My New Carrera C2

After selling my 993 back in January I thought I'd scratched the 911 itch for the time being. My intention was to drive the lease 'Eurobox' I had at the time and revisit the Porsche situation in a few years. But one October lunchtime I started looking.. Initially this was simply for research purposes as I had planned to purchase in the spring; but this initial foray soon unravelled into fully-fledged ownership. I don't know precisely why, but I felt that it was time for a 911 in my life again. I've always liked the 997 variant. It's my favourite body-shape after the 993, retaining many of it's styling cues such as the dash design and the oval lamps.

I knew (for obvious reasons) that only a second generation would fit the bill. This was going to be my daily for a year or so and I wanted that DFI engine doing the work and not (potentially- how ever contentious that may be) my wallet. For me a 997.2 was the best path. And because the daily errands were going to be conducted in a 911, I looked towards the humble 3.6 litre Carrera. I've always preferred the narrow body cars and the better MPG would help my not infrequent triple digit drives to and from work.

I began my search with the well respected independents and happened upon an Atlas Grey Carrera 2 at JZM with 47k on the odometer. Looked nice in the literature. No sun roof or rear wiper (which I liked) and a few nice options such as heated seats and sound package. A non-PASM, manual car which I liked for it's integrity (good raft of receipts & paperwork and no over-revs over range 2- so no events over the limiter). Arguably a PDK would have been more convenient in traffic but the manual box is an absolute peach, although there is a knack for selecting first gear.. A few more toys would have been nice but not a deal breaker as I like my cars quite basic. I'm a primitive.

A visit was booked. A deal was struck! Reasonable at a whisker shy of 36k. JZM kindly undertook my list of remedial items which included a machine polish, new discs & pads to the front end, wheel refurb, new centrecaps, new kick-plates, fresh MOT and half a tank of fuel. I also paid for the car to be under-sealed paying particular attention beneath the under-trays- mainly due to the recent thread discussing such prevention.

A couple of weeks later I picked a beautifully prepared Atlas Grey Manual C2 Carrera. Nevertheless, off it went to the excellent Bruce Stevenson at Spider Vehicle Enhancement nr. Tunbridge Wells. Bruce performed the following:

- Repaint 4X callipers & replace decals
- Repaint 4X brake hubs - custom/experimental OEM grey primer colour with rust inhibitor
- Enhancement detail plus localised machine polishing
- Ceramic coating (Gtechniq Crystal Serum Light) plus two coats hydrophobic coating (Gtechniq EXOv4)
- Wheels off, deep clean & quartz-based protection (Gyeon Rim Q2)
- Wheel arch deep clean & corrosion protection - incl. protection to suspension components
- Engine bay deep clean & ACF50 treatment
- Interior leather clean & protect - paying attention to wheel, handbrake lever & gear shift (restore matt texture)
- Wheels bolts removed and painted

I've been using the car for just over a couple of weeks now. I'm happy to report compete success as a well rounded daily. Touch wood. It trundles along in traffic very nicely and pushes on with gusto when pressed. I've even managed to coax 36mpg over one particularly sedate morning commute. The 3.6litre lump coupled with the DFI does make for a rather lacklustre soundtrack but as a daily it's subtlety is actually quite apt. If the car were a weekend ride I'd totally update the exhaust and install an induction kit. And hopefully, what with the preventative measures I've taken to protect the car, the winter weather will be kind.

My only plans moving forward are to fit a Bovee 1000 for streaming music from my iPhone and to fit some lowering springs. Although, riding on 19" wheels, this may be a tad too harsh for a daily, especially as the first 15 mins of my commute are county roads.

This thread would be useless without pics so take a gander..

A few more

Stunning!!

Congrats :thumbs: :thumbs: :thumbs: :thumbs: :thumbs:

Great pics MattyR, thanks for sharing.
I also have a 3.6 Gen 2 car and I'm more than happy with it; the car has more than enough performance for UK roads and yet is reasonably practical including fuel economy - it also looks great, and best of all the C2 is the cheapest variant. For me (given the congested roads round here) a turbo or a GT car would be wasted and they're way more expensive.
The two things I really wanted to change on my C2 were the ride height (I went for Ohlins Road & Track coilovers), and exhaust noise (I bought a cracking system from CGR in Rotherham).
Anyway, hope you enjoy yours, it looks lovely.

:worship:

I'm sure it will give you '000s of miles of fun amongst all the daily duties. :thumb:

I don't envy you keeping it clean though.

:congrats:

Great looking car Matty! I really like the colour and obviously, IMHO you have the best design wheels too! Enjoy the ride!

I follow Spider Vehicle Enhancement on facebook and saw the photos last week.

Great job. I'm also in Tunbridge-Wells btw.

Very nice. Now I know what I should have done when I collected the car. Instead I just collected stone chips and added km. Then I got the ceramic coating... and some other bits and pieces. All back to front.

Congrats Matt,

I got my Gen2 c2 manual no sunroof no wiper from JZM too, also got gtechniq applied.

Mine had 37k miles and was £39k three years ago for reference. I found JZM great to deal with, got them to include various extras as they wouldn't budge on sticker price.

Yours looks stunning!

Take care washing as the coating will still pick up swirls.

Great 911 and fantastic work to get it into that condition! Lowering springs and geo done well would get you the look and handling you're after, an obvious place to go for that is Center Gravity, they would guide you through the whole package, maybe some subtle spacing on the wheels too. But in any case, fantastic car, including if you keep it standard as Porsche intended :worship:

Great looking 911 manual Carrera 3.6 keeping it simple but
a real peach of a car, nice one! :thumb:

Stunning , looks fantastic :thumbs:

Very nice. Congrats.

Welcome aboard.

Car looks fantastic.

An exceptional detailing job- now you just have to keep on top of it!