[Qmulus]

What blows me away is how long people kept messing around with ball or roller bearings on the IMS instead of replacing with a proper oiled journal bearing like it should been from the beginning. The first time I saw an M96 in pieces I was AMAZED that they put a sealed ball bearing in a modern engine. What the F!? I can picture a design review of the M96 engine at Porsche. (Cue dream sequence.) There are a bunch of engineers, accountants and management sitting around a big table when a young engineer claims he can solve the IMS oiling issues and save $10/engine by fitting a roller bearing instead of having to do the machining to get an oil feed gallery to the bearing. The bearing company says it will work with data to back it up, the bean counters loved it, and the old, experienced engineers protested saying it wouldn't work (but had no data to support their claim - yet) and eventually walked out of the meeting. Management says it is a no brainer. Do it! The young engineer was a hero! For about six months...

Porsche really has a lot of German engineering stubbornness (some would say arrogance) in taking ideas that were flawed to begin with and making them work or quietly making them go away, especially in regards to their engines. You would think they would learn, but they keep making the same mistakes. Witness the new GT3 engines.

Anyway, back to IMS bearings. I think the only real "solution" is that proper oil-fed journal bearing that has (finally) been released by LN. The next amazing part to me is that people pay $1800 (plus installation!) for it. It is a great way to make money - for awhile anyway. Heck, I would patent that as well!