Any Porsche exec's listening?

[Lil bastard]

I dunno, personally, I don't think trying to let Porsche off the hook for poor engine design by intimating that they may be coming to the owners rescue in a confidential manner holds much water - arguement-wise.

It's probably more fair to say that they simply turn a deaf ear, especially to 2nd and 3rd owners when they are fully aware of the shortcomings of this engine series. And, I'd speculate that their 'support' is much more readily available to 911 owners than the economy model Boxster owners.

If any other car manufacturer tried to continue selling a poor design, they wouldn't last 3 years, let alone 12. But Porsche seems to be able to borrow on their past reputation to keep finding new suckers out there. I think that says more about us than them.

It'll be interesting to see how they change in what I expect to be a crash in Cayenne sales (the only product sales which have been continually growing) in light of the current (and not soon to end) crisis in fuel costs. Maybe they'll actually have to address the needed changes in engine design if they want to produce anything more than volkswagens in the future.

[Topless]

Sad but true... Second owner, beyond the warranty period you are 99.99% S.O.L. The same is true of Ford, Chevy, Toyota, Nissan, etc. etc.

[Brucelee]

Originally Posted by Topless

Sad but true... Second owner, beyond the warranty period you are 99.99% S.O.L. The same is true of Ford, Chevy, Toyota, Nissan, etc. etc.

Well, yes and no.

For example, Toyota did an extended warranty deal on its engines.

Acura and Honda ditto on its transmissions.

These companies had design flaws and took the right step.

I don't see Porsche ever doing that.

[Topless]

Originally Posted by Brucelee

Well, yes and no.

For example, Toyota did an extended warranty deal on its engines.

Acura and Honda ditto on its transmissions.

These companies had design flaws and took the right step.

I don't see Porsche ever doing that.

Some are better than others. Chevy laughed when two of my 305 V8 fleet pickups developed flat cams at 32000mi and 35000mi. Original owner, 30k warranty period, flawless service records. Ford said "Go Fish" when a V6 would not pass a compression test at 56k... original owner, 48k warranty period. I have been buying Toyota's ever since.

Extended warranties are great when MFG flaws are discovered but rarely go beyond the original owner. Maybe someday Porsche will see value in this.

[TriGem2k]

Chevy Trannys have no problem going out at 60k miles. Chevy has known about this since 94-95 and still won't do anything about it.

[senna21]

I think Autofarm in the UK estimates that about 5-10% of the 996/Boxster engines wind up having a some form of major engine issue.

Good reading here.

http://www.autofarm.co.uk/pdf/Total911_July06.pdf
http://www.autofarm.co.uk/pdf/911PW_Apr06.pdf

I'd love to get a Boxster S and sell my MR2 Turbo but the engine failures just scare the h@ll out of me.

I'm sorry to hear about your poor misfortune 2001saxster but I doubt you'll get any kind of compensation.

Do you know if it was the oil to air separator that failed or was it the dreaded cylinder wall failure. I also know of a gentleman on Rennlist that bought a second hand Boxster at a dealer for his wife and the engine ate itself within two weeks. He bit the bullet and just bought a crate motor from Porsche. I think it was $10K out the door and had everything ready to go in. The only items I don't think it had was the flywheel and A/C compressor. His failure was caused by the oil pump gear digging into the housing and eventually a large chunk of metal caused it to size up.

Good luck.

[blinkwatt]

Porsche doesn't care about customers if the car is out of warranty period. Check Rennlist,MANY people have had their 996 3.4L engine go out.....Porsche has done nothing.

[renzop]

Chrysler mini-vans have notoriously faulty transmissions. They fail often and at low mileage. The problem existed for at least 10 model years. I have had 2 friends who between them have owned 4. All 4 had transmission problems after warranty was out but before 75K miles. Chrysler never lifted a finger.

[kabel]

Sorry to hear about your situation, this may be a good place to vent but i doubt any PCNA executive has spent quality, if any time on this forum. What you may be able to find here is moral support and a knowledge base for others in your position. There are a few discussions in this forum that might interest you, here are two:

Poll: RMS and Engine problem questionnaire

Shortlived Boxster engines survey

And if you have not done so already, head over to Rennlist.com & Renntech.org. There you will find even more information and other experiences and recommendations on this subject.

Best of luck to you.

[Kirk]

Would Chevy replace a blown engine on a 7 year old used car? Unlikely. How about Ford? I think it's pretty doubtful that Porsche will step up to the plate, but darn right it's worth a shot and I would try my best to professionally present my case to them.

With cars like this though I would definitely try to keep a little slush fund set aside in case major repairs are needed. These cars are expensive to fix and sooner or later they will need to be repaired in one way or another. I think that's just a given with a highly tuned performance car like what Porsche makes.

One of my co-workers likes to live large. He's thus always tried to own a 911 - even if it was a used one that he could barely afford. Good for him - living the dream. But when pushing your budget like that it's hard to always keep living that dream. He was winding the car out and dropped a valve - CRUNCH! He took the car to an independent shop where he waited three months for the engine to get rebuilt. Then the car sat there for another year because he couldn't pay the bill. Eventually he had to sell the car off at a great loss to a friend who could pay the bill. A couple years later I saw him again with another 911. Hopefully he learned this time and had a little slush fund set aside just for the car so that he could hold on to this one.

[pbanders]

Originally Posted by Kirk

One of my co-workers likes to live large. He's thus always tried to own a 911 - even if it was a used one that he could barely afford. Good for him - living the dream. But when pushing your budget like that it's hard to always keep living that dream.

One of my personal "life lessons" is to never own anything that I can't afford to keep up or replace. You see people all the time who buy Porsches and then flip out when they find out what it takes to keep them going.

Same thing's true of home ownership, but at about a 10X expense level