Duckie v Carrera tail weight n A/C
 

Any educated guesses as to the weight of a Duck Tail compared to a 84-89 Carrera and deck lid?

Also, can an A/C condenser be used with a Duck Tail?

If you are concerned about weight and you should be for a tail, then one of the lighter ways to go is a stock steel lid(stripped of all the unnecessary bracketry + a MAShaw RSA tail. This combo weighs <50% of any factory setup & will be as light as any aftermarket duck. It's also has superior aero

The Carrera Tail (84-89) is much better suited to modern high performance A/C than the Duck Tail as you can put a high efficiency condenser in that tail and save many hundreds of dollars on updating the A/C and run a simple system blows 32F at the vents.

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I just weighed this stuff a few weeks ago.

'87 factory Carrera tail with steel lid attached, no A/C stuff whatsoever, no engine lid light, no third brake light periscope, no hinges or gas charged struts, latch assembly attached....................... 35 pounds.

MA Shaw ducktail unpainted without latch= 11 lbs + 2-1/2 lbs for plastic grill from 911 SC.

So you're saving a little over 20 lbs switching to a ducktail from the Carrera tail. What you lose is a bit of high speed downforce if you track your car.

Excellent!

Good answers, thank you all.

I think it would look nice to use a carbon fiber Carrera tail and not paint the area that is usually rubber.

I guess I wonder how much a stock Carrera tail adds to a stock deck. I would guess about 15+/- lbs???

That's for the flatter "whale" style tail as opposed to a Turbo/tea tray type (as below), correct?

Assuming that to be the case, does anyone have a weight for the factory engine cover with factory tea tray?


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As I recall, my FG ducktail weighs about 7-8 lbs. w/o the plastic grill. Other than carbon fiber, a 100% FG ducktail will be the lightest of the spoilered options. An AC condenser should fit, but you should measure to confirm.

Sherwood

I had a stock Carrera decklid with a stock Carrera tail. I went to a GT Racing all fiberglass one piece part and it was 19 lbs lighter than the stock set-up.

I was just about to pull my tea tray off and weigh it, but if somebody does know this it would save me the trouble. If not I will advise thru this post, what the weight is. I need to lose weight in the rear, any other options? I have already put on FG fenders and bumper, and AC delete, car is at 37%front 63% rear, and 2393lbs. 82sc w/ 3.2 euro spec engine.

Correct.

I was surprised my ducktail weighed 11 lbs, as I expected it to be in the ballpark of Sherwood's stated weight. But the MA Shaw piece I have seems really sturdy so there's probably some more weight in mine due to the added cloth & or thickness of it? Either way, i'm happy with the 20 lb. weight savings which supports what chrisp said. I'm also pleased with the elimination of the big 'ol tail i'm not too fond of looking at and maintaining (PITA to wax and rubber-treat). I've always liked the smooth looks of the tail-less cars. Duck seems like a nice in-between.

I do not know the weight of a tea tray. But I can advise you of more places to save weight- hood replacement will gain you 23 lbs and tail at least 20 lbs. I was suprised to find that the hood and tail + lid are places that save nearly as much weight as replacing bumpers with fiberglass. If I didn't dislike the look of the 74-89 bumpers so much, i'd have left them in place and just done the hood and duck. I'm a bit bothered by the lack of crash protection my car now has.........

BTW

Factory steel hood from my '87 = 34 lbs
MA Shaw fiberglass replacement = 11 lbs.

Keep in mind that fiberglass hoods and tails require you to ditch the gas struts, to avoid damaging the glass from the force required to compress the struts.

Thanks, that weight would be a big incentive.

FWIW, a lighter muffler (M&K or Monty) will help by as much as 15#; deleting the engine heater fan is about 10#, and the cruise control 5-6#. Pelican and TRE have block-off plates - Pelican is plastic, TRE is steel. This is supposed to let you keep some heating ability; search around if interested.

There is a lot of weight in the rear seat area under the carpeting/back rest/rear deck. Others have posted losing 30-35#!

Lexan or polycarbonate rear window and quarter windows will shed more weight for the hard core; as will sun-roof delete if you have one.

How was the fit of the MA Shaw piece? I'd really like to avoid spending money on body work.

Gas struts? Gas struts? We don't need any stinking gas struts.:D

Another big weight source:

My RS America 4 way power cloth sport seats weigh 49 lbs each. OUCH. My Cobra Imola track seat is 21 lbs. with side mounts. Pulling the passenger seat at track days nets me a 77 lb. weight loss.

fit of the duck looks good. But to be honest I haven't mounted it yet. I'll be sure to let you know. My supplier guys (both very good close friends) kept saying the Shaw stuff requires little to no work for fitment. They've done a number of installs of the 'glass stuff, so i'll have to take their words for it.

BobF, I have a monty and since I live in s.Fla. the heat stuff is long gone, I'm down to tail and windows, I guess. I have FG front hood, fenders and spliter. Yes I have a sunroof, still works as well, what kind of weight can I gain here and what do I replace it with, Carbon?

What does your 84 weigh in at, as a wide body.
TW

I hate sunroofs. I'd like to ditch mine and not have to look at the ratty cloth trim and faded paint on the roof lid.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/porsche-911-technical-forum/377238-sunroof-removal-weld-shut.html

See post number 13 by jmshepard for the weight = 37 pounds. WOW. Some really good information in that thread how to do it right too. Apparently its not a simple job to close the roof

It's at 2583 with 5 gallons of gas, no spare, tools or driver. Not bad for an all-steel M491 that started out at 2827.

It is a no sunroof car, and I have deleted the a/c, sound system, misc. interior stuff, trunk carpet, air filter, fog lights, engine sound pad, w/s washer tank (20# full!), and a few smaller items.

The next hundred pounds should be fairly easy - duck, bumper pad delete, Eoro bumber crush tubes, M&K muffler, engine heater fan, rear passenger compartment sound proofing, racing driver seat and Odyssey battery. After that it gets tougher. I, too am concentrating on rear weight and just doing the easy stuff at the front and center of the car.

My problem is one of the auto-cross classes I run in has a minimum weight and so I may end up with ballast bolted to the passenger side floor when I run there:mad:. Oh well. I'd love to try and get it to 2300#, but the ballast would be silly at that point. We'll see. The driver could stand to lose 30# and they can't penalize me for that.:D

For clarity, the car was weighed for corner-weighting mid-way through my weight reduction program. I've kept pretty good track of what I have removed, but the weights are from a bathroom scale for large items and a food scale for smaller stuff. The larger items especially could be a pound or two off either way. So, I amthinking overall weight is +/- 20# or so. It will get re-weighed (and corner-weighted) after I am done.

OK so I just pulled my spare factory Turbo/ Tea tray spoiler and non turbo engine (read small opening not for inter-cooler clearance) lid off the garage wall and weighed it on the bathroom scale. It weighed in at 37 LBS. :eek:

It has no latches, A/C bracket, or anything else mounted. Just the tail and the lid.

Hope this helps,

Gregg S.

SmileWavy

Yes. The stock condenser is bolted to the hinges and only leans on the bracket on the tail. I mounted the ducktail and simply eliminated the bracket on the tail itself. Been like this for 2 years, and the air works as well as you'd expect a fully charged SC system to (which is fair at best;))

Thanks for the info. This is about what I thought it would be. Did you try to sell the Tray? If so at what price?
tom

Thanks to all for the great info, my greenP track machine.

tomhttp://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1209608678.jpg