Some details on 9A1 engine in GT3R
01-19-2016, 02:42 AM
#31
Rennlist Member
Originally Posted by Alan C.
R. Deacon, Care to share your oil analysis?
Last edited by signes; 01-19-2016 at 12:48 PM.
01-19-2016, 10:55 AM
#32
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The latest issue of Christophorus states that the engine in the GT3R is based on the 9A1 in the RS. Allegedly it pumps out 500 hp (same as the RS) but with higher torque (figure is unspecified). The engine has new bearings for the crankshaft, a new tuning for the intake camshaft, and a new control unit designed for racing. A heady 9500 RPM limiter figure is quoted.
It is interesting to note that the changes mentioned deal with both the crankshaft and camshaft. There has been a lot of discussion about these two being weak points of the GT 9A1 engines. Maybe these changes in fact confirm that those are real weaknesses and not just unfortunate issues.
It is interesting to note that the changes mentioned deal with both the crankshaft and camshaft. There has been a lot of discussion about these two being weak points of the GT 9A1 engines. Maybe these changes in fact confirm that those are real weaknesses and not just unfortunate issues.
Sorry to hear Macca. Doesn't help you at the moment but at least a relief to see Porsche finally on track with the new motor and subjecting it to proper battle-testing.
01-19-2016, 12:45 PM
#33
Rennlist Member
I just did my break in oil service with ~900 miles and came back clean. Comment was funny, actually said they were surprised how little trace metals the found. Will post it tomorrow.
I've added my 9000 mi. report below for comparison. The first oil change was at 1000 mi. At the 1000 mi. mark all of the miles were under 4k per factory break in spec.
Last edited by Alan C.; 01-19-2016 at 04:10 PM.
01-19-2016, 12:52 PM
#34
Rennlist Member
01-19-2016, 01:07 PM
#35
Guys, I'm travelling internationally but had the misfortune to experience the issue and remedies first hand last week. I'll update everyone when I can by way if a seperate thread when I have time.
It's my opinion you can not make the E series engine as robust as the G as there are internal oiling changes...
It's my opinion you can not make the E series engine as robust as the G as there are internal oiling changes...
01-19-2016, 01:48 PM
#36
Race Director
01-19-2016, 02:25 PM
#37
Rennlist Member
01-19-2016, 02:33 PM
#38
Race Director
01-20-2016, 12:33 AM
#39
Burning Brakes
It's disappointing that Porsche's pre-release test program for the engine and car failed to reveal this weakness prior to commercialization. I recall reading about a similar issue (insufficient oiling on one end of the engine) on heavily tracked Cayman, prior to the switch to the 9A1. Not sure if racing a few 991 GT3s prior to global customer sales would have uncovered this weakness, but if so, it would have been far better to shake out the gremilns on a handful of race cars than a much larger installed base of street cars, IMO. Hopefully Porsche will do the right thing and upgrade every E-series owner to a new lubrication system that eliminates this problem, regardless of whether the problem has manifest itself yet.
01-21-2016, 01:53 PM
#40
Rennlist Member
01-21-2016, 03:41 PM
#41
Rennlist Member
01-21-2016, 11:31 PM
#43
Rennlist Member
Ok guys. Ill run a quick update here. Im going to keep this factual and fairly brief as I am awaiting a new G engine from PAG by air and clearly do not want to prejudiced the outcome of this. I want to be clear that PAG, the local dealer and everyone within the distribution chain have been incredibly proactive here and I have been given exemplary service.
I do however feel a responsibility as a founding member/poster of this board to present you with my own experience. I still believe the 991 GT3 is the most enjoyable 911 Ive owned, a brilliant car its easy of daily use and flexibility of application in almost every driving scenario only eclipsed by its absolute insane competence and speed on the track...
My GT3 was delivered Euro Delivery early Dec 2013. The first MA175 engine (serial number but no letter suffix) completed 3500 trouble free road only km before replacement in May 2014 under the engine recall campaign. The replacement engine designated with suffix "E". This engine was built to remedy the "rod bolt fastener" campaign.
The E engine was serviced at 6500km and ran a total of 11,300 km before throwing the "engine performance reduced drive on" red warning light on 09 Jan 2016. The car was always warmed up prior to extended rpm use. The E engine had completed 2500 track KMs (10 track days) and a further 2500km of "spirited driving" (by this I mean at targa type pace also using higher rpm in manual shift). On the track I had primarily used SportAuto. This was the second track day I attended with the GT3 in 2016 and the fault occurred on the first warm up lap when the engine was extended beyond 8000 rpm in 3rd gear 2/3 way around the track. I brought the car back to pits and cycled the ignition. The fault code disappeared. I then went back out on the track, completed a warm up lap successfully and at the end of the second lap in 4th at 8300 rpm the same fault code appeared. In both cases the ECU retarded the cars ignition.
The car drove fine in standard PDK mode so I dropped it into the dealer where we reviewed the "Miss firing at High Rpm Bulletin 59/15 dated 2 Sept 2015". I already had a copy of this on file as I have been monitoring the situation with these issues closely. The specific code thrown was misfire cylinder 6.
The GT3 was due for its 20k km service at this time so the techs first completed the service including plug replacement. They showed me the bulletin for the plugs - these are now a 12 month or 20k km replacement interval in our market. They then ran through the fault replication and isolation methods outlined in the bulletin. This included swapping coil packs to try and isolate if it was a coil issue. The car would replicate the fault regardless. New plugs, different coil packs etc.
The next course of action was to remove the engine and pull the camshafts and rocker fingers as per the bulletin, for inspection. The team completed this quickly and efficiently. The outcome was typical f others who have experienced this issue and almost identical to the diagrams used in the bulletin example (below).
Passenger side cylinder head (driver side in USA) cylinders 4,5,6. Looking at the technical diagrams from the 991 GT3 technical manual below we can see cylinder 6 being the furthermost from oil inlet supply rail. Wear on inlet side finger rockers gets progressively worse until cylinder 6 where the DLC coating is worn to the steel n the lower, flatter side of the foot. Small line like "groves" start forming to through the DLC coating at the top of the finger lifter (curved side) and these change from one band to two as you move towards cylinder 6. The cylinder 6 inlet rocker foot is through the DLC and the cam associated with it shows some fine scoring as you would imagine from steel to steel contact.
The end result is a new engine has been ordered and will arrive early February to be installed in time for the South island Track Tour an event I have been involved with organizing every other year and will see 5 track days over 3 weeks including 5000 road km. My wife will attend as always and it was ur biggest disappointment in 2014 to miss this on account of the "stop sale" recall which came int affect nly a few days before our departure. We took instead the 993 which again served us faultlessly - but it is a very firm and unforgiving car on the road these days and my wife swore she would not attend another such event unless it was in "comfort" of the GT3! The plan is the new engine will be installed in the car and calibrated by mid Feb latest and I will do 2000km run in on the way to the first track meeting 2000km south of where I will depart in early March.
Ok. So where does this leave us? Ill be honest. I was expecting this to eventuate after hearing from a number f others wh had experienced the same issue. However I was surprised it had happened so soon to me. The car is well maintained and looked after. I dont rev it cold and Im mechanically sympathetic. less than 8000 miles, run in mostly dry temps around 15-25C and used only 2500 km on the track? Our tracks are small and tight pulling alot of G compared to many I have seen in the USA which are faster with big sweeper and straights, but still thats not alot of track use. After all my 993 has seen almost 100,000km of fast road and track and is still running fine (no doubt top end rebuild on the way).
Why has this happened? I do not know for certain. I believe that there is a lubrication issue at play here. I understand the G series engine has a different oil filter, ECU oil pressure changes to the software, a larger diameter oil filter neck and Im told a revision to the oiling pump - all of which are in line with the MA176 (RS) power plant.
Porsche set the goal very high for the MA175. Its the most glorious power-plant they have produced with its singing rev line. If there is any fault to their plan I would suggest it was running customer cars before competition ones. The engine simply didnt have enough development time on it. The 9A1 racing engine has taught PAG alot abut this engine including its lubrication. We hope that the G series engine as per the MA176 RS engine incorporates the finding from these lessons and addresses the issues with remedies.
My warranty (like most outside of the USA) lasts only 3 years and expires at the end of 2016. Im very glad and thankful that this issue has manifest itself early for me. It has prevented my upcoming 3 week track holiday being sabotaged and hopefully the replacement engine has been designed to be durable for a long time which should see me through my 2016 calendar of 10-12 track days and well beyond.
For those with E series engines do not despair. If you are running these cars on the track at high rpm the issue, if it occurs, will make itself known before your warranty expires and Im sure you will receive the same superlative service I have so far received from Porsche. You may also receive a new engine!
Part of me cannot believe the scenario playing out. The other part cant help but chuckle that this is the gift that keeps on giving! I guess you need t keep your sense of humor about you. My car with 2 replacement engines and a compensation package will soon we Porsche more than it does me!
Most of all I feel lucky to shortly have the enjoyment of this 9000 rpm engine once again. This time Im sure they will have it right (they have known of the issue since late 2014 and have yet kept pumping the cars out of the factory unil only a month ago so they must have been confident with the MY16 gen cars they had the situation under control or else surely they would have ceased production early?).
I know many of you will have questions of me but at this time I think Ive said all I wish to say above. Theres enough information there for you to draw your own conclusions. I dont know anything about the F engines. Im guessing another revision. Will oil sample testing show the occurrence of this issue early? Probably not until the DLC coating on the finger rockers has departed and by then the ECU will have thrown the fault code (amazing how the ECU has parameters than allow it to understand when this is occurring - must be a variance in timing etc). If you have the code Im sure the missfire will be 3 or 6 (furtherest cylinders from the oiling inlet), possibly even a 2 & 5. Ive heard of 3,5 & 6 faults.
One thing to remember, this isnt the end of the world. The ECU is retarding the engine well before any significant damage is done. Cams and rockers are wear items on race engines. They should last longer than this admittedly.
That's my update guys. Not great news I know. The good news for me is a brand new engine but a a some inconvenience, a disbelieving wife and no doubt a whole community or 991 GT3 naysayers gloating over these issues doesn't quite make it a bed of roses does it. Its still a bloody good car and Im not giving up on it. Those of us that have the measure of this beast on the road and track know the Porsche gods were generous with the 991 GT3. Even if they hath taken away a little as well. For me the 991 GT3 has been "an adventure" that started with a fantastic winter DE in Europe and continues to this day with wild back road sortes in New Zealand and blistering track days. There have been compensations and new engines too to make life that little bit more exciting too! Never a dull moment!
If I were an E series engine owner, what I would recommend is you drive the car in the manner that was intended for the duration of the warranty and should it be an issue you will be looked after by warranty....
I do however feel a responsibility as a founding member/poster of this board to present you with my own experience. I still believe the 991 GT3 is the most enjoyable 911 Ive owned, a brilliant car its easy of daily use and flexibility of application in almost every driving scenario only eclipsed by its absolute insane competence and speed on the track...
My GT3 was delivered Euro Delivery early Dec 2013. The first MA175 engine (serial number but no letter suffix) completed 3500 trouble free road only km before replacement in May 2014 under the engine recall campaign. The replacement engine designated with suffix "E". This engine was built to remedy the "rod bolt fastener" campaign.
The E engine was serviced at 6500km and ran a total of 11,300 km before throwing the "engine performance reduced drive on" red warning light on 09 Jan 2016. The car was always warmed up prior to extended rpm use. The E engine had completed 2500 track KMs (10 track days) and a further 2500km of "spirited driving" (by this I mean at targa type pace also using higher rpm in manual shift). On the track I had primarily used SportAuto. This was the second track day I attended with the GT3 in 2016 and the fault occurred on the first warm up lap when the engine was extended beyond 8000 rpm in 3rd gear 2/3 way around the track. I brought the car back to pits and cycled the ignition. The fault code disappeared. I then went back out on the track, completed a warm up lap successfully and at the end of the second lap in 4th at 8300 rpm the same fault code appeared. In both cases the ECU retarded the cars ignition.
The car drove fine in standard PDK mode so I dropped it into the dealer where we reviewed the "Miss firing at High Rpm Bulletin 59/15 dated 2 Sept 2015". I already had a copy of this on file as I have been monitoring the situation with these issues closely. The specific code thrown was misfire cylinder 6.
The GT3 was due for its 20k km service at this time so the techs first completed the service including plug replacement. They showed me the bulletin for the plugs - these are now a 12 month or 20k km replacement interval in our market. They then ran through the fault replication and isolation methods outlined in the bulletin. This included swapping coil packs to try and isolate if it was a coil issue. The car would replicate the fault regardless. New plugs, different coil packs etc.
The next course of action was to remove the engine and pull the camshafts and rocker fingers as per the bulletin, for inspection. The team completed this quickly and efficiently. The outcome was typical f others who have experienced this issue and almost identical to the diagrams used in the bulletin example (below).
Passenger side cylinder head (driver side in USA) cylinders 4,5,6. Looking at the technical diagrams from the 991 GT3 technical manual below we can see cylinder 6 being the furthermost from oil inlet supply rail. Wear on inlet side finger rockers gets progressively worse until cylinder 6 where the DLC coating is worn to the steel n the lower, flatter side of the foot. Small line like "groves" start forming to through the DLC coating at the top of the finger lifter (curved side) and these change from one band to two as you move towards cylinder 6. The cylinder 6 inlet rocker foot is through the DLC and the cam associated with it shows some fine scoring as you would imagine from steel to steel contact.
The end result is a new engine has been ordered and will arrive early February to be installed in time for the South island Track Tour an event I have been involved with organizing every other year and will see 5 track days over 3 weeks including 5000 road km. My wife will attend as always and it was ur biggest disappointment in 2014 to miss this on account of the "stop sale" recall which came int affect nly a few days before our departure. We took instead the 993 which again served us faultlessly - but it is a very firm and unforgiving car on the road these days and my wife swore she would not attend another such event unless it was in "comfort" of the GT3! The plan is the new engine will be installed in the car and calibrated by mid Feb latest and I will do 2000km run in on the way to the first track meeting 2000km south of where I will depart in early March.
Ok. So where does this leave us? Ill be honest. I was expecting this to eventuate after hearing from a number f others wh had experienced the same issue. However I was surprised it had happened so soon to me. The car is well maintained and looked after. I dont rev it cold and Im mechanically sympathetic. less than 8000 miles, run in mostly dry temps around 15-25C and used only 2500 km on the track? Our tracks are small and tight pulling alot of G compared to many I have seen in the USA which are faster with big sweeper and straights, but still thats not alot of track use. After all my 993 has seen almost 100,000km of fast road and track and is still running fine (no doubt top end rebuild on the way).
Why has this happened? I do not know for certain. I believe that there is a lubrication issue at play here. I understand the G series engine has a different oil filter, ECU oil pressure changes to the software, a larger diameter oil filter neck and Im told a revision to the oiling pump - all of which are in line with the MA176 (RS) power plant.
Porsche set the goal very high for the MA175. Its the most glorious power-plant they have produced with its singing rev line. If there is any fault to their plan I would suggest it was running customer cars before competition ones. The engine simply didnt have enough development time on it. The 9A1 racing engine has taught PAG alot abut this engine including its lubrication. We hope that the G series engine as per the MA176 RS engine incorporates the finding from these lessons and addresses the issues with remedies.
My warranty (like most outside of the USA) lasts only 3 years and expires at the end of 2016. Im very glad and thankful that this issue has manifest itself early for me. It has prevented my upcoming 3 week track holiday being sabotaged and hopefully the replacement engine has been designed to be durable for a long time which should see me through my 2016 calendar of 10-12 track days and well beyond.
For those with E series engines do not despair. If you are running these cars on the track at high rpm the issue, if it occurs, will make itself known before your warranty expires and Im sure you will receive the same superlative service I have so far received from Porsche. You may also receive a new engine!
Part of me cannot believe the scenario playing out. The other part cant help but chuckle that this is the gift that keeps on giving! I guess you need t keep your sense of humor about you. My car with 2 replacement engines and a compensation package will soon we Porsche more than it does me!
Most of all I feel lucky to shortly have the enjoyment of this 9000 rpm engine once again. This time Im sure they will have it right (they have known of the issue since late 2014 and have yet kept pumping the cars out of the factory unil only a month ago so they must have been confident with the MY16 gen cars they had the situation under control or else surely they would have ceased production early?).
I know many of you will have questions of me but at this time I think Ive said all I wish to say above. Theres enough information there for you to draw your own conclusions. I dont know anything about the F engines. Im guessing another revision. Will oil sample testing show the occurrence of this issue early? Probably not until the DLC coating on the finger rockers has departed and by then the ECU will have thrown the fault code (amazing how the ECU has parameters than allow it to understand when this is occurring - must be a variance in timing etc). If you have the code Im sure the missfire will be 3 or 6 (furtherest cylinders from the oiling inlet), possibly even a 2 & 5. Ive heard of 3,5 & 6 faults.
One thing to remember, this isnt the end of the world. The ECU is retarding the engine well before any significant damage is done. Cams and rockers are wear items on race engines. They should last longer than this admittedly.
That's my update guys. Not great news I know. The good news for me is a brand new engine but a a some inconvenience, a disbelieving wife and no doubt a whole community or 991 GT3 naysayers gloating over these issues doesn't quite make it a bed of roses does it. Its still a bloody good car and Im not giving up on it. Those of us that have the measure of this beast on the road and track know the Porsche gods were generous with the 991 GT3. Even if they hath taken away a little as well. For me the 991 GT3 has been "an adventure" that started with a fantastic winter DE in Europe and continues to this day with wild back road sortes in New Zealand and blistering track days. There have been compensations and new engines too to make life that little bit more exciting too! Never a dull moment!
If I were an E series engine owner, what I would recommend is you drive the car in the manner that was intended for the duration of the warranty and should it be an issue you will be looked after by warranty....
01-21-2016, 11:43 PM
#44
RL Community Team
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
Good info.
Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for sharing.
01-21-2016, 11:47 PM
#45
Race Director
Mark, I can't thank you enough for that very complete report. I have questions, but I won't trouble you with them. I think maybe a call to PCNA is in order to find out what the long term implications of this information might be and to establish a record of my concerns with them. Anyway, absolutely first rate job and I hope your new engine install goes smoothly.