Oppo test drive report: 1986 Porsche 944 Turbo

"Textured Soy Protein" (texturedsoyprotein)
08/12/2014 at 23:59 • Filed to: None

Today I tried out a car that I've been a big fan of—at least in theory—for a long time: a Porsche 944 Turbo. I've thought about getting one off and on for probably about 10 years now, but it never quite got around to driving one.

!!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , some kind of lowered suspension, a 930 steering wheel, and a bolt-in rollbar in the back seat. Overall, it was in pretty good condition, with one major exception which I'll cover later.

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Exterior

Honestly, even though I like the overall car, I don't think looks are its strong point. It's boxy, and a bit dated-looking. It's ok. The boxed fender flares appeal to the gearhead in me, but I don't think it would ever be accused of being pretty. The Turbo front fascia and lights look way better than the regular 944 at least. The rear bumper is pretty hideous, but !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! that cleans the looks up considerably.

(This car also has the GT Racing front splitter, euro '91-'92 rear spoiler, 968 mirrors and door handles, Kinesis Supercup wheels, and the rear turn signals have been painted red. All of which taken together makes for a nicer look.)

Interior

I rather like the 944 Turbo on the inside. There's decent enough room although headroom for me at 5'11" is a bit tight. But compared to a 911 of the same year, there's way more room for your feet, and there's actually some separation between the seats. It feels much less cramped, but there's less headroom. The seats are comfy and have plenty of adjustments. Pedals are well placed, there's a good foot rest, and visibility is excellent.

I'm usually not a fan of tan interiors, but with the black dash top and floor mats, the tan here works for me.

The sunroof is a metal panel, that only tilts up a couple inches. Which I guess is alright. You can see it tilted in the 2nd picture of the GT Racing bumper I posted above. It's also removable, which then makes for an almost-targa. I didn't try to remove it, but I bet it would be nice. It's a pretty big hole in the roof, like such:

Ergonomics overall are pretty good. The switchgear for the most part makes sense. The only real quirk is the power mirror adjuster joystick is on the driver's door, but the switch to choose which mirror to adjust is in front of the shifter. Not really a big issue in the scheme of things. Overall, I'd be pretty fine with taking this car on an extended road trip.

Acceleration

It is...pretty decent. Not fast enough to really pin you back in your seat, but it feels healthy. For a mid-80s turbo motor, I was expecting more lag, but it wasn't that bad. It feels a tad quicker than say, a 986 Boxster S, even though it's got less power. Could be either due to torque or gearing. Or just because the 986 S is too damned quiet.

Assuming you do proper maintenance on the motor, you can pretty easily extract more power without too much expense. An '88 Turbo S or '89 Turbo (since all '89 Turbos got the Turbo S goodies) would be a bit of an improvement.

Transmission

After my experience with an '86 911 being possibly the worst transmission I've ever experienced (although that particular car most likely needed some transmission work), I was a bit nervous about the transmission of the 944 Turbo. Turns out I needn't have worried. It's quite nice. The clutch wasn't particularly heavy. It engaged slightly high up in the pedal travel but that could be due to age/wear. The shifter is rather good with reasonably short throws and well-defined gates. It has a nice snickety feel. No ropeyness here. It's actually better than your typical modern Porsche or BMW shifter. I wouldn't quite put it up there in my top shifters ever though—those remain the Miata, S2000, RX-8 and FD RX-7. Heel-toe downshifts were easy enough.

Handling

Here's where things got a bit off the rails. This car had steering issues. It didn't track straight, but it wasn't tramlining. There was some kind of weird play in the steering. Going down a straight road, it would pull to the left, then the right. Turning in to high-speed sweepers was a bit scary, because at first I would turn the wheel and nothing would happen. I'd have to keep turning the wheel and eventually the car would turn in. Not good.

I did some research and it could be due to bad tie rod ends, or the steering shaft itself, or the shaft U-joints. Hard to say without getting under the car. This car was lowered in some way, no idea on what sort of parts were used. That could also be contributing to the problems.

Once I got the car turned in, I liked how it handled. Body roll was well-controlled, steering the car with the throttle was easy, and overall it was mostly nice. Just the steering issues were a bit scary. Grip was decent, but it didn't have particularly great tires. Yokohama AVS ES100 on the front, and General Exclaim UHP in the rear.

Ride was actually very smooth, especially considering how low the car had been dropped.

Brakes:

Pretty good. ABS wasn't introduced on the 944 Turbo until '87. But the '86 still has the nice monoblock calipers, like these:

Pedal was reasonably firm, but not rock hard like you need to exert yourself to get the car slowed down. Stopping power was good. I didn't really push them though.

There are also plenty of upgrades out there, from better pads/rotors, to going for bigger brakes from other Porsches, other aftermarket big brake kits, etc.

Audio

I didn't turn the stereo on. Oops.

This car had some kind of 'Bullet' aftermarket exhaust. I'm not sure what exactly that means, but the exhaust tip said Bullet on it.

Best info I could find was the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! site, which looks like they just make mufflers and tips. So I think this was a "custom" muffler shop job.

Sounded pretty alright though. Not as good as the M Performance exhaust on my 135is, but that's a particularly good sounding exhaust.

Will I buy it?

Ehhhhhh.....that's a tough question. I can now confidently say that I like 944 Turbos. I'm not so confident about this particular car's steering problems. Another consideration is this particular car doesn't have an LSD. Before I drove the car, I did a little research that told me not all 944 Turbos came with an LSD. Porsche put a build sticker with option codes in the hatch area under the carpet, and the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

LSD is option code 220. So I checked the sticker.

The option codes are the little 3-digit numbers at the bottom. No option code 220.

There are plenty of available LSD and torque-biasing diffs out there. Or you can swap in an LSD-equipped transmission from either a later 944 Turbo or a 944 S2 (the S2 also has shorter gearing which is apparently desirable). But...none of those options are cheap.

The guy said he'd sell me the car for $7200. Which is an ok price. But without knowing what is required to get the steering sorted, and particularly with knowing how much it'll cost to get rid of the open diff, I'm not sure this is my best move.

Still liked it though.

DISCUSSION (24)

BKRM3 > Textured Soy Protein
08/12/2014 at 21:26

Not to be a nerd, but isn't this car a 951?

Textured Soy Protein > BKRM3
08/12/2014 at 21:28

Its internal model code is 951—the build sticker I posted says 951—but it was marketed as the 944 Turbo. Kinda like how the 911 Turbo is the 930.

Textured Soy Protein > Textured Soy Protein
08/12/2014 at 21:34

Kinja'd!!!

For some reason, somebody decided the mirrors needed little car bras of their own.

BKRM3 > Textured Soy Protein
08/12/2014 at 21:37

Ahh, right! Thanks. I try to keep internal model code knowledge on the DL usually.

Dsscats > Textured Soy Protein
08/13/2014 at 00:04

That doesn't look like a turbo. Doesn't look like the right front bumper. Also, I don't think those wheels came on the Turbo. I could be wrong on both counts. I probably am.

Textured Soy Protein > Dsscats
08/13/2014 at 00:13

How are you wrong? Let me count the ways.

The front bumper on this car is definitely the turbo bumper. It was shared with the 944 S2. This is the original non-turbo 944 front bumper: http://www.jerryallgire.com/sitebuildercon…

The "phone dial" wheels were most certainly standard on the 944 turbo.

The build sticker lists the model code as 951—Porsche's internal code for the 944 turbo.

This dash had a boost gauge on the dash which moved around when I drove it.

When I popped the hood, the motor looked like this: http://data.motor-talk.de/data/galleries…

Saracen > Textured Soy Protein
08/13/2014 at 00:21

For the issues the car has, and the condition of the interior, 7200 is too high. For that much I'd start looking at S2's...and they'd be cleaner. There was one recently sold on my local for 7500, and it was super clean, bone stock, all the maintenance records.

Saracen > Dsscats
08/13/2014 at 00:24

Man, I hope you're trolling..

Textured Soy Protein > Saracen
08/13/2014 at 00:24

The S2 (and 968) do nothing for me. Give me a turbo. Just a better example than this one.

Saracen > Textured Soy Protein
08/13/2014 at 00:27

I'd rather have throttle response than turbo lag in such a precise handling sports car. The 3 liter engine delivers plenty of power.

Textured Soy Protein > Saracen
08/13/2014 at 00:28

Well, let me put it another way. Since I've got my 135is now, cars under 300 hp just don't feel very quick anymore. While the stock power ratings of the turbo, S2 and 968 are all similar, the turbo is the only one that can (relatively) easily make a bunch more power than stock.

Saracen > Textured Soy Protein
08/13/2014 at 00:30

/shrug I've increased my Golf R's output to 300hp. I find I can still have plenty of fun in lesser powered cars.

Edit: granted I think the base 944's base 2.5 liter and 2.7 liters motors are simply not powerful enough, I think the S2 and the 968 have plenty.

Dsscats > Saracen
08/13/2014 at 00:31

What, because I don't know everything about the 944? As i said, I could and probably am wrong.

Saracen > Dsscats
08/13/2014 at 00:34

Because the dude obviously researched the car, then DROVE the car, decoded the build sticker, and you're just like "that's not a Turbo."

Dsscats > Saracen
08/13/2014 at 00:35

I didn't say "that's not a Turbo." I said "that doesn't look like a turbo". I said I was probably wrong and I was. No need to be a dick about it.

Textured Soy Protein > Saracen
08/13/2014 at 00:48

It's not that lower powered cars can't be fun. I drove a Miata for several years. I just happen to have a relatively powerful car now, which I like, and want a sorta similar amount of acceleration.

Right now the cars I'm actively considering are the 944 turbo, 996 C2, C6 Z51, Z4 M Roadster, and FD RX-7.

In the interest of bench racing, my 135is supposedly does a 0-60 in 4.6 seconds and the 1/4 in 13 flat. Not that I put much stock in bench racing, but all those cars are at least in the 13s in the 1/4 mile. Except the 944 turbo.

That's a pretty wide gamut of prices and ages, but it's basically about finding something I like.

Saracen > Dsscats
08/13/2014 at 00:49

Ah, name calling already. Classy.

I'm not sure what else your statement could have implied.

Dsscats > Saracen
08/13/2014 at 00:52

Sorry, what? You tried to call me out for being wrong on something I admitted to being wrong about. I doubt you missed the other person telling me that. My statement, if it was confirmed by another Opponaut, would have implied that it was improperly repaired in an accident, thus having the front bumper changed out. You tried to make it seem like I was being a dick to him and saying he was wrong. That wasn't the case at all. You misconstrued or misunderstood what I was saying

N51fanatic > Textured Soy Protein
08/13/2014 at 07:33

7200? CP. I was thinking ask was gonna be like 5500/6k as I was reading.

K-Roll-PorscheTamer > Textured Soy Protein
08/16/2014 at 10:59

Having driven a '74 911 with the 915 trans, I have to ask; how bad could it have been for you to say it was the worst transmission you've ever driven?? I certainly hope that you weren't trying to speed shift it; it's not meant for that. The 915 requires smooth and while not slow, not fast shifts either. It takes a good amount of time to get use to. If you were to find another '74-86 911 with it's trans sorted out, I bet it'd be a much better and rewarding experience.

Textured Soy Protein > K-Roll-PorscheTamer
08/16/2014 at 13:59

It basically really didn't want to go into the first three gears. There was no feel for where the gates were. The clutch pedal didn't have any sort of linear pedal feel at all. Engagement was tricky.

K-Roll-PorscheTamer > Textured Soy Protein
08/16/2014 at 14:11

The not going into gears is definitely a problem. If there's no feel for the gates, I'd assume that shift coupler may need to be replaced; especially if there's a lot of play with the shifter. I'm not sure what to say about the clutch pedal though. But I agree that engagement can be and is sometimes tricky. As I said, it's a transmission that you can't really judge after driving once. I've driven the '74 six times now and I'm improving slightly each time I drove it. It takes time but it's worth it; I'd suggest trying out some more 911s from the period if you can.

Stef Schrader > Textured Soy Protein
08/25/2014 at 00:09

...BUY IT.

Textured Soy Protein > Stef Schrader
08/25/2014 at 01:11

I think if I do end up with a 944, it will be a Turbo S. Or maaaaaybe a 968.