IMS Failure - Need Advice

[Jaxonalden]

Mark, your car is still worth some pretty good money since it's a 550. If it wasn't a 550 I was going to suggest you tow it to Porsche Cars North America Headquarters in Atlanta, light it on fire and sling shot it from behind your truck right through the front doors.

I love my car, but the way Porsche has handled this KNOWN situation with a latent defect in their IMS bearing is preposterous. :troll: I don't understand why there hasn't been a case action lawsuit because of this.

[Jake Raby]

I am contacted on at least a monthly basis by those attempting a class action and they are looking for info or an expert witness. It's usually an attorney who had an engine scatter himself. I won't even consider talking about anything to do with a court room.. No amount of money could convince me otherwise.

I have also had 60 minutes talk to me about exposing these failures after their camer man's Boxster engine failed and found its way to my facility. Nope- no part of it.

As for the original poster's failure- people forget that we repair engines post IMSB failure all the time without a full reconstruction. The work carries no warranty but we can repair engines that are considered junk by others and have never had a single one return for a round #2.

[Eric G]

I have to give props to you Jake for not going down the road so many people ask you to go. Of the two sides of this issue to be on, helping owners get through the problem of the IMS failure or repair/upgrading before a failure is far better then being on the side of throwing rocks at Porsche for this issue. Taking the high road leaves you out of the fray and preserves your business to do what you do best.

To the OP, you may find that if you are not willing to invest in rebuilding/replacing your motor that parting out the car might be a more lucrative deal in the end for you. Time consuming yes, but based on what you paid you might be able to recoup your purchase price. On the other hand...if you got the car for a great price a replacement motor could leave you in a great car in "near to new" condition. It all depends on why you have the car (daily driver or fun fill in the blank days car).

[Jaxonalden]

Originally Posted by Jake Raby

I am contacted on at least a monthly basis by those attempting a class action and they are looking for info or an expert witness. It's usually an attorney who had an engine scatter himself. I won't even consider talking about anything to do with a court room.. No amount of money could convince me otherwise.

I have also had 60 minutes talk to me about exposing these failures after their camer man's Boxster engine failed and found its way to my facility. Nope- no part of it.

As for the original poster's failure- people forget that we repair engines post IMSB failure all the time without a full reconstruction. The work carries no warranty but we can repair engines that are considered junk by others and have never had a single one return for a round #2.

Sounds like a "Why bite the hand that feeds you" answer Jake. People with failures are stuck with huge costs and you DON'T want to help them right a wrong? For those with failures I'm sure they will all say, Thanks Jake!

Eric, I don't call that "..going down the road so many people ask you to go", I call that protecting his investment.

[Jake Raby]

You don't get it...

Have any idea what would happen to the value of your car and everyone else's if the story hit 60 minutes? They'd blow it up like the Volvo story, the Jeep CJ5 story and all the others and the prices of the cars would all plummet to the point where you couldn't give them away.. They are the media and they will do anything to create the drama that excites their ratings- they don't give a single damn about you, me, Porsche or anything else.

The same goes with a class action, but its worse because the only person that is going to benefit from the win would be the slimy lawyer who arranged it. The owners of the cars won't get more than 20 bucks in the mail for owning one of the cars and prices will plummet. The Boxster would go down as "The Porsche that had the class action suit for engines blowing up". Nothing good would come from it and now the cars are all old enough that the newest IMS equipped car is well out of warranty.

I believe that mechanical issues are solved in the shop, in the lab and on the track- not in some freaking court room filled with slime balls wearing polyester suits. I put my energy into solving the issues, because you can't fix the past but you can develop fixes for the future.

The other reason I never talk to any of these people about court cases or to 60 minutes is because simply telling the truth about these engines has already labeled me as a fear monger and it gets really old really quick. I have thousands of pictures that I could post, but all they do is devalue the cars more and make people thing that we are making this into something bigger than it is to stimulate our wallets. Today we have to shut up, not share pics and just take it all in and save it for later because it has been apparent for years that the following can't handle the truth.

In short, wrenches fix engine problems, not a gavel~

[jdiba]

Why is Jake forced to come on here and defend himself constantly ? I honestly don't get it.
His company designs a solution to a very real problem (to what degree I'm not going to get in
to. All you have to do is read this forum to see the failures pop up one after another and that
is indisputable). Porsche sold a flawed product. A seriously flawed one. I for one am glad there
was a solution designed for it. What is wrong with making money ? What happened to this
country ? Making money is not an evil thing. (Although I recognize there are powers in this
country presently who would have you believe otherwise). I get that. I guess what upsets
some of you is you feel he takes advantage of it by some form of advertising ? People, you are
inundated with advertisements from the moment you open your eyes each day till you close
them at night. Its called free-enterprise. That company designed a fix to a problem of
something I own. Far as I'm concerned he has a right to advertise if he feels like it. You don't
like it ? Read something else or don't buy the solution. Porsche doesn't have to do anything
for you if your product is out of warranty. Why would Jake want to alienate Porsche ?
If someone were going to bring a Class-Action suit against Porsche, wouldn't it make
sense for it to be a group of owners as opposed to someone who designed and sells
a fix to the flaw ??!? Am I angry at Porsche for selling a product with a flaw ? Of
course. But its OWNERS that need to go after them.

[Taipanic]

I agree with Jake. Taking this to class action level would only put money in the lawyer's pockets and devalue the brand. Obviously there is an issue of bad design here but Porsche didn't design this with any malicious intent and the problem doesn't affect all motors. I have a whole house full of crap that has design and/or manufacturing flaws - either they get fixed and improved upon or they get discarded and replaced by something better.
In these days of information technology, there is no excuse for not knowing the issues for any product you are going to spend money on. There is no excuse for any Porsche owner to not know about the IMS issue and the steps that need to be taken to prevent catastrophic engine failure. I have been reading and researching the Bosxter for years. I just bought a 98 with 100k and I know it will need new belt, waterpump, and at the least an IMS Guardian ASAP. I know the risks and benefits going in. Like a lot of people here, I don't have a lot of extra money to throw into the car so I will do everything I can to keep the major issues to a minimum to my daily driver. I appreciate there are companies out there like Jake's and LN who have gone above and beyond to design and produce solutions to this flaw. Also these forums - where there are real people with real problems and real solutions and great advice shared. Without them, I would never have purchased a 986/996 or 987/997 model. As it is I already have my eye on the new Boxster for a second car in a year or two.

[BoxsterSteve]

Class action would be a terrible thing.

Could you imagine Boxsters being worth more as scrap and for parts than as running vehicles? Try to sell one if the media really hyped up this issue. No doubt it is a very real problem, but what would our cars be worth after an Audi 5000 unintended acceleration style of media coverage? Remember the Pinto? What do you think of? How about the Corvair? The list goes on. The issue is real,yes, but the media would destroy any resale value of our cars.

Having your motor grenade would be unimaginable to deal with. It would have happened to my car if I hadn't have done my pre-purchase homework . I went in with my eyes open, having researched. Google for "Boxster engine problem " or "catastrophic engine failure". There's lots of info out there. Isn't everyone reading this post on a computer and on the Internet?

I hate to say buyer beware, but it'd the sad truth, and it's no consolation to anyone whose pristine low mileage car has just popped an engine.

[coreseller]

Originally Posted by jdiba

Why is Jake forced to come on here and defend himself constantly ? I honestly don't get it..

Could not agree more. I rarely visit the board since I've sold my Boxster but the few times I have I am continually amazed at some members throwing darts Jake's way. If they truly think Jake's services or advice are bogus, ignore both.

To the OP; Mark Beardsley, man I feel for you. If it were me the choices would be simple; If I loved the car, put the money into it (my money would buy the middle of the road Raby option) and enjoy it, If totally soured towards Porsche over the experience, sell it as a roller then drink a beer or two and get over it. An expensive lesson but pissing Porsche's way isn't going to get you anywhere.

[cbbepop]

Audis and BMWs give extended warranties on known issues 10 year or 100k even on discontinued chassis: I believe the IMS issue should have long ago been dealt with in such a manner by Porsche. Not doing so have already hurt the resale value for Boxsters. But since the 986 and 987 have both been discontinued, I don't see Porsche being pressed into such actions even through a class action law suit. They sell about how many Boxsters per year? - 100? With such a number it seems like Porsche carefully allocate their funds, even if they are a luxury brand.

[Jake Raby]

Why is Jake forced to come on here and defend himself constantly ? I honestly don't get it.

.
Because its easy for people to do so. The keyboard warriors have balls the size of watermelons when behind the monitor.

I have given seminars in front of 300 Porsche enthusiasts and had Q&A sessions that lasted 45 minutes with a line 3 people wide and 75 feet long to talk to me in person before.

In the past 18 years I have had ONE PERSON say something to my face,but thousands post something negative online, none of which have been the purchasers of my products. I made an example out of that one guy and 75+ people laughed their asses off after what he said was used against him. He then left the scene like the **************************** he was and commenced to break a CV joint in the parking lot, which got him a lot more laughs and he was totally alienated.

None of it bothers me, but I have to admit that it has taught me that my info is best sold rather than given out for free.

Anyway, nothing good comes from a court room in regard to cars and engines. All the people that hate me for researching these engines and sharing what I have found don't realize that with one letter to the right people that I could single handedly devalue their car to the point that it could not be given away. The media would go crazy with it.
Instead of busting my balls they better be glad that I refuse to talk to these people and share what I know and have recorded. The opportunity has presented its self many times and I have turned it down.

[Jaxonalden]

Well it 's obvious that I'm the one with the target on his back here. I stand by my original statement.

I too will be paying a couple thousand dollars for Jakes retro bearing, and that in itself pisses me off because I have to if I want to protect my (investment) car. I should not have to do that...Porsche should pick up that cost. The fact that the company has a bad design which has cost countless fellow members on this forum ten's of thousands of dollars is BS.

I hate having a ******************** sandwich in front of me and being told I have to take a bite. I just want what's right. Jake, you are the subject matter expert. You know the weakness in their design. Yet when people ask for your help, to right the wrong the company knowingly passed to their customers, you say no. That's just hard for me to take.

[Jake Raby]

I just want what's right. Jake, you are the subject matter expert. You know the weakness in their design. Yet when people ask for your help, to right the wrong the company knowingly passed to their customers, you say no. That's just hard for me to take

Sorry. If you only knew what it was like to bust your ass researching and applying these fixes only to be called a "fear monger" you'd understand.

As I stated, the issue isn't going to be solved in a court room. Yes, it might put some of Porsches money in someone else's pocket, but the people who own the cars would get pennies of it while some fleabag law group cashes in on the big money.

I have better things to do that sitting around talking to attorneys and wasting my time in a court room. There are products to develop, classes to teach, books to write and results to be gathered.

Honestly the people on these forums and especially "the vendor haters" have hardened me to the point of being selfish. If you want to be hurt at someone because I won't help, go ******************** slap one of those ass hats.

[Jaxonalden]

Well, maybe Porsche will have a change of heart and issue a recall. Send all current owners a voucher good for $2,000 towards a Jake Raby IMS upgrade so this issue can be put to bed.

Right after that happens...pigs will fly, Hell will freeze over and the Cubs will win the World Series.

[vijen6]

Originally Posted by Jake Raby

.
Because its easy for people to do so. The keyboard warriors have balls the size of watermelons when behind the monitor.

I have given seminars in front of 300 Porsche enthusiasts and had Q&A sessions that lasted 45 minutes with a line 3 people wide and 75 feet long to talk to me in person before.

In the past 18 years I have had ONE PERSON say something to my face

Did those people in that 3 wide line pay to come talk to you or attend your the seminar Jake? I'm guess yes they paid in some way. If not entry fees then at least in travel cost.

For those who have an issue with you, probably don't want to pay to come talk crap man to man. It's not all about 'internet balls'.

Edit: for the record .. I don't have anything against your product .. in fact I do have some of them on my car .. however, I don't exactly like how much of your post most of the time is a teaser into 'arcane' knowledge that shall not be shared ( its actually amusing to me how many 'tuners' share this attitude .. even non porsche ones ) .. I'm sure keep secrets and letting people know you have them is good for business so I guess I can understand why .. maybe one day when I have $20k-$30k for one of your secret sauce engine, I'll also get to learn the secret handshake

[Eric G]

...keeping secrets is what keeps businesses going. If every business shared everything " on their how to process" they wouldn't be in existence very long. Look what happened to Kellogg and why they had to shut down their plant tours...people where stealing industry secrets.

In the age of digital communications and the instant satisfaction of "I want what I want and I want it now" mentality", forum like this unfortunately have become a battle ground when companies "create a solution to a plaguing problem.

There use to be a time when people had to think through problems and figure out solutions...now most just click a mouse and "Poof" your answer is in front of you. Jake has spent considerable time and energy developing a solution...and he did NOT do it by clicking on a mouse and asking someone to give him the answer. In developing this solution Jake has created a business, and that business has workers who have families and are supported by this process. Should he just fire his staff, close his doors and give his technology away? Short answer...No.

It is websites like this and the sponsors who keep it running and the forum members benefit and derive great insight and how to knowledge from them.

Yes Porsche is a great product and they have invested billions into making their product what it is. But with that said, all products suffer issues (some serious, some not so) and Porsche is no different.

The Boxster is a two seat not very practical car that is built for driving enjoyment but fills the bill for many as a daily driver. If you are not able to purchase the car new and obtain a warranty to cover repairs and your not very handy at repairs...your going to need someone who is able to do the work. Just like Jake...should they just give you their time and effort for free? I think not.

For all those that feel things cost to much or are not shared openly enough, try this...sit down and read the service manual and research the problem and come up with your own solution and feel free to do with it what you want.

[Jake Raby]

Look, when we started developing the solutions to these problems we were laughed at for even disassembling one of the engines. In those days a brand new engine cost 5-7K and it was considered a total waste of time to even think about repairing one... Well thats what everyone else thought, but not what we saw.

Today that has all paid off, not just for us but also to each of you. How? We were able to learn enough that we can now work with companies like Worldpac to enhance their training programs to offer classes to independent technicians all over the US and Canada.

The majority of those that are here that use an Indy shop can take advantage of what we have learned and shared through these classes, one of which I am preparing for today. Its coming up in San Rafael California on June 23&24.

That said in my early days I made a lot of mistakes and divulged too much. After having info copied and pasted from my website to only be used against me later by someone who tried to be our competitor I have learned that there is no such thing as free information. From 2001 through 2007 I averaged an expenditure of 100K/ year in R&D costs, none of which were shared with anyone other than LN Engineering. Last time I checked none of you here had sent us a contribution for the cause, so I can't see how you can complain about us not sharing everything we know with you online for free? Why do we owe anyone this information? Hell, in the past month we have spent over 15K in further testing of the IMS Solution by making some very risky changes and forcing the component to fail just so we can see what happens and how the engine responds to a full blown failure. In the past 3 weeks we have purposely presented challenges to the product that we knew would kill it and have pulled the engine completely apart and reassembled it 4 times in the past 3 weeks just to see what was damaged and how severely.

Did those people in that 3 wide line pay to come talk to you or attend your the seminar Jake? I'm guess yes they paid in some way. If not entry fees then at least in travel cost.

For those who have an issue with you, probably don't want to pay to come talk crap man to man. It's not all about 'internet balls'.

Actually you have assumed incorrectly. What I was referring to were "tech talks" and etc given to PCA groups, at events and etc where there was no price of admission. Those in attendance might have paid to be at the event to show their car or etc but none paid me, nor was I paid by the show for the talks. Most of them were just attending the event that I was at and many didn't even know I was going to offer the talk until it was announced at the show.

I only charge four my engine rebuild school here at my facility and I doubt that anyone is going to pay 1500 bucks to argue with the instructor, knowing they'd find their way off my property in about 30 seconds if they did. I am paid by Worldpac to be an Instructor for their WTI program and the technicians that attend my classes are very respectful of what we have done and how it has been accomplished. Many of them have a true understanding of what is required to truly develop these fixes, where many here can't even fathom it.

I'll continue to learn and add "the secrets" to my journal. I am hoping to finish my "M96 engine assembly guide" over this summer. If buying what we have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and years of our lives to learn pisses anyone off, then they can go buy a Kia.

[Delgesu]

Originally Posted by vijen6

Did those people in that 3 wide line pay to come talk to you or attend your the seminar Jake? I'm guess yes they paid in some way. If not entry fees then at least in travel cost.

For those who have an issue with you, probably don't want to pay to come talk crap man to man. It's not all about 'internet balls'.

Edit: for the record .. I don't have anything against your product .. in fact I do have some of them on my car .. however, I don't exactly like how much of your post most of the time is a teaser into 'arcane' knowledge that shall not be shared ( its actually amusing to me how many 'tuners' share this attitude .. even non porsche ones ) .. I'm sure keep secrets and letting people know you have them is good for business so I guess I can understand why .. maybe one day when I have $20k-$30k for one of your secret sauce engine, I'll also get to learn the secret handshake

Secrets?

If you want Jake's 'secrets', take his class. I'm sure he'll be more than be happy to educate you from knowledge that he's acquired over the years. But you'll have to pay for his class, and so you should!

Im a long time lurker, newbie poster, and I have no affiliation with flat 6.

It just irks me when people feel that they are entitled to get intellectual property for free.

[vijen6]

In my post I did mention "I'm sure keep secrets and letting people know you have them is good for business so I guess I can understand why" but I guess people didn't read that part.

I perfectly understand why Jake keeps his secrets. Its good business. The teases that he post on numerous other thread without providing actual concrete answer is also good business. Though that is annoying to me as someone searching for answer to certain questions, I completely understand it, and don't fault him for being a business man.

However, its not what Jake leaves out and keep secret that annoys me most. Its the way he phrase certain things. For example the 60 minute thing ..

"Have any idea what would happen to the value of your car and everyone else's if the story hit 60 minutes? They'd blow it up like the Volvo story, the Jeep CJ5 story and all the others and the prices of the cars would all plummet to the point where you couldn't give them away.. They are the media and they will do anything to create the drama that excites their ratings- they don't give a single damn about you, me, Porsche or anything else."

To me that sounds like he's saying hey, I'm actually doing you guys a favor by hiding your dirty laundry so be grateful, but that's not quite true. His website already makes it clear to anyone that can google re: the severity of this issue in our car. So basically, the way I see it, Jake is okay with telling everyone on the interweb re: our IMS issue, but telling 60 minutes is going to kill our resell price. I would argue that the internet has a bigger audience than 60 minutes so he's not doing us any real favor.

Anyways, like I said, he's not the only tuner I've seen on forums with this 'quirk', so maybe its a flaw that comes along with 'genius'. Perhaps its even me mis-reading his intentions since sarcasm and tones don't translate well to text all the time.

I've bought products from him in the past and probably will continue to buy them if / when I need it. Maybe even take his engine rebuilding class if / when I can afford to. However, I'll most likely also continue to roll my eyes when I read his future posts on this forum.

[Jake Raby]

To me that sounds like he's saying hey, I'm actually doing you guys a favor by hiding your dirty laundry so be grateful, but that's not quite true. His website already makes it clear to anyone that can google re: the severity of this issue in our car. So basically, the way I see it, Jake is okay with telling everyone on the interweb re: our IMS issue, but telling 60 minutes is going to kill our resell price. I would argue that the internet has a bigger audience than 60 minutes so he's not doing us any real favor.

You sure are concerned with trying to figure me out~

That said the pictures of failed components on my site is less than 20, the total of my database of component pics is over 11,000.

If I wanted to obliterate these vehicles and engines I'd post every single one of them.
Want a sample? Here ya go.


I believe that the major reason most people bust our balls is because they see our businesses flourishing while the rest of the economy is broke and most of them are broke and can't afford to repair their car. They all feel that we took advantage of a niche market. They fail to realize that we see engines from all over the world because we took the time to research and become proficient with these engines when no one else was willing to.