Vintech 993 with Coilover Race Package

Elephant Racing built this 993 in-house. Destined primarily for street use, we set it up with the Coilover Race package – and worked hard to strike the right balance between performance and comfort. Let’s see how we did.

Thomas Fleuret of Vintech, a SoCal based Porsche design house, has an enviable pedigree. He worked in-house for Volkswagen before moving on to design concept cars for Renault. Now heading up Vintech, he has an exacting eye for design and an affinity for the narrow body 993 series 911. For his personal car, he wanted street car that was also a “beast”. Thomas was looking for good road ride quality, but with the razor sharp control and responsiveness of a race car. Simultaneously achieving these competing objectives was the challenge, the classic “have your kuchen (cake) and eat it too”. He entrusted Elephant Racing to make that vision a reality.

To meet the challenge, we started with our Coilover Race package and made a couple modifications. We took a series of steps to deliver performance and ride quality simultaneously.

Firstly we addressed the springs and dampers, which largely dictate ride quality. We de-rated the springs to 250 lbs front/ 450 lbs rear. While stiffer than stock, this provides good compliance for the street. We opted for MCS adjustable dampers to allow tuning the system to match the springs and driver preference.

Front lower control arm monoball kit for Porsche 993

Rear control arm monoball kit for Porsche 993

Spherical bearings are equipped throughout. These provide racecar-sharp precision, control and enhanced road feedback to the driver. Contrary to myths that spherical bearings make a harsh ride, they actually enhance ride quality by allowing free movement of the suspension and allow the springs and dampers to do their job.

The Coilover Race package includes our RS front uprights. These upgrights have the wheel bearing positioned higher, thus allowing an agressively low ride height while maintaining proper geometry. But they help ride quality too, by giving back suspension travel that would otherwise be lost when lowering the car. Performance and ride quality.

3 way adjustable swaybar for Porsche 993

RS type adjustable swaybars are fit front and rear. These can be dialed up from fairly soft-to-stiff, which provides tunability on the ride quality / performance trade spectrum.Lastly we fit our 935 style front chassis brace to take out flex and add some rigidity to improve steering inputs. While it may not contribute directly to ride quality, it did meet with the approval of Thomas’ designer’s eye and front chassis stiffening.