2006-2008 IMS bearing design opinions

[texomawaves]

I understand this bearing fails less, but is non-serviceable. Any opinions on the IMSB in these 3 years? Reason I ask is I am thinking of selling my 98 high mileage box for a newer low mileage box.

[husker boxster]

Buy it and don't worry about it. According to stats in the IMS lawsuit, the larger design fails at approx. 1% rate.

As far as options, there are several. Direct Oil Feed is one. And there's a guy on Planet-9 who has developed a system where he drills a hole just larger than the IMS so he can pull the bearing w/o tearing the engine in half. He replaces the IMS bearing w/ a more robust version. He has 30K+ mi on his experiment so far. YMMV.

I have magnetic drain plugs on both my 987.1s. That's my protection policy. That and changing my oil every 4-5K mi. I have 46K on the LE and 40K on the CSS. Work issues interrupt my sleep more than 2 IMS cars in my garage.

[jdraupp]

It is Jake Rabys experience that the only 987s you want to avoid are the ones that are heavily tracked. Where the 986 bearing survive longer the harder they are driven and tracked and the garage queens die young, the large bearing is the opposite.

[Smallblock454]

To be honest and if your budget will allow it i only would go with a 2009 with the new engines. 2.9 without DFI would be my choice. These seems to be robust engines that don't make big problems. And if you find a manual without PDK you won't have extra large expenses for the PDK in the future.

Regards
Markus

[itsnotanova]

Don't quote me on this but I think guys are taking off the cover and removing the seal so oil can get up in the bearing.

[husker boxster]

Originally Posted by jdraupp

It is Jake Rabys experience that the only 987s you want to avoid are the ones that are heavily tracked.

It's not so much the IMS that fails if heavily tracked. There are issues with oil starvation and bore scoring and rod bolt failures. However, there are ways to prevent these items AND they require certain sequences to occur to create the problems. 'Heavily tracked' generally means R Comp tires and serious mods. Once again, 1 incident and the Internet blows up like a North Korean missile assuming everyone's 987 is going to fail.

They debate 987 IMS failure on P-9 all the time. There's a 12+ pg thread on it that's been alive for 3-4 yrs. Ya know how many confirmed IMS failures there are in that thread? 1. But the hysteria lives on. A guy put up a WTB ad looking for a Cayman with a blown engine. 3 mo later he's still looking. If there are sooo many engine failures, why can't he find one? There must be 1000s of them out there if they're blowing up all the time.

Don't get caught up in the hysteria.

My agenda for the next 2 weekends:
2 day DE at my local track
3 day DE at COTA

[JFP in PA]

Originally Posted by husker boxster

But the hysteria lives on.

I wouldn't bet on that, we have seen them fail, and more than once.

[Giller]

ANYTHING can fail - so there will no doubt be some IMS failures even on the bigger bearing. It will happen - but the odds are extremely low from what we have in evidence so far.
I would still encourage going 2009+ if it's in the budget.

[Gelbster]

Originally Posted by texomawaves

I understand this bearing fails less, but is non-serviceable. Any opinions on the IMSB in these 3 years? Reason I ask is I am thinking of selling my 98 high mileage box for a newer low mileage box.

It is serviceable and the entire machining process has been posted on video here. It got a lot of ridicule and dismissive comments. The vendor was unable or uninterested in addressing any of the legitimate concerns.
I wish I had taken Smallblock's advice - it would have been cheaper in the end.

[Jake Raby]

Service the engine every 6 months/ 5K miles.

This is all you need to do in our direct experience. With a decade of time in service the M97 diameter IMSB has proven effective in every application except track service. Why? The larger diameter of the bearing has increased surface speed of the balls and cage, which are outside the optimum rating when sustained RPM exists.

We have seen TWO M97 IMSB failures from all time street cars in the past decade.

All the products I developed for the M97 were a waste of time, and few of them hit the market, all of those that did make it to the market were aimed toward engines requiring a full tear down, and build. The IMS Solution can be fitted to the M97 shaft with these developments, and thats one example.

Just drive it, and change the oil. Don't add anything else, all you'll do is create another problem.

[geraintthomas]

There's a guy on here with 300,000+ on his Boxster, and he didn't even know what an IMS bearing was. As said, anything can fail. The way I see some people worry about it I'm surprised they walk out their front door in the mornings for fear they'd get run over by a steam roller.

Someone said that its the equivalent of plane crashes. They're EXTREMELY rare but when they happen, everyone and their mums will hear about it. It's very, very rare. Don't garage queen it, drive it the way it was designed to be driven and things like that potentially won't fail at all.

[2speed]

On that note My S is an 01 . I live in Michigan the car came from Atlanta. Four years ago.
She now has 140k. And I hope for another 100K . It is not abused but it is used as intended. Frequently. Recently changed sway bar bushings lower control arm. And drop links . The only part on the front end that was actually bad after 15 years was the drop links... Remarkable for any car....

I highly recommend spending a little more for some nice drop links that is a hard working part.
I felt bad I did not look at my IMS when my clutch was replaced last year..
Drive it enjoy it and hope for the best.