$1600 for a PPI?
 

I was looking to get a PPI in Torrance, Ca and was quoted $1600. Granted, they were checking for a lot of things, but this dollar amount seems excessive. What do you all think?


Tony

That is the most ridiculous amount for a PPI I have ever heard of. Should be in the vicinity of $100-200. However leakdown tests etc if asked for would incur more. I would look somewhere else cheaper.
Cheers, Guy

Did you ask for a leakdown or a shakedown ??? This must be a joke right ?

I'm curious to know what they do differently than other shops to charge that much. For that price you can have IMS and RMS replaced and have the car inspected.
A few months ago I helped a forum member from Fl. I got to test drive a 06 997 and took it to Dons Autowerks for a PPI. I was impressed with what they inspected. They started out by hooking up diagnostic tool and scanned the system to include over rev and cam deviations and fault codes etc. Once this was done they took the car for a test drive and on to a lift. They had a check list that they went by. They also looked for paint over sprays or any type of body work. The whole process took almost two hours. I was impressed.

Does the $1600 price include a reach-around and happy ending??

+1 for Dons Autowerks. I had a 2001 S inspected ther last year. I didn't buy the car. Best $200 I could have spent! ��

Maybe for a Turbo or aircooled 911 if it included some disassembly & testing.

Bend over and don't even get a kiss...

I am going to guess this is Callas Rennsport. They are on the pricey side but you cannot (IMHO) get better service. Tony knows Porsches and his reputation is stellar.

Callas Rennsport | Porsche BMW MINI Service, Repair and Maintenance

It was Callas, and I have no doubt that they know their stuff. With that said, $1600 for a PPI on an 03 Boxster S? That's roughly 1 tenth the cost of the car. That's more than the taxes on the car. I understand that there are some things on the car that can cause catastrophic failure, but this still seems REALLY high.

+1 on Callas. I'm sure he is pricey but his reputation is second to none. I attended one of his Tech sessions and he mentioned that he actually trains Dealer Technicians.

For a PPI I don't think you need someone of his caliber.

Guy might be good, but seriously...what does he charge per hour to cost $1600? A PPI is almost 100% labour.

$1600? WTF?

That is a shop that doesn't want your business and a $1,600 PPI is their way of saying so.

I bet Amagalla will drop by soon again and say something like Oh sorry guys it was 160.00... read it wrong on the quoting paper lol

If you got the cheddar to spend go for it as you have found a good source to give you an overview. If you don't go somewhere else.

I believe the $1600 includes 4 reach-arounds:eek:

its a car not the space shuttle

Tony Callas and I work together instructing classes, and yes, in most every class there are dealer techs.. Sometimes with an alias, sometimes not.

The list of what Callas inspects for is mind blowing, the car is invasively inspected and it takes at least two days.

It could be worse, my version of a PPI is 1,950.00 but is mostly engine specific, though I also pull most of the car apart looking for damage and cover- ups as well. I do these personally, and they often take me a week.

To properly carry out an invasive PPI takes a lot of time. You won't buy anything really worth a damn for 400.00. Just ask the guy that had his 996 inspected at a mid west Porsche dealer and then had the engine fail 300 miles from home while he was driving the car back. The car never even made it home, it was shipped from where it dropped directly to me, where he then expended another 20K for my reconstructed engine.

He told me that my PPI would have been with 5K to him....

The top 1% of heart surgeons are not going to cut you a discount on a coronary cath because you're old and don't have much money in the bank. LOL.
A top guy can catch the tiniest of red flags that most will not even see. That's what you're paying for and not the checklist of what has to be done during the PPI.


Tony Callas is featured in Excellence Magazine from time to time on tech advice.
I remember his pointing out a few must-do's when doing the IMS swap which I later called to confirm with my indy and he's not one to shy away from telling you which oils to avoid.
To write that in a magazine that must play nice with Porsche and their business partners is very interesting.

The difference between someone really knowing the engine and the systems that control it compared to the guy who just measures the externals is significant. For the $400, you get the kind of job an experienced Porsche mechanic can knock out in two hours. For $1,600 you get lots of additional things inspected, measured and diagnosed by an expert who knows all the tricks.

Only you can determine if one is a reasonable value to you or the other is better. 8 years ago a very good PPI cost me $400. It took at least 2-3 hours and then the mechanic took about a half hour with the car up in the air going over every little comment. It was also a case where he knew he would be getting the repair business that his investigations uncovered it needed. It would be more in today's money. Also, since the car is older now and we know more of the weak points now, there are more things to examine in a comprehensive PPI than there were back then.

Imagine this scenario. PPI #1 puts the car up in the air, wiggles the suspension and inspects the half shaft boots. PPI #2 does that plus lasers the frame, measures all alignment specs, measures the corner balance drives the car a significant distance, etc. Different information is then available to be passed on to the car owner and prospective purchaser. Information which will have to be documented in differing detail and then explained in differing detail to them both. Which one you want is your choice but one takes more expertise and time and should cost more. While the other may be enough for you. Now if those details are right in Tony's case, I have no way of knowing. I just throw them out there as a hypothetical example of how there can be two different PPIs and both priced appropriately but differently.

Tony has an excellent reputation. Has had for years. Does it matter that he taught the guy who might be doing the PPI? That he gets all the hard cases so knows more of what to look for? Or is the obvious enough? Only you can determine that.

Good luck. May your results be as good as mine were.

An invasive PPI is all well and good except that very, very few 986/996 owners would allow their car to be torn apart by a prospective buyer and his shop for a PPI. You want to open it up? Buy it and you can do whatever you want. Most owners won't even let you pay for an oil change to see the oil filter.

Even more so, why would a shop blindly quote a $1,600 PPI to someone without explaining all of this to the customer?

I was thinking the same thing that Jake was in regards to the depth of a PPI. A guy on Rennlist paid for a PPI at a Porsche dealer and his engine was a boat anchor five weeks later.

If someone takes your money and doesn't check cam deviations, do a leak down, gut the filter and possibly even drop the pan then you don't know the expensive part. Yet.

To their credit, they didn't blindly quote $1600. They explained why it would cost as much as it did and take 2 days. It's just that, to me, $1600 seems like an undoable amount of money. If I was buying a $45~$50k 993 from the early 90s, then this level of inspection would probably be called for. But, for a $16k Boxster....I don't know.

Tony

That would have been good info to include in the original post.

I stand corrected. Again. :)

When I bought my 01 S used from an out of state seller, he gave me 3 days of ownership to change my mind, and put it in writing. I could do any level of "PPI" that I wanted during this period, and he would take it back for a full refund with no questions asked if I wanted. But if I damaged anything by wreck, destructive inspection, whatever, it would be on me. This seemed fair.
The 2 day drive home, after a PPI at the local dealer, was a good shakedown. I found evidence of a prior wreck mentioned in the presale discussion, and replaced a MAF; neither was sufficient to make me want to back out after just a little seat time.:)

Tony is a good guy with a ton of experience, a member of my club, and runs a very thorough shop. He has worked on my car in the past and the quality was always first rate.

That said, it is doubtful I would have them run a $1600 PPI on a car for me. If it were a $400k 997 GT3 Cup car maybe but a Boxster/Cayman... not likely. I want a cursory look by another set of experienced eyes besides my own, not a fully invasive 2 day operation. Ultimately it is his business and he gets to decide what services he offers and what he charges for his work. Use him or don't based on your own needs and aversion to risk. YMMV

It is high for a PPI relative to the price of the car. But if I could negotiate the price down to cover the cost, or most of it, I wouldn't think that a worse way to spend the money over putting in my pocket. There are so many ways these cost-cut engines can fail and so many Porsches are sold without any real documented history. There's value in knowing what exactly is up with your car. And whether it's worth doing a $3K IMS/clutch, $6K suspension overhaul, $2K in waterpump and rotors/pads, $2k in bodywork, etc. These are all common repairs for a 10+ year old Boxster. The best decisions are made with the best available data. How many 986/996 owners would have gladly parted with $1600 to have kept that $15-25K roller out of their garage.