Autoweek Words on IMS
 

Dutch Mandel just posted an interesting commentary on the Autoweek Daily Drive page:

Porsche class action suit, Autoweek column - Autoweek

Thanks for the heads up, Riverside. My 04 Boxter S fell victim at 10-years, 42-days and 52,000 miles. I'll use this in affecting my $7,000 worth of revenge via social media.

TO HELP OTHERS OUT incase its still clugee:

IMS problem
Porsche IMS Bearing Failure Explained - YouTube

The IMS Solution
The IMS Solution - YouTube

The LN Engineering IMS Retrofit Kit for MY97-05 Porsche Boxster and 911 Models
IMS Retrofit | The LN Engineering IMS Retrofit Kit for MY97-05 Porsche Boxster and 911 Models

The Porsche Boxster 986 Enthusiast Guide: Intermediate Shaft (IMS) Bearing Info and Fixes

Also worth considering, IMO, is the DOF (direct oil feed) for Porsche IMS bearings developed by TuneRS Motorsports and also sold, with various replacement bearings, by pedrosgarage:

TechnoFix DOF


TuneRS Motorsports | PORSCHE PERFORMANCE, PARTS, REPAIR, RESTORATION AND MOTORSPORTS FACILITY

Makes perfect sense to me and, for the later, larger single-row IMS bearing equipeed 987's, a great way to get lubrication to a bearing that cannot be replaced without tearing down the engine. The price ($799.99 plus shipping) seems quite fair, as does the price and the choices available for upgraded replacement bearings for the earlier engines.

Although I have decided to wait until I need to replace the clutch on my dual-row bearing engine, this is the route I plan to take.

Brad

P.S. Yes I know, some will complain that there has not been extensive testing over a number of years and a huge number of miles to 'prove' the efficacy of this system. Frankly, I believe that this is unrealistic as:

1. There are a great many cars (in fact the vast majority) with their original IMS bearings and no failures. Not surprisingly, it took Porsche a number of years themselves to discover the problem with their sealed single-row bearings. How many yeears and how many miles of testing would be required in order to satisfy the doubters?
2. Direct oil feed to bearings is hardly new technology - in fact it is the norm. Where Porsche failed was in using a 'sealed' bearing containing grease in a high heat, relatively high load situation. From various tear-downs, it seems that if (or according to some, when) the seal fails, in some cases the oil washes out the grease leaving only a small amount of rancid oil/grease insufficient to lubricate the bearing. In other cases, it seems that if enough splash oil is able to get through the failed seal, the bearing can last indefinitely. Many who have removed their original bearings have found that while the seal had failed, there seemed to be a fair amount of oil in the bearing and no signs of play, scoring or other significant wear.
3. The upshot of this is that with adequate lubrication (and pressure feed is clearly better than splash in various driving conditions), there is no reason to believe that the bearing should not last as long (or longer) than any other engine component. Put in a new bearing (the OEM SKF has proven adequate in the majority of cars, even without pressure lubrication), or an upgraded ceramic (again, no real side by side testing, but ceramic is clearly stronger than steel), install direct oil feed and whatever problems your car develops, logic and experience dictate that the IMS bearing should not be one of them.

Why does the author claim that it concerns US produced Porsches only? It´s the same flawed IMS design for the Stuttgart produced vehicles.

Thanks for posting that, this guy knows what he's talking about, a must see.

Porsche's IMS bearing explained Intelligently

<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/hzUq2DFpeKw?feature=player_detailpage" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Haz, there were no US produced Porsche 986/987/996 models. The lawsuit only applies to cars SOLD in the USA, since that is where the litigation was brought and is being settled. Of course, the IMS bearing problem is one that exists with these models no matter where they were sold, but the rest of the world are left out for this reason. Understand that its not just other continents - it also does not apply to cars originally sold elsewhere in North America - eg. Canada or Mexico.

Brad

Really? I was sure Porsche had a production facility some where in America.. So, all Porsche sold around the world are made in Stuttgart? Sorry for OT..

edit* Boxster and Cayman production was outsourced to Valmet Automotive in Finland from 1997 to 2011, and in 2012 production moved to Germany.[53]

Porsche - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(53) Porsche

Only Headquarters in US, cars are built in Germany, but they are looking to move the plant to China where VW's Audi are being built for 2014

Porsche to Build New U.S. Headquarters in Georgia's Aerotropolis
New Complex Near Atlanta to House Nearly All U.S. Porsche Operations Under One Roof, Including Test Track

It seems there are too many theories and anecdotes but no actual scientific study. It's a big toss-up regarding the IMS issue.

theories and anecdotes are unecessary in the first place. Simply swap out the original IMS and your worry comes to a screeching halt.

In the years since the improved bearings have become available, I can't recall a single member on this or any other forum coming back to say that they did the swap and their engine still exploded. Not a single one.

if people put this much time and energy into worrying about the water pump and oil changes, Jake Raby himself has said he'd have two cars sitting in his parking lot awaiting repair.

Dumb question?
 

If your Boxster has already had the LN retro fit completed, can you still benefit from adding the DOF as described by Pedro? Or is that "belt and suspenders" approach that is not necessary? Do ceramic ball bearings as in the LN bearing benefit from this direct oil injection?

LN bearings require that it be at least inspected after 50k miles if i'm not mistaken. So I would say yes belt and suspenders. But something to consider at your next clutch change. This is good news for anyone driving 05 1/2 thru 08 Boxster /Carrera.

There are thousands of cars running ceramic. DOF sounds good to me. And there is also the solution. There are options out there. :cheers:

Actually ...
 

... Porsche built only 10% of the Boxsters in Germany (Stuttgart). the other 90% were built in Finland in the city of Uusikaupunki. 100% of the 996s are built in Stuttgart.
You can tell where your car was built by looking at your VIN.
If the 11th character is an S it was built in Stuttgart.
If the 11th character is a U, it was built in Uusikaupunki.

Happy Boxstering,
Pedro

Not the case for their double row bearings. And since the single row bearing is/has being phased out by LNE in favor of their no bearing unit, the single row unit is not a going forward issue for new installs.

My guess is that you might want to do the DOF modification if you have an LNE single row bearing. Seems to me that it would extend the life beyond 50K miles. But LNE or Flat6 should probably be consulted first.

At the end of the day the whole IMS debacle seems to be one of simple oil starvation, the DOF attacks the root cause cause of this miscalcualtion by Porsche rather than fortifying the bearing itself to better withstand the oil starvation. Or do the no bearing upgrade. You have many options, anyone staying up at night over this simply needs to do any of these clever fixes and quit worrying.

Yup, saw the stats on the wikipage for the Boxster. Mine is a German import, so Stuttgart.

I'd like to give Dutch Mandel and AutoWeek some big time kudo's for having the balls to call out Porsche on this issue.

Where are the editorials from the Porsche insiders like PCA's Panorama? Or Excellence? ......Hello? Buhler?

If he was trying to help the public and existing owners he should've made mention of fixes that have been available for the IMS issue for some time now.

If this is the first you're hearing of this issue you probably come away thinking that the IMS is a terminal disease.

Excellence probably should have blasted Porsche but at least they have covered the work by Jake Raby at Flat6, LNE and others extensively. And that's far more useful to the next owner or an existing one since its points toward the direction of preventing a huge expense.

it almost seem to me like the author intentionally left out the bearing upgrade options or the direct oil feed to heighten the drama.

Does anyone know how many Boxster they sold b/t 1996 and 2008? over 500,000 units?

"having the balls to call out Porsche" is not surprising, bc Porsche is just like any other sport car, there's really nothing really outstanding when compared to other makers.

Porsche engine is not rocket but I believe they make things more complex than it should be, and thats where Porsched get ridiculed.

Has Porsche been making good engines? probably not because they completely redesign the engine w/o the IMS, it's direct cam drive now, much like Subaru Boxer H6. Ibelieve they completely change their mentality regarding placing the IMS b/t the crank and cam or not.

Has Porsche been making good car? Definitely yes!

No, not over 500K units. I can't find the source again, but I've read that 243K sold from 1997-2012.

TO

By mid 2009 Porsche had produced 200K. I believe 160K 986's were produced before the 987 came out in 2005. By mid 2011 they were up up to 300K.... **but** since the the Boxster and Cayman are really the same car (simply a variant like a 911 Cab and a 911 hardtop Carrera) Porsche did not separate them in reporting sales -- to further underline that this is essentially one car. Calling them Boxsters and Caymans is simply Porsche marketing spin that everyone adopts for no good reason.
So in my opinion they should be considered as one car when discussing sales, again no ever separates 911 Cab from 911 Coupe when talking sales.


From a Planet9 Post.
Production 2005/2006
Boxster: 14,383 Units
Cayman: 16,297 Units

Production 2006/2007:
Boxster: 11,727 Units
Cayman: 14,985 Units

I may be wrong on this, but I understand that they will be making a double row bearing kit for the single row engine.

Considering the serious consequences of an IMS failure this should warrant a recall. However, a recall means that Porsche should have a solution for the problem, which they don't. They have responded to the class lawsuit by offering a 'reasonable solution' that severely limits their responsibilities, which makes it possible for them to make it legally through the lawsuit but also limits their damages. Keep in mind that even when they would have a solution that this would cost at least $1,000 per recalled car, that quickly adds up to a couple of hundred million bucks.
If we would assume that they would be so nice to replace any engine that has had an IMS failure then this would still add up to a couple of tens of millions of dollars. So, if you would be the boss of Porsche, what would you do?

Note that I'm not defending Porsche, I think they are handling this in a despicable way, but that's what you get when bean counters run the show.

There is a solution. There are several actually. And at least one has been available to owners from the aftermarket since 2009 or maybe sooner, I forget.

IMHO the minute your car is out of warranty, since 2010, it's on you to address this issue. At this point all single row bearing cars have been out of warranty anywhere between 4 to 13 years. And to my knowledge there has never been a inventory shortage of LNE or Pelican IMS bearings. Probably because most haven't kept up with the most widely discussed issue of the Porsche engine.

However for the engines that failed before the aftermarket solutions were common place procedure, then Porsche should pony up rebuilt engines 100% simply for reputation, probably peanuts to them anyway. I think this gesture would have sent a very clear signal to owners and prospective owners that once the warranty runs out, an owner needs to stay informed by calling a independent mechanic, doing a Google search on the issue, etc. IMO if the aftermarket provides a solution for an out-of-warranty car issue then manufacturer's blame has to be reduced significantly.

We can all agree that, for a very long time, Porsche made a huge mistake of using a roller bearing on the IMS. As someone pointed out to me from this forum that the new 9A1 engine does NOT have IMS; they completely deleted it. This drastic design change made me to believe that they made a serious mistake of using the IMS over decades. Porsche saw the problem and was trying to remedy the bearing problem and I believe the best solution is to delete the IMS to avoid using the roller bearing.

The bottom line to the IMS issue is the pride of a company, there's no question in anybody's mind that placing an intermediate shaft b/t the crank and cams was not the best idea; it maybe a very good idea but not the best! Although Porsche had many reason to use IMS as part of their engine design but overall as a product, it's a bad design when you have catastrophic failure. Porsche should at least honor recalls on engine with 100K miles or less. No company out there with sport cars that I've seen in the last two decades have engine fail like this.

Recalls are recall, it should not factor in the level of efforts required to fix/repair/replace it. Look at the top car maker in the world, Toyota, and they have hundreds of TSB and recalls in the last few decades across Lexus, Scion, and Toyota. They address big and small things.

do you mean the nature of the failure or the quantity of catastrophic failures?
The latter is nearly impossible to determine because of non-existent complete and reliable reporting.

If anything, its all the other ways that the engine can fail that should be getting more attention since there are no low cost, premptive repairs for those like there is for the IMS bearing. Or that Porsche never stressed the importance of staying on top of the engine cooling with other preemptive repairs and maintenance, or that they recommended oil intervals that many believed were very inadequate. It's like we all spend our time talking about the least likely mode of failure (since it can be addressed).

The ballpark estimate puts Porsche's image problem in perspective to its business problem.

Imagine if Porsche paid up to fully compensate all those who suffered IMS failures and retrofitted all other Boxsters. The payout would be huge. At $10,000 a replacement and $1500 per retrofit. Porsche would have to shell out over $300 million. That about one-third of 2011 net profit available for distribution to shareholders.

http://986forum.com/forums/uploads01...1379970293.gif

Isn't $300mil is like chump change for Porsche?

According to their annual report for 2011, they had 1.5 billion in net profit

1.5 billion in profit with IIRC a bit less than half reinvested in the company and a bit more than half paid to shareholders. So it's not chump change as far as shareholders are concerned.

Does anyone have any real data on this IMS issue? How prevalent is the issue? I am looking to buy a S but frankly this issue has put me off somewhat.

Depends on the year of the car. Look 3 post up from your post, that's a chart from Porsche. I wouldn't buy one again. Nothing like knowing every time I start the motor I could have complete engine destruction with no warning.

There is a $2000 aftermarket solution to this problem. IF you think a 12 year old car won't need some mechanical work, then you aren't realistic.

IF you can't afford the $2K, then you shouldn't be buying this car in the first place.

IF you let this minor issue put you off from buying a Porsche, then you are making a mistake.



/

If you are referring to the IMS, then I would say that this fear is real but can be put to rest in just one day at any reputable Porsche mecahnic's shop to do the LNE or Pelican retrofit or look into the DOF option. And if you want an early warning, the aftermarket has that covered to with the LNE's Guardian that goes on your dash. Worrying about is unecessary because this is one failure that you can actually do something about.

Ideally, these car is for hardcore enthusiast that do the repair themselves or for those that have deep pocket to have a shop work on it. If I were to buy another boxster/cayman (first or second gen), I would need to invest in a car lift before I commit. I would at least inspect the IMSB every other years to ensure that it's working properly.

Working on these car w/o a car lift, mid-engine or rear-engine (911), requires a lot of patience because everything is so compacted and the location of the engine makes it a challege to work on.

I agree but I would NOT recommend people to use the LNE or Pelican retrofit. Those are just as good (or bad) as the OEM. Pelican nor LNE makes no guaranteed of performance, according to their websites; who would, right? Remember OEM IMSB have been reported with >100K miles by many.

I believe the DOF could be a very good solution.

Anyone want to buy my car? 2003 S with 105k miles on it and Triptronic trans.

arguable. In the 3-4 years since the aftermarket options have become available, and across the various Porsche forums, I can't recall a single person who did the upgrade and came back to report an engine failure. Not a single one. In fact, I'm not sure I can think of any other product that you can buy for a Porsche today that never had a person post a complaint after the job was done. Neither Pelican nor LNE.

Point is to take the orginal one out at some point, sooner if its the single bearing unit. And with most things in Porsche world, if you have to replace a known weak spot, replace it with something better and in the case of the LNE unit it is in fact a much better spec'd unit over stock. Even if the bearing is not the root cause of the issue its still a critical engine component that should show signs of development, not unlike your coolant cap. And if you go with the LNE Solution, you remove ball bearings from the equation entirely which pretty much means you never have to service the bearing or need to worry about oil feed issues ever again. Sure its expensive but welcome to Porsche world where parts are expensive on the following days: M-F, Saturday and Sundays.

I must say that I am in complete agreement with Perfectlap on this. Lets look at this in context: The problems themselves happened in only 8 % of cars with single-row bearings and less than 1% in cars with double-row bearings. Keep in mind that this is regardless of mileage, age and maintenance schedules - and that it seems clear that cars with frequent oil changes are much less likely to have a failure. If despite what are pretty good odds at avoiding failure on all cars (and exceptionally good on dual-row bearing IMS cars with frequent oil changes) you are still worried, then pay for an upgrade and/or or the LN 'solution, or DOF. Considering the relatively low cost at present for 986's and early 987's, for many it will be relatively cheap, but worthwhile insurance to take into consideration when you buy the car. At least this is a problem that is predictable (and most mechanical problems on cars cannot be predicted with any certainly as no stats are available from the manufacturer); it is also a problem for which there are fixes available.

Brad

There are certain things that maintenance effort is acceptable, but regarding something that's an important component of the engine rotating assembly should not be acceptable. Look at the industry, who expect to directly maintain their rotating assembly? NOBODY!