patdonahue

Hello. I have a 2001 Boxster S 19500 miles total, I am the original owner. The car is maintained by the Porsche dealer on Porsche's low yearly mileage program. The car is kept in an enclosed garage with a trickle charger. Although not driven as often as I would like when it is driven usually I put 100 miles or so on the car and when it is washed I take it out for a 15-20 mile drive to dry out the brakes, etc. I have had zero problems with the car, no leaks or drips on the garage floor. The IMS has been upgraded, brake flush every 2 years, 6 years ago I had a major done @ appox 10000 miles and 10 years, etc, etc.
My questions: on items like the water pump, AOS, is the consensus here that these are mileage items or time replacement items? Or just items that need replacement when they need it? I really like the car and plan to keep it a long time (16 years and counting as of now )
Thanks for your time.
Pat D

mikefocke

Items that are rubber or plastic age as well as wear.

Tires age and they are a safety item. I replaced some perfectly good tread depth Michelins because they were 7 years old. I don't play around with my contact patch to the road. I once ignored them and it cost me a '99 Boxster.

Today I just swapped a new AGM battery into my wife's car just because it was 5 years old, not because it was having trouble starting in 25F weather.

How much preventative maintenance you do is one of those risk/reward choices that only you can make. OTOH, there is a risk every time you do some work that something might get not done right, the new part might fail, or something might get disturbed in the process and a completely unrelated problem gets created.

I think I might do the AOS but not the water pump just because the pump gives warnings and the AOS is plastic.

Dave H.

and the AOS connecting bits are crap too.

at 160k i just did the battery, WP, AOS & motor mount. only the AOS and MM were showing signs of going out (both with about 70k on them). WP was just 60k scheduled maintenance and battery was 10 years old, so just PM.

Macster

For things like the water pump and AOS -- to name a couple -- replacement is driven (no pun) but the number of miles but also -- after a while -- by time.

My belief is if for instance the water pump gets noisy this is a mileage related failure. What I base this on is at 172K miles the water pump in my 2002 Boxster got noisy and had to be replaced. The pump (bearings) wore out.

However, if the pump develops a leak that is less mileage related and more a time related thing. What I base this on is at 120K miles my 2003 Turbo water pump developed a leak. The "difference"? The Boxster was driven a lot right from the outset. The Turbo spent its first 6 years in a garage, well, mostly. When I bought it in June 2009 it had only 10K miles and was like new. While I added the miles these could not make up for the fact the car sat unused too long and age started to take its toll. (Might add the water pump was not the only (admittedly suspected) age related failure/problem. There was the RMS, spoiler hydraulics, front diff axle flange seales, transmission selector shaft seal. All seals. All leaking. All I believe related to age and lack of use early on.)

With the AOS my experience is these last 80K to 100K miles. Thus my belief is if the unit fails at fewer miles it is an age related failure.

Mike F. covered it well. My philosophy is if it ain't broke don't fix it.

A problem with preventative maintenance is you are doing this based on someone else's schedule. One can offer up the recommendation water pumps should be repalced every name your mileage. Say 50K or 60K miles.

Thus in the case of my Boxster it would be on its 5th water pump (at nearly 300K miles) instead of the 2nd. Big cost difference as water pumps are not inexpensive to replace.

The same applies to clutches. Both the Boxster clutch and Turbo clutch are original.

In fact it applies to just about everything.

The only tihngs I would replace on time are the tires and plugs.

Another way of looking at this is say you replace the water pump. Ok but what about the coolant tank? The one in my Boxster split and had to be replaced? After you get done with the coolant tank there is the fuel pump. But what about the starter? The alternator? Oh, the good old AOS? The serpentine belt and all the idler rollers and tensioner rollers? And then there are the CV boots. Coils. MAF. Throttle body. My Boxster engine has even had one VarioCam solenoid and actuator replaced.

There are the coolant hoses. The radiators. The Boxster radiators are original as are the raidator fan motors. (The radiators in my Turbo did develop leaks at around 130K miles and this even though I keep the radiator ducts free of trash.)

The list is nearly endless. If you replace just the water pump and AOS this does not mean you are released from keeping an eye on things. New parts can develop problems. And there are all the other things that can develop a problem. You still have to be on the look out for a problem from any quarter.

My philosophy has been to give my cars good servicing and of course give them reasonable treatment and keep an eye and ear on them and when something comes up have it addressed.

This has worked well for me but of course you are free to do what you feel is best for you.

Byprodriver

The AOS plastic is indestuctable. I would not touch a OE AOS until the 1st sign of the internal rubber diaphram leaking. My 2000 Box has 118K miles on it's original AOS connection hoses.

patdonahue

Thanks to all those who responded. Helpful replies indeed. Nice to see all these high mileage Boxsters on the road doing so well! like I said I want to keep this one for a while, its been a great car.
Pat D

KevinH2000

I have had my 2000 for about 10 years. I bought it with 30,000 miles on it and now have 103,000 on it. I do all the maintenance on time, but wait for things to indicate they are about to break before I replace major components.

The water pump, clutch and flywheel and the rear wheel bearings all started to get noisy before I replaced them. Inspection of the parts after they were removed showed that they were near failure. (I did the water pump myself and the contrast between the noise made by the new and old pumps when you spun them by hand was amazing.) While the transmission was out for the clutch and flywheel, I had the AOS and the RMS replaced. The RMS was leaking. I was getting more and more smoke that indicated the AOS was on its way out. The labor for replacing the AOS and RMS was less with the transmission out,

I know that I may be setting myself up for an inconvenient breakdown. However, you could also replace a major component on a preventive basis and then have something else fail or have the car totaled in an accident.

Good luck with your decision making.

4kix66

The real 100% will fail for sure problem on a 97 thru at least 99 and probably 00 thru 04 as well is the top up/down mechanism. Be ready! It will happen to you. This is probably not mileage or age based but up and down based. The more ups and downs the sooner. So a 10000 mile car in S. Cal is more at risk than a 100,000 miler in Seattle. The S. Cal car might have 8 u/d per day. The S. car 1 per week. Anyway, this is not a question of if, it is a question of when. I have mucho experience with this in N. Ca. 6 cars 4 failures. SO FAR!

dbcooper292

I have a somewhat similar pattern of use, my 2003 just hit 40k. I did the water pump because, at least on my car, half the pump surface is engine block and the impeller is metal. so if you follow the advice to wait for the water pump symptoms, when the bearing gets loose the impeller starts eating the block.

patdonahue

Thank you both also for your comments. Love the 914!
Pat D

4kix66

Pat
Thx re 914. Where are you? Is there a chance I know you? Also you have a famous Porsche racing name.

GVA-SFO

Just read the thread, quick, and it look to me that one thing that has not been mentioned, and this would scare me like hell: the brake fluid.
Do not play with that : flush the brake fluid every two years.
(If you track the car, better flush it every 6 months.)

And yes, about the tires, I fully agree. Considering that after 6 years, they are close to done is a good way of showing that you like your car !

..My two cents !

And, yes : A Boxster S is a fabulous car, mine is a 2001 too !
You should post some photos of yours !

patdonahue

Yes, I change out the brake fluid every 2 years, ditto on the tires, good advice.
No relation to the Donahue of Porsche racing, I am in southwest Mississippi, originally from New Orleans. My first Porsche was a '73 1.7 914-fun car!
My 2001 S

dbcooper292

Forgot to mention, some older water pumps have plastic impellers and the worn pieces can block a water passage so those are not a good bet to run all the way down.

Macster

Newer water pumps too have plastic (composite plastic) impellers.

There is not much clearance between the impeller blades and the block surface as the pump is more efficient with the impeller blades running as close to the block surface as possible.

In most cases when the impeller contacts the block and this breaks the impeller blades I suspect the water pump was noisy for a while prior to this happening and the owner ignored the noise until the pump bearings got so bad the impeller moved out of position and thus was able to contact the block.

I recall in the case of my Boxster's water pump one sign something was amiss was the belt had a sharp edge to it. It was a relatively new belt, too. I had the old one and even after I don't know how many miles the belt edges were dull.

My point is the belt edge was sharp because the belt was contacting the side (inside side) of the water pump pulley. (There was sign of the belt rubbing on this.) And it was doing this because one pulley, in this case the water pump pulley, was not in its correct position. Clearly the water pump was noisy but it was also suffering from some looseness in the bearings enough to allow the pulley to get out of position. Since the impeller is at the other end of the shaft opposite the pulley the impeller was also out of position and no doubt the impeller blades were running dangerously close to the block.

No doubt had I ignored the noise or tried to nurse the pump in an attempt to get more miles from the pump the impeller at some point would have contacted the block.

This is why when I was convinced the pump was the source of the noise I didn't even drive the car 25 miles to the dealer but had it flat bedded and the water pump replaced.