I got an email back on the Drop Link Question of 2018:
As for the Anti Roll bar drop links - your friend is not incorrect, but in the case of the 996, he is not correct either.
Lowering the car, does change the angle of the roll bar (but not the mounting points) but there is lots of room, and no risk of conflict with other components.
We are running your car within Porsche ride height tolerances, and the lower, standard 996 (X74/GT3/GT2 etc) does not require shorter links.
If we were to run the car lower than GT3, then potentially we may need shorter links to allow us clearance.
Even in these circumstances, the roll bar would never be pre-loaded, as the roll bar bushes are a pivot point, and the drop links are always the same length, so we'd use shorter links - not adjustable.
As long as the drop links are always the same length, the roll bar will not alter its torsional strength.
The problem when you use adjustable drop links, it is possible to set the length of the links differently.
If one link is shorter than the other, this will pre-load the anti roll bar.
We can use adjustable drop links as a tuning aid, to stiffen an anti roll bar by adding pre-load, but this is not necessary on a road car.
On some cars, the roll bar bushes are tightened in such a way that by lowering a car can alter the tension on the bush, and cause preload that way.
Usually this is on heavy engined Mercedes or BMW, and the roll bar bushes are tightened with the vehicle load on them.
But again, in the case of the 996, this is not the case, and the bushes securing the roll bar allow the bar to rotate quite freely.
I got an email back on the Drop Link Question of 2018:
As for the Anti Roll bar drop links - your friend is not incorrect, but in the case of the 996, he is not correct either.
Lowering the car, does change the angle of the roll bar (but not the mounting points) but there is lots of room, and no risk of conflict with other components.
We are running your car within Porsche ride height tolerances, and the lower, standard 996 (X74/GT3/GT2 etc) does not require shorter links.
If we were to run the car lower than GT3, then potentially we may need shorter links to allow us clearance.
Even in these circumstances, the roll bar would never be pre-loaded, as the roll bar bushes are a pivot point, and the drop links are always the same length, so we'd use shorter links - not adjustable.
As long as the drop links are always the same length, the roll bar will not alter its torsional strength.
The problem when you use adjustable drop links, it is possible to set the length of the links differently.
If one link is shorter than the other, this will pre-load the anti roll bar.
We can use adjustable drop links as a tuning aid, to stiffen an anti roll bar by adding pre-load, but this is not necessary on a road car.
On some cars, the roll bar bushes are tightened in such a way that by lowering a car can alter the tension on the bush, and cause preload that way.
Usually this is on heavy engined Mercedes or BMW, and the roll bar bushes are tightened with the vehicle load on them.
But again, in the case of the 996, this is not the case, and the bushes securing the roll bar allow the bar to rotate quite freely.