Car introduction - 1996 C4
 

I've been enjoying this car since 2001. I got it with 22000 miles from the dealer in Westmont, IL. The dealer also had a newer NSX and a Merak in the lot. No contest in terms of performance and durability.

The dealer had installed a chip, a strut brace, and 2nd gear for the PO. Stock, the car has factory Aerokit, RS clutch, factory sport exhaust, Litronic, six-speed, and unfortunately AWD. Gotta trail brake at low speeds, else it's going off!

Had some white-knuckle drives in the Midwest wet weather, trying different tires for wet-weather stability. It feels much more stable with the Potenza RE-050A compared to Goodyear GS-D3 or Pzero Rosso.


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Big Rock, IL is all country roads, so no problems with the air injection clogging up here. I purged the system with solvent at 65000 miles but the passages were already clear.

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Put a clutch in myself. Time consuming but pleasant. Was pleased to find an RS clutch (no dual-mass FW). New drivers find it easy to stall, but it's not too bad.

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Also took that opportunity to replace the all the seals on one cam housing. Found out after tear-down it was just the oil bridge leaking. The oil ran down the back of the housing, so it looked like a leak at the cam seal or housing-to-case seal. Fun was had anyway! Set the cam timing the old way with a dial gauge and a new 930 mechanical rocker. Note the home-made cam holder. Made from 4130 tubing and drill blanks, flame welded and normalized.

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Had some probs. with the factory sport mufflers coming apart. There is an irresistible brow (hill) not far from my house and after many grazing contacts with the road surface, there was a 1" x 2" piece of stainless rattling around in each muffler. Also one muffler had a split seam. Easy fix with the home-made TIG welder.

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I used this car once or twice for PCA DE at Road America. Funny, when you are approaching turn 5 at 137 mph and the track falls away beneath you (downhill), the steering is useless until you get some weight on the front wheels. That's inconvenient because the track widens a little leading into 5 and I would like to move over a little to take advantage. I asked the guy parked next to me with the same car what he does and he said "137 mph??!!!". Well, that's no help.

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Car is largely unmodified, but have been thinking about lowering the ride height. These struts won't last forever. Also, not sure if keeping the AWD is worthwhile. It is however fun to blast off at stoplights in wet weather.

Nice, I have a '95. When I bought it, it had Koni Sport adjustables in front and stock Monroes in the rear, not a good match. I installed H&R coil-over, lowered and aligned to RS spec. Much better on track and street. Also looks better.

Very nice. So are you an astronaut? I was looking at your avatar and wondered.

Applied and was rejected for astronaut candidate in the most recent selection phase.

My logic is one day, there will be many people working in space, so they have to lower the bar eventually!

The avatar is a photo from the day NASA set up a Public Relations tent at race at Road America. Interesting that they thought they would find technical-minded people at an auto race. They were right! Came home with some nice NASA posters that day.

Very good.