The beast blew an AOS
 

Brand new AOS lasted about a year, the other day went to check the oil and could barely get the oil cap off ! Large whoosh of sucking sound . Got a hold of Jake and he confirmed . He sent me another under warranty ( thank you ) so today I'm going to install . I turned the heat on in the garage about 45 minutes ago so heading out soon .
I have searched on this forum , the internet and have the 101 projects for your Boxster book so I think I'm prepared . Not really looking forward to this but it has to be done . Wish me luck .

Best tip I can give is when I did mine I took off the passenger side tire and went in thru there. Good Luck!

Look forward to your best practice when its all done. Also how long does it take, what were the hardest, and the unexpected.

Why do some of these last for so long while others go to crap so soon? I did a replacement in 2010 (actually, a friend replaced it for me), so the original had lasted 9 years before being replaced as a precaution, but my first original one seemed fine when taken out. Have no issues with the replacement either, so I think I'll just keep it in this time till I see any signs it's on its way out.

OK it is in but not without me making two critical dumba$$ mistakes , I will say the job was about what I expected minus the dumba$$ mistakes. I have a scissor lift so for you guys doing this on ramps I salute you :cheers: . OK so to start I put the top in service mode, remove engine cover and marvel for a moment looking at " the beast " :D

So now I proceed to dumba$$ mistake number one and that happened when I went to remove the top accordian hose from the AOS . I thought ( not much thinking took place ) that these fittings unscrewed ! Quickly learned that is not the case as I twisted the one end of the accordian hose right off of the elbow :mad: So for you first timers the clamps squeeze and pull straight back.

I paused for a moment and I think I heard laughing from the north........probably Jake laughing at me for the dumba$$ move :D Not much I can do so I proceeded to removing the AOS . As others have said I removed the rear passenger side tire and while access is tight if you scrape enough layers of skin off your arms fit just fine :p

Removed the AOS, looked it over for a minute, cussed a few words at it then proceeded to installing the new one . I put some oil on the o-ring on the block fitting and some oil on the bellows and proceeded to install it . Some more arm scraping and I had everything lined up and started installing the mounting screws. Got them both started and slowly tightened them while " gently " prying the AOS tube into the block. Voila she's in !!! I had made sure the bellows was lined up and now jambed my hand up there, and started working the bellows over the block nipple and got it done. I thought to myself well that wasn't too bad..........and then it hit me........dumba$$ mistake number two .

My shiny new S.S. clamp for the bellows was on the ground next to my foot :eek: Yep I forgot to loosely install the clamp onto the bellows before installing the AOS . So I examined it for a few minutes , briefly had thoughts of putting a rag in the gas cap and lighting it but quickly came to my senses.

So for aprox. one hour I tried to get that friggen clamp started and FINALLY it started........yeah buddy !!!! Tightened it down and all is good . So now the AOS is 98 % installed but I have to figure out something for that top hose. I milled around my stash-o-crap and found some shrink tubing that was just large enough to slide over the accordian tubing and the elbow . I place a small bead of high temp O2 sensor safe silicone on the two butt joints of the tubing AND on the outside of the tubing and elbow. Made sure the " clocking " was correct and fired up the heat gun . Two minutes later the repair was done . I was careful not to overheat and it shrunk down nicely. Got a nice bead of squeeze out this baby should not leak . Cleaned up the squeeze out and then grabbed some electrical tape . Went from one end to the other three times making sure good overlap on each wrap . Finished it off with three zip ties to make sure nothing unravels .

She is now 100 % done. To be extra safe I am waiting the full 24 hour cure time before firing her up . I'll let you know the results tomorrow . :cheers:

Start to finish it took me 4 hours but without the two mistakes probably could do it again in 2.5 hours or so . Jake has told me he's had AOS failures right out of the box !

To add insult to injury I just received an email from Jake , he said he's replaced one of these in 45 minutes IN THE GRASS at Road Atlanta with no lift or ramps.......man I feel like a wimp ! Some guys just HAVE to show off.....hahaha it's all good .

In case anyone makes the same dumba$$ mistake as I did with the top hose it's part # 996 107 146 00 for my 02 S . Only $24.00 so not a bad hit to the wallet I just ordered one as backup in case my Rube Goldberg repair doesn't work .

Great work on the AOS replacement, and a good suggestion to preemptively replace that easy to break top AOS hose.
I had a similar situation doing the coolant tank, where I bought a replacement oil tube just in case. I needed it all right, as soon as I touched the coolant tank, the old fill tube let go.
Glad I had it, and I will certainly get a replacement top hose when it's AOS time!

Good job...no apologies needed. We don't get to do these jobs every day and so we learn as we go, sometimes missing something very obvious in hindsight (what isn't?).

I'll go ahead and jinx myself now. My 2000S has 132K miles and, as far as I know, has the original AOS. I've thought about doing the job preemptively but given what I've read about failures of AOS replacement parts, I'll stick with mine for now.

Enjoy your car tomorrow!

I waited the full 24 hours for the silicone to cure on my Rube Goldberg repair of the AOS hose. Hit the key she fired right up. No oil leaks no vacumn leaks I'm a happy camper .

I waited the full 24 hours for the silicone to cure on my Rube Goldberg repair of the AOS hose. Hit the key she fired right up. No oil leaks no vacumn leaks I'm a happy camper . Took her for a 20 mile jaunt no issues . Hopefully the AOS will last a while :D

Ok, that's one dumba$$ mistake we've all made! (more than once if you are a super dumba$$ like me!)

Glad you got it done, and thanks for all the info. My AOS is 3 yrs old (installed when Jake rebuilt my engine),
so I'm hoping I get a few more years out of it...

About the AOS. You guys know there is also a PCV valve? Replace that.
Source:
http://986forum.com/forums/general-discussions/44375-anyone-ever-replace-pcv-valve.html