Genuine Water Pump or After Market - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners

JamesBorisPerez · 04-22-2010, 07:43 PM

The cost of a Genuine Water Pump for a Boxster 2003 S is $ 370.00 and after market is $ 170.00. I know the old saying " you get what you pay for" but what's everyone's experience.

Please advise.

gschotland · 04-22-2010, 09:49 PM

You can get an OEM water pump from Suncoast Porsche in OR for ~$200. No need to pay out the a$$ at your local dealer.

http://www.****************************************************.com/

Lots of iffy remanufactured water pumps out there for as little as $100. Of course some think the OEM unit is equally iffy. I bought from Suncoast and have no regrets so far.

Dragonwind · 04-23-2010, 12:34 AM

It's a tough call for me because my OEM failed in under one year and was replaced under warranty (for the part + labor) so who knows. The original lasted 10 years and wasn't bad just old and I had it changed before anything went south...of course that's what the new one did lol!

Lil bastard · 04-23-2010, 09:17 AM

There are several aftermarket pumps out there which are superior to the OEM.

This is because the OEM uses a plastic impeller which actually disintegrates over time while the pressed metal impeller on the aftermarket pump lasts the life of the pump (ie bearing). A degraded impeller may not always be the cause of failure, but over time, it is the cause of reduced coolant flow.

When the time comes, I'll go with aftermarket due to it's robustness. The fact that's it's less expensive simply sweetens the deal.

Cheers!

JFP in PA · 04-23-2010, 11:30 AM

Interesting comments, particularly as I see it the other way around: We see more problems with the aftermarket units failing prematurely than the OEM pump. After too many “come backs”, we no longer install aftermarket and only use the OEM units as the result.......

jcb986 · 04-23-2010, 01:01 PM

There is another post like this on Pelican Parts 986 BBS. The guy was going to change his water pump as a maintenance procedure which was working fine. A Porsche Tech said it was not necessary to do so. Pumps can go 10K to over 100K miles. Replace after it only starts to fail and he then described how to monitor which was really simple. The pump usually leak first as they began to fail. Me, why fix something that's not broken.