Just back from my first road trip in my '02 986S
 

Just home now, ended up at 27mpg which is still not bad given a fair bit of in town driving (both in Portland and various places on the coast), a couple of mountain passes which mandated some 3rd/4th gear WOT action through passing zones, then 70-85mph cruising en route home with the A/C on.

A few thoughts:
-I hate the standard Porsche seats just as much as I remembered from my 944. Why these awful, hard, unsupportive things are considered fitting for a sporting car I will never understand. I should have snagged that pair of 987 sport seats off of ePay...
-You really have to work the gear lever and bury the throttle to extract significant performance. I found myself surprised that 4th gear wasn't digging deep enough when I found myself at the bottom of a steep uphill incline with a passing lane starting at ~50mph and a whole fleet of trailers/motor homes/semis to get past...
-I wouldn't want suspension stiffer than the Bilsteins for long distance touring. Things get rough in a hurry over broken pavement at high speed.
-That said, part from the awful seats it didn't beat us up at all. Top up, it's noisier than a hard top car but still very reasonable. The A/C is surprisingly effective. Wind management isn't bad with the top down.
-It's fairly practical with the two trunks, but definitely lacks interior storage. I wish the glovebox standard on the '03-04 cars was an easy retrofit.

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Who says Porsches can't be efficient? This was from our drive South over about 190 miles, a combo of holiday weekend stop and go traffic intermittently spanning 60+ miles and 80+mph cruising. Overall MPG for the trip was about 27.

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I liked the juxtaposition here

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Walked out of our hotel in PDX to find my car in very good company...991 GT3

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Stunning Mini a long way from home (BC)

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Caffenating

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Enjoying the view

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What it's staring at: Indian Beach on the Oregon coast

What broke? TBD. There is an odd noise occasionally emanating from the RF that does not seem to be speed dependent. Fuel pump? Something resonating in the suspension? I will need to find out. Didn't stop us from making it home just fine so can't be that serious...(until it is, of course).

Damn Porsche econobox

I've done a few longer drives and don't find the seats to be that bad
Yea, ya gotta drop to 3rd @ 50 for high speed passing. Nice that 3rd is good to high 90's though. Once you get it to 5k, its a mini rocket

Sounds and looks like a great trip. We are planning our first decent road trip next month from MN to NC and back. I will be very interested what we average for MPG even though it's not a huge worry as it's way more fun and exhilarating driving our Pcar than our others.

Quick newbie question how do you get your gauges to display MPG, temp, miles to empty? This is something different on the 02's than the 01's?

You have a nice nice setup almost exactly the same as mine.

Seat comfort could be relative to Butt size??
Along JayG's comments - I've Done long trips(10 - 15 hrs in the saddle) and I personally don't find these seats any less comfortable then others.
4th gear at 50 mph is boarder line for 6 speed manual. Defiantly need to drop to 3rd for decent acceleration or even steady climbing @ 50mph especially if you have a passenger

I find that on long trips the MPGs keep going up. Just did 600 Miles last weekend. 1st day 27mpg highway. 2nd day home, 29+ mpg hwy. All in the 75-80 mph

01BOXYS - Display - Do you have second stalk under turn indicator stalk? This would indicate you have OnBoard Computer option and that is where you tailor the display items

The longest day I've driven my '03S is 10 hours, but I've found the seats to be very comfortable :confused:. Maybe you don't have them adjusted properly.

Ya know, I guess haven't noticed. I will check and see if I do, that would be very handy to have.

Nmbrsix - I just went back and read the other five threads you started. Very cool. Unfortunately, I agree with you regarding the seats. I just can't get comfortable in them and find long drives painful. Oh well.

Your photos and story(ies) and great. You did it the right way with the Boxster when you first bought it by getting it sorted out top to bottom. Then, you go on a road trip after two months of ownership. Outstanding.

Great car.... keep you post coming.

Possibly but not in our case. My other half is much smaller than I am and found the seats to be equally as uncomfortable.

Coming from a turbocharged daily driver ('12 GTI) the Boxster still surprises me at how deep I have to dig sometimes. My previous toy was a '94 Miata, so I'm quite accustomed to rowing gears and using the throttle to extract the performance. :D I just figured with 30+hp more on tap than the GTI that it wouldn't need quite as much of that as the Miata did. Blame the longish gearing I suppose.

Unfortunately I must not have the Onboard computer option to display the MPG and miles left to empty. That would have been a very nice feature. Was this a factory option at time of purchase?

I think the seats are great, I am average height & weight which i assume is the design benchmark. I once drove my Box for 24 hours with 2 hours of breaks mixed in.


I think further from home than the Mini is the Honda Pilot in front of it, manufacturers plates means it's from SoCA.

Big difference in passing time when a Box is fully loaded.

Hey there, nice pics... can you post a better quality picture of your smoke tail lights... did you buy them off ebay ?? Thanks.