Premature Engine Failure - Boxster

[Jake Raby]

Interesting that the '06 engine has failed.. We are just starting to see the "new" IMS bearings beginning to fail and it would be interesting to know if thats what your failure is.

BUT get a second opinion by someone that believes in repairing these engines. Lots of things that "down" an engine at the dealership are actually repairable with a little bit of innovation and elbow grease.. Problem is most dealershios just want to do oil changes and engine swaps.

BTW- With certain failures the frequency of service and how well an engine is cared for simply do not matter... Changing the oil in the engine doesn't ever impact the lubrication of the IMS bearing..

[Dragonwind]

That sucks man. Look at some other posts. People have been successful with getting Porsche to cover the engine costs.

Jake: I was wondering when you might start seeing 987 engines with failed IMS bearings. If I understand correctly, that one cannot be changed without a full teardown as the opening in the block is actually smaller than the bearing itself.

Chris

[Jake Raby]

We've already been seeing them, just not in higher numbers. As these cars come out of warranty over the next few months I know we'll see an increase.

The bad part of it with the '06 and newer engines is the fact that the bearing is larger than the access port in the crankcase. What that means is an absolute impossibility of bearing retrofit as the old bearing cannot be removed.

When one of these bearings starts to go bad, the engine is 100% compromised. Wonderful execution by the engineers, wonderful.

[mikefocke]

keep a positive outlook and ask the dealer to ask Porsche for some help.

Your service history and relationship with the dealer do matter in how they treat your request.

If you are the original buyer and bought it there even more.

Don't expect 100% but any help saves you considerable $ and beats the nothing you can legally deserve and will get from a negative/antagonistic approach.

Not implying you are.

Sure sorry to hear of your troubles.

[Chase53]

Hello, this is my first post to the forum, I'm going to be purchasing an early Boxster soon, I have my eye on one in paticular that's a 1999 with 50+++ miles on it. The carfax report shows that the front crankshaft seal was replaced 4 months after the car purchased new and the transmission was replaced at the same time with less then 6000 miles on it in August of '99.

At 16,000 miles in April 2000 the engine was removed, but does not say why. After that it has a pretty clean record other then failing smog at 44,000 miles, it has since passed smog several times including just a few months ago.

At what point did Porsche use the updated seals? Is the past service record any clue as to what I might be buying? Any way to check that I don't buy a hand grenade waiting to go?

This will be my 4th Porsche, I have had a 914, 944 & 911SC before, the 944 had a rod go with only 600 miles on the engine, of course Porsche replaced it, but it took 6 months to get the car back!

Thanks in advance.

[RandallNeighbour]

Chase, are you sure you don't want to keep looking for another boxster that doesn't have so much drama and unknowns surrounding it?

Boxster are plentiful and cheap, and pristine models with a detailed service history can be found most everywhere.

BTW, you will quickly discover that in 1997, Porsche began making lots of crappy plastic parts on their cars that did not withstand heat or age well. Any 99 I might buy had better have quite a few things replaced on it recently for me to be interested enough to even test drive it.

[jcb986]

Originally Posted by Chase53

Hello, this is my first post to the forum, I'm going to be purchasing an early Boxster soon, I have my eye on one in paticular that's a 1999 with 50+++ miles on it. The carfax report shows that the front crankshaft seal was replaced 4 months after the car purchased new and the transmission was replaced at the same time with less then 6000 miles on it in August of '99.

At 16,000 miles in April 2000 the engine was removed, but does not say why. After that it has a pretty clean record other then failing smog at 44,000 miles, it has since passed smog several times including just a few months ago.

At what point did Porsche use the updated seals? Is the past service record any clue as to what I might be buying? Any way to check that I don't buy a hand grenade waiting to go?

This will be my 4th Porsche, I have had a 914, 944 & 911SC before, the 944 had a rod go with only 600 miles on the engine, of course Porsche replaced it, but it took 6 months to get the car back!

Thanks in advance.

The front seal could have been defected originally and needed a few miles for it to start leaking. Engine replacement is a good thing. The earlier models 97-99 had block casting problems, D chunk and RMS bearing failures. In 2000 they had made improvements in these areas.