Another one bites the dust - value??
 

May 15th (six and a half weeks ago) I was elated to bring home my new-to-me '99 boxster with 65,700 miles on it. I bought it as a present to myself for my 26th birthday after dreaming about Porsche ownership for the last 19 years. (My dad has had 911s since I was 7). I got what I thought was a good deal on the car ($2000 under private party book value) and took it to my mechanic for a check-up. The bill was $1600 for the 60k service, front brakes, and spark plug tubes and seals. I was also aware as I picked it up that they wanted to change the ignition switch and figure out why the idle was high, but I wanted the car back and really didn't want to spend more money on it so I took it.

Two weeks later I drove the car to work with the top down and when I pulled in to a spot and tried to put the top up nothing happened. I thought it was the e-brake switch and it could be fixed for $160 or so and dropped it off at the shop again. This time the ignition switch had to be done and since the check engine light was back on I had them figure out why the idle was funky. I got it back with a new ignition switch, idle air control valve, and Mass Air Flow sensor for another $1400. At this point I'm $1000 over book value and the car runs great, so I'm happy.

June 29, after having the car back from the second visit for 10 days, I was having a great time at a PCA autocross in Hartford. I took an instructor for a run to see if I was good enough to become an instructor myself, and got approved. As I pull off the autocross course I heard an odd clanging noise that sounded as if a piece of metal was bouncing around in my engine or transmission, so I shut it off, called AAA, and had it flat-bedded back to the car's favorite place, the shop. At first they said they couldn't replicate the noise, but then were able to and weren't sure if it was engine or transmission.

Today I got the dreaded call. The motor is blown. Intermediate shaft failure. $11k for a new factory motor installed. $15k for a new factory 3.4 motor installed. Or, the shop may be willing to buy the car from me as a roller.

What should I do?
What is the car worth as a roller?
It is not a good day to be me. :barf:

Addiction,

So sorry to hear your news ! Are you sure it's the IMS ?

I thought IMS failure was extremely rare on a '99 :

http://986forum.com/forums/boxster-general-discussions/17073-2003-boxster-s-prevent-ims-failure.html

http://mike.focke.googlepages.com/problemareas

Nick

Here's my opinion for whatever it's worth.

If you are addicted to the badge and the particular car you bought and planned to keep it for 10 years or indefinitely, then replace the motor with a 3.4. You will have a wicked-fast boxster, especially if you keep the 5 speed tranny. You lose some top end (which you'll rarely enjoy anyway) and add a lot of low rpm grunt that the 6 speed trannies do not possess.

If you are not smack dab in love with your car and don't plan to keep it forever, then you would be throwing good money after bad because you'll lose your shirt in two years when you tire of the car.

I bought my 97 for $15,500. I've put $8000 into it with a salvage transmission, lots of repairs to the cooling system, suspension and emissions, and the balance on new rims, skirts, humps, xenons, salvaged seats out of a 2002 carrera, etc. If my engine blew tomorrow, I'd put a 3.4 or a 3.6 in it as soon as I saved up the cash to do it.

Why dump even more money into a car worth $12k?

1. I can't afford a newer 3.4 boxster at $40k (I pay cash for cars).

2. I am happy to keep my car for the next 10+ years and a new motor would serve me well and the cost would be amortized over many years.

I hope my thinking process on your sad situation helps you decide what to do.

Maybe a Chevy V8?
 

http://www.renegadehybrids.com

Check out this site. I just emailed them on the Boxster and whether they have anything in development of us.

I will keep you posted.

This is EXACTLY what I would do...


www.electricporsche.net


I sent those guys an email about your situation. I was meaning to do it just out of curiosity (or peace of mind!) in the event that similar fate were to befall my beloved BoxsterS. Seems to me that dumping $15K into a 10 year old car is a losing battle. Now on the other hand if its got no need for $5 gas you might have something good on your hands. :cheers:

I was never a fan of these conversions before, but given my current situation it seems like a bargain, if they were to make one for the boxster. Definitely keep us posted.

I understand you logic and why you love the car. It would worry me that the used 3.4 engine could let go too. This does happen in the other motor sizes I understand.

Just a thought, albiet a discomforting one.

Guy up the road from me had a 944 conversation. Jesus, was that fast.

For $15k I can have them put in a brand new Porsche factory 3.4. My mechanic has flat-out refused to install a used 2.5 or 3.4, which I agree with. I have already ruled out the possibility of a new 2.5 because $11k for essentially what I originally had is just plain silly.

Probably the only two realistic options are:

1. Sell the car for whatever I can get for it as a roller (Any ideas what $$ that might be??)

2. My mechanic recently put a new 3.4 in a 996 race car that was then wrecked on the track. He is looking in to how much it would cost to acquire and install that motor for me.

If I can get that "new" 3.4 in the car for under $13K I'll probably do it and then keep the car indefinitely. If that's not possible I'll likely dump it. I paid cash for the car, but I'd have to beg my dad to loan me the money for the new motor. I bought a condo 3 months ago and am out of cash after the 986 purchase and repairs.

All I have to go on is what my mechanic said and the fact that the noise I heard sounded just as described in the threads you linked to. It still runs, but to quote the mechanic "it's about 5 revolutions away from bending all the valves and destroying itself." I told him if it's only a core at this point, let the valves bend - what do I care?

How about 2.7 or 3.2 motors? I would think they are somewhere between the 11k and 15k figures?

Just more options.

The car is probably worth, as a roller.....hold onto your ass... what you paid, minus what it will cost to fix it, divided by two. The mechanic is not going to buy it for the difference in what it's worth and what the motor costs him. Why invest the money to risk just getting what he would get if you pay him to fix it?
So, if you paid 20 and it will cost 11k (and it's always more) you're looking at probably four grand for the car, as is.

I was looking the same route, but spent my cash as a down payment and financed 20k to get an '06, certified car, warranteed out to 5/2012 and another 89k miles.

Speaking of warrantees, what is the deal if an indy puts in a new motor and what is the deal if the dealer does it? You will at least get some kind of warrantee on the new motor from the factory and it may be quite alot more difference from the dealer than the extra cost.

decisions, descisions.....

Who is the mechanic. How was he able to determine it was the intermediate shaft. What month and year was your 1999 made - need to look at the black sticker on the drivers door.

IMS is very rare on pre-'01 Boxster's, I would get a second opinion about it. Has he dropped the engine and checked the bearings?

The mechanic is Dan Jacobs LLC (Hairy Dog Grrrage). He's a very well-known indy in the area with a great reputation.

He was able to determine the failure from the noise it was making as well as all the metal in my 1200 mile old oil and filter. He says that the outer coating comes off the ball-bearings and ends up throughout the engine, resulting in failure and the wonderful sound of metal shards destroying expensive (poorly designed) machinery.

I obviously don't have the car handy, but if I recall correctly it was made in May of 1998. Does that sound right?

My current line of thought is to dump it for whatever I can get for it and go for an older, reliable, air-cooled, brutal 911.

Don't think those older 911s are all that much more reliable.
Say this over, several times - Cam chain tensioner, cam chain tensioner, cam chain tensioner....
Then check out the maintenance schedules and see how much they cost. Say - valve adjustment, valve cover gaskets, warped valve covers, cooling fans, etc., etc.

$11k for a 2.5L replacement? That's nuts.

Get on renntech.org and talk to member 'tholyoak'. He has redone a lot of Boxster's engines.

Metal in the oil filter is not good. You first said you had a 1999. Some 1999 engines were sleeved. The engines were made late 1998 (but sold as model year 1999) to early 1999. I think you have a typo in your second message where you say May 1998.

TP, what is a sleeved engine? Is it good or bad, and is there anyway to figure out if my engine is like that?
Thanks! :cheers:

http://www.pca.org/tech/tech_qa_question.asp?id={F3EA752A-E838-43E5-A43D-BB4F445F5A8F}

Copy and paste the link to see if it works.

Thanks for the link, I had no idea that they had done that.

seems like nobody has answered your second question so far "how much is the car worth as a roller"?

Well here's my math:
You probably paid around $20k for the car.
Putting a new engine in will cost around $12k ~ $15k.
So the worth of the car as a roller is probably around $5 ~ $6k (if you find anyone interested), depending on how the car looks and if it has Xenon etc.

That's not much and so IMHO your only way is to "raise" the cash and get a new engine

(P.S.: have a look at the last line in my signature)

OUCH! I guess it may get parted out then. I'd have to be able to get more than that out of it in pieces I'd think, since every little sensor is $200 to $700 new.

Parting it out sounds good, unless you consider the value of your time to do it, if you would buy many of those used parts for your car, how many parts you will ruin getting to the one that you sold and what it will cost to get rid of what is left, IF you can get rid of it anywhere.

Have you thought about looking for a used engine? I know that sounds scary but it might be doable from a money perspective.

I have considered the possibility of attempting to swap in a used motor myself, but I won't consider paying a shop to swap in another 2.5 time bomb. This option is probably not a terribly smart one to make, as I wouldn't even consider myself a shade-tree mechanic when it comes to Porsches. If it was a VW I'd be pulling the motor tomorrow, but it's not. Instead I'll spend my time drafting a nice letter to my friends at Porsche, since I'm a far better writer than wrencher. Though it's clearly out of warranty it has fewer than 68k miles on it and is bone stock and unmolested. I'd expect a Hyundai to last twice as long; I'd have expected a Porsche motor to last longer than that. If nothing else it should make me feel slightly better just to express my feelings even if they do nothing.

Used engine
 

Hey man, I know it sucks that your motor blew, as mine did this last year, and I hated the car for it. Heres the thing though, I am going to be removin my engine from my car. I have a motor that Greff motors put in my car back in december, and now has about 40k miles on it. I have the documentation on it, and would be willing to make you a sweet deal if you want to bring your box back to life. It is still in the car and you can listen to it purr.

Let me know! My price is $4,000.00 firm, plus shipping.

Why are you pulling the motor? I'll keep this in mind. I'm trying to come up with a list of possible solutions and will decide on a course of action once I calm down and regain my ability to think rationally.

because I hate my car, and am sick of dumping money into it everytime it breaks. I have spend 30 grand on this damn thing in the past year and a half, and ive had enough. Now, some shaft in my transmission is shot, and ive had enough. no more investing money in it. Im gonna get some of it back instead.

I'm sure it doesn't make you feel any better at all, but I feel your pain.

yea, I know. A lot of people with these cars feel my pain. if I had to do it all over again, Id buy a brand new porsche with warranty. Note would be more, but still less than all these repairs.

The co-owner of this forum has a Mazda Miata with a tubocharged engine (aftermarket). Great little car and very quick indeed.

Long story short, he decided to find another used engine to replace the existing one, which has a bad head.

Cost shipped to his door? $850.

My point of course is that with our Boxsters, it is not just that they seem to always have some issue, but that the cost of the issue seems to always be ridiculous..

I am not suggesting that everyone go out and buy a Miata. I am suggesting that Porsche in some sense, playing us all for suckers on the cost of repairs side of the ledger.

Update
 

I appreciate the help you've all provided and figured I'd let you know where I stand right now. I'm not replacing the motor with either a 2.5 or 3.4 because I just don't believe in the motors anymore. I am going to look a bit in to the Chevy conversion, but will likely just dump the car. The highest bid right now is $6500. Anything over that will be entertained. It's a shame my 20 year love affair with Porsche had to end this way.

I have never heard of anyone putting a Chevy engine in a Boxster, this isn't a 914. Will anyone even do it?
You might also consider the Subaru boxer engine.

I know this is an emotional time, right now, but I think in a few years you'll look back and see it was also an emotional decision.
You talk like every Boxster motor is going to fail, it's only a matter of time, while not seeing that the vast majority of them don't fail.
Bad luck is bad luck and I'm sorry your luck was that.
It's also a bad decision for Porsche to have a replacement as the only option on the Boxster engine , when parts availability would make them as rebuildable as every other engine on earth. That one is a mystery to me. They would make money on parts, also.

Renagade Hybrids has been doing Chevy conversions on 944s, 911s, and 914s and I'm just going to check with them to see if they are in development of a Boxster kit. It could be cool and is the only way I may be comfortable keeping the car. I loved driving it, but I just wouldn't trust it anymore with a Porsche power plant.

I know not every Boxster motor is going to fail, but based on the limited information available it appears that somewhere between 10 and 25% of them fail due to RMS, IMS, or a slipped sleeve. I'll call it a 10% failure rate and in my opinion half of that would still be way too high for any reputable manufacturer of "durable" goods. Hyundai stands behind their cheap North Korean econo-boxes with a 10 year, 100,000 mile warranty. Why doesn't Porsche, a company with a (recently underserved in my mind) reputation for longevity have a similar policy? I no longer believe in German engineering and as has been suggested so many times on this board, I will not own a Porsche without a warranty because it's just too risky.

As for being emotional about it, yes, I most certainly am. I have been obsessed with these cars for 20 years and feel betrayed by them. A reputable company claiming that "The most valuable capital this company has is its loyal customers with their sense of Porsche responsibility." (taken from the PCNA web-site http://www.porsche.com/usa/aboutporsche/porschecarsnorthamerica/n432/ ) should stand behind the product they build, fix the engineering flaws that become aparent, and take care of their customers so that we, as my father did, instill the love of Porsche in our kids and grandchildren that made the company successful. Failure to stand behind your products and take care of loyal customers is asking for failure.

Man, I'm sorry to hear about your engine blowup. It would be nice if Porsche offers a 10 yr. / 100K mile powertrain warranty just like Hyundai, but they probably will never do so. Hyundai does it cause simply like you said, the powertrain would be cheap to replace in a Hyundai, but not in a Porsche. That being said, with all the stuff you read on Porsche boards about engine failures, I believe Porsche should step up and goodwill replace any failed engines due to RMS, IMS, or slipped sleeve issues. It would go a long way in restoring confidence in the Pcar community.

FWIW, however, as much as I've heard about these issues for all these years I've been on these boards, the only problems I've ever personally had on my 2001 Boxster were a cracked coolant tank and peeling radio knobs/door pocket lids, which were all replaced under warranty. I think now with the modern Porsches (the 987/997 line), you see even less stories about blown engines, so it may not even be much of an issue these days, but it would be nice if Porsche took care of the folks who have issues like you, to restore their reputation, and insure that they don't lose any more future customers due to this known issue. Good luck with your situation.

Also, have you contacted Porsche about this. If you bought the car used, and the previous owner had an engine replacement, you might be able to get PCNA to fix the car. I have only heard of them fixing a blown engine out of warranty once or twice, but it would be worth asking.

Addiction,

Sorry to hear about your engine failure.

I think the letter to PCNA is a good idea. Follow it up with phone calls, too.

My car suffered the dreaded IMS failure wihile with its previous owner. He had it religiously serviced at the local dealer, so they went to bat for him with PCNA. End result is Porsche paid for 75% of the total cost of replacement, despite the fact that the car had 69K miles on it and was out of warranty.

I think you have a stronger case if you can document the maintenance history and an even stronger argument if most of the service was done by dealers. Do you have any records from the PO?

Unfortunately I don't have any records from the previous owners. Through carfax I know it has been a CT car with 2 owners before me, but I can not verify maintenance history. I really don't expect anything to come of contacting PCNA, but I need to do it just to make myself feel better. Plus, if I don't let them know about what happened they won't have the opportunity to make good on it.

Addiction, that is some good advice. Carfax tells you it has been a CT car it's entire life, you should be able to find out who it belonged to and what dealers it was serviced at. That could go a LONG way toward getting some help from Porsche. It will take some leg work, but what do you have to lose?