to find a company that specialised in custom built headlights and retrofitting HID projectors. Looking through their customer gallery, I thought what I had in mind should be pretty straightforward for them. The company is called Headlight Retrofits and they're based in Scotland. I called them to find out a bit more, and they were more than happy to answer all my questions. The work I wanted done was a very reasonable price as well, so I decided to package up the lights, crossed my fingers and sent them off.

The process took about a week and they kept me updated throughout. I was really pleased with the results and couldn't wait to get them back on the car. This is how they look on the car.

by Dave W, on Flickr

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

Untitled by Dave W, on Flickr

One thing I wasn't completely sure about was what to do with the headlight washers. In the end I went with body colour as I wasn't convinced chrome would look right.

I'm sure some people might not like the way they look, but they're one of my favourite parts of the car now.
 
Personally a big fan of the lights mate! Could you pm me the price you paid? Keep up the updates :)
 
Jay. - Cheers mate, glad you like the lights. I've just sent you a pm. Hope it helps.

:thumb:
 
Impressed with the work on the lights - you've managed to do something I've not seen before, which is to keep the fundamental shape of the 996 lights but to highlight that the actual light shape is very 'standard 911'. Great work.
 
DW 996turbo said:
Lofi - Thanks mate, I really appreciate that. Glad you like them.

I'd love to see how those look on a darker colour car and perhaps with the washer covers darkened off, but I think you're onto something there
 

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