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randijo · 11-23-2007, 06:09 AM

This is my first post on this forum. I wanted to tell what happened to my wife’s Boxster:

Last year I bought her a new 2006 Boxster with Tiptronic. The car now is about a year and a half old and has just over 12,000 miles on it. We live in a cold climate (Minnesota), so the car is stored in a garage from December to March. The car is never driven very hard. It has never been on the track. It hasn’t been modified in any way.

Two weeks ago my wife was driving my son to a birthday party on a Saturday. She was on the freeway when she accelerated to pass a car. Suddenly something didn’t feel right with the car. A few seconds later the “check engine” light started flashing and the car started beeping at her. A message on the instrument panel told her to get the car to a Porsche dealer immediately. She pulled off the freeway and turned the car off. After that it would not start.

She called Porsche Roadside Assistance who sent a tow truck. The car was towed to the nearest dealership (Carousel Porsche, Minnesota) where they didn’t even look at it for 3 days. They pulled the engine and started taking it apart. The service manager checked a computer readout and was able to tell that the car had not been driven in an abusive manner. He said he was able to tell it had never been over-revved. They eventually determined that there was a hole in one valve lifter which caused it to fail. This apparently led to significant engine damage.

Next the service manager told us that Porsche wanted them to take the engine apart piece by piece and catalog all the damaged parts to determine if our engine should be fixed or replaced. He described this as a tedious process, and he didn’t seem very enthusiastic about doing it. He dragged it out over several days, and eventually announced to us that Porsche had authorized replacement of our engine with a rebuilt engine. Tomorrow it will be exactly 2 weeks since the car died, and it still isn’t fixed. We’re hoping it will be done by early next week. My wife is very unhappy because these are the last few days of the driving season here in Minnesota, and she has missed them. We’ll be putting the car away for the winter again soon. The service manager’s attitude is that we should be happy that Porsche is fixing our car under warranty. My wife is now nervous about driving the car. She is afraid of taking any long trips because she is afraid of getting stranded somewhere far from home or a dealership.

I have a number of questions regarding this experience. Has anyone out there had this happen to their Boxster? It seems like the dealership has taken their sweet time repairing the car. Is that pretty common? Is a rebuilt engine going to last as long and be as good as the original engine? Is this going to reduce the future resale value of our car? Any thoughts?

11-23-2007, 06:09 AM	#1
randijo Registered User Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Minnesota Posts: 19	Blown Engine This is my first post on this forum. I wanted to tell what happened to my wife’s Boxster: Last year I bought her a new 2006 Boxster with Tiptronic. The car now is about a year and a half old and has just over 12,000 miles on it. We live in a cold climate (Minnesota), so the car is stored in a garage from December to March. The car is never driven very hard. It has never been on the track. It hasn’t been modified in any way. Two weeks ago my wife was driving my son to a birthday party on a Saturday. She was on the freeway when she accelerated to pass a car. Suddenly something didn’t feel right with the car. A few seconds later the “check engine” light started flashing and the car started beeping at her. A message on the instrument panel told her to get the car to a Porsche dealer immediately. She pulled off the freeway and turned the car off. After that it would not start. She called Porsche Roadside Assistance who sent a tow truck. The car was towed to the nearest dealership (Carousel Porsche, Minnesota) where they didn’t even look at it for 3 days. They pulled the engine and started taking it apart. The service manager checked a computer readout and was able to tell that the car had not been driven in an abusive manner. He said he was able to tell it had never been over-revved. They eventually determined that there was a hole in one valve lifter which caused it to fail. This apparently led to significant engine damage. Next the service manager told us that Porsche wanted them to take the engine apart piece by piece and catalog all the damaged parts to determine if our engine should be fixed or replaced. He described this as a tedious process, and he didn’t seem very enthusiastic about doing it. He dragged it out over several days, and eventually announced to us that Porsche had authorized replacement of our engine with a rebuilt engine. Tomorrow it will be exactly 2 weeks since the car died, and it still isn’t fixed. We’re hoping it will be done by early next week. My wife is very unhappy because these are the last few days of the driving season here in Minnesota, and she has missed them. We’ll be putting the car away for the winter again soon. The service manager’s attitude is that we should be happy that Porsche is fixing our car under warranty. My wife is now nervous about driving the car. She is afraid of taking any long trips because she is afraid of getting stranded somewhere far from home or a dealership. I have a number of questions regarding this experience. Has anyone out there had this happen to their Boxster? It seems like the dealership has taken their sweet time repairing the car. Is that pretty common? Is a rebuilt engine going to last as long and be as good as the original engine? Is this going to reduce the future resale value of our car? Any thoughts?