Want to buy a Boxster, but I'm Afraid..very afraid! - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners

02-01-2005, 04:25 PM

it all depends on how the person drives it like any car.
All boxsters are made the same, its the idiots who mess about with engines and upgrades who cause the problem.
Some will disagree but its the truth, mess about with the engine and pay the price... If you read these posts about engine failure ect... its down the owner or the prevoius owner.

Boxsters are not probe to faults... I bought my boxster new in 1998 and never had ANY major problems.. I know many other UK owners also who have never had any problems and the only people who have are on internet forums.
Dont take to much to heart about boxsters having major engine failure ect.... If you see a boxster thats looks to good to be true then walk away...

Also anyone who says stay away from the 1997 -1999 is talking rubbish....

Brucelee · 02-01-2005, 05:25 PM

I think it is fair to say that there is no reliable external data to answer your question. Certainly, you can lose a motor in a Box, like any other car. It IS more expensive to replace/repair the Box motor than say, a Honda Civic.

My experience is that the car can be very relaible if taken care of and driven properly. The issue with a pre-owned Box is that this takes some attention on the part of the buyer to insure he/she is buying the right Box.

Most of the Boxsters I sell come with the balance of the factory warranty. This provides some protection from big ticket items and if you have the funds, this is certainly a way to go. At the end of the warranty, you then need to decide if you go naked, sell the car, or buy an extended warranty.

Overall, if you want the Box, I say go for it, but buy with caution from someone you trust. If you want to call me, I can tell you how I go about buying my Boxsters for resale. Caution and diligence is the watch word here.

Good luck and thanks for posting!

jonomo · 02-01-2005, 05:35 PM

Brucelee...

I just emailed ya today... I use to live down in SD last year... If i had known I woulda stopped by your place.!

Brucelee · 02-01-2005, 07:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jonomo

Brucelee...

I just emailed ya today... I use to live down in SD last year... If i had known I woulda stopped by your place.!

Great. If I can help, I will be most pleased~

Perfectlap · 02-01-2005, 08:12 PM

BruceLee,
would you recommend a service contract for a 2000 Boxster with only 12,000 miles?
I passed on the plan they tried to sell me on at the Acura dealership where I bought the Boxster. The previous owner traded it in for a CL or something.
The service records only included one oil change and something electrical I think.
I asked for more but they said that was all it had done.

aglsteven · 02-01-2005, 08:41 PM

Jonomo,

There were a few issues with 97 and 98 Boxsters engines. I bought my 98 Boxster in 2003 and it has its second engine in it. By the time they are this age, if anything major is going to go wrong, it will have already happened.
Typical things that go wrong with Boxsters are:
Hood retracting cables snap.
Air mass sensors need replacing.

Servicing a Boxster is going to cost more than a Golf, but my garage tells me he doesn't like Boxsters because they rarely go wrong

He likes late 70's to early 90's 911 'cos he gets to do $9000 engine rebuilds on them all the time.

I get the impression that the 2.7L Boxsters from 2000 onwards have had most of the bugs ironed out of them, as well as better low-end torque, equipment and power. Probably worth spending up to one of these if you are concerned

jonomo · 02-02-2005, 10:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aglsteven

There were a few issues with 97 and 98 Boxsters engines. I bought my 98 Boxster in 2003 and it has its second engine in it. By the time they are this age, if anything major is going to go wrong, it will have already happened.

If you're already on your second engine, then that shows me that the motors are not very reliable. I don't think you should have to switch out a motor on a car thats less than 10 years old. That means I should expect to switch out the motor every 5~7 years. That doesn't help me at all. Maybe I'll get the S2000... so ugly, but very reliable!

Brucelee · 02-02-2005, 05:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Perfectlap

BruceLee,
would you recommend a service contract for a 2000 Boxster with only 12,000 miles?
I passed on the plan they tried to sell me on at the Acura dealership where I bought the Boxster. The previous owner traded it in for a CL or something.
The service records only included one oil change and something electrical I think.
I asked for more but they said that was all it had done.

On this car with that mileage, the service history sounds about right. For the future, I would do an oil change (Mobil 1 of course!) every 7500 miles, not 15K as the manual says. Assuming you drive prudently, this should keep your engine internals intact.

The issue of a service contract is thorny at best. Much depends on the following variables:

What is your risk profile, that is, how well do you respond to planned vs unplanned expenses? A service contract is simply an insurance contract which takes your money before an event happens and in fact, may not happen. On the other hand, it protects you when it does and more so if the costs are higher than otherwise expected.

Some folks love to buy insurance, others never do!

The second variable is the contract itself. What does it cover and how is the company about paying. From my understanding, if that SC was actually underwritten by Acura, they are pretty good about paying. That said, you have to read the contract carefully to see what you are getting.

On the Box, the big ticket items would include a total engine (unlikely for sure), clutch, trans and rear main seal. Less costly are other seals and gaskets and of course, electronics.

I wish I could just answer for you but as you can see, it really is very individual indeed, just like how we all like to personalize our Boxsters here on the forum.

BuffaloBoxster · 02-02-2005, 06:14 AM

Just to throw my two cents in on the subject of extended warranties... In May I bought my '01 Boxster, and the factory warranty ran out in November. During that time, I had a couple of little things fixed under the factory warranty - my HVAC controls had a couple segments on the LED go bad, and I also had the transmission mechanism on my top break. All of it was fixed under factory warranty. The bill for the HVAC was over $1000 (mostly the part from what I understand), and the top transmission was about $700.

I bought an extended warranty from Warranty Direct. I did some research and they've been around a very long time, and I had a hard time digging up dirt on the company. Their converage most closely mimicked what you'd see covered on a factory warranty, and they will let you have the car serviced by the dealer. My coverage was a little over $2000 to extend the warranty by four years and up to 100,000 miles. Knowing how expensive these cars are to have fixed, if only what has gone wrong over the first six months I've owned the car go wrong in the next four years, I'll still be pretty close to breaking even. And I'd hate to have everything sunk because that unlikely failure just happens to occur on my car, and I'm making payments on a car I don't have $9000 for an engine rebuild and a Bxster without an engine is obviously not going to get me much money out of the deal.