JohnCK2014

I am going to buy a first Porsche. I have from 40 to 45K US to spend. I will use the car as a daily driver rain or shine and some but not a lot of snow. Would like to track the car a couple of times a year and put from seven to ten thousand miles a year on it. I love my Merc AWD. But I grew up driving front engined rear wheel drive cars in a cold climate. So the lack of it doesn't intimidate me.

I love the AWD looks and insane performance of a turbo. But the maintenence costs of a turbo and a 10 plus year old car scares me. Part of me says be sensible and go for the 4s that is a beatiful car and fast as hell in its own right. But the other part says if you wanted to be sensible you would buy a certified pre owned base cayman.

Advice?

Amber Gramps

John, you need to look a little further down the list and find the 996 and or the 997 forums. This is the air/oil cooled section. Welcome though.

Personally I'd try to find a 997. The 996 is butt ugly.

Although when they are selling for $18,000 one could overlook the looks:

http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/cto/4313853413.html

JohnCK2014

Thanks. But I am not part of the cult. So I find the 996 Turbo beatiful. But there is no accounting for taste.

Steve Weiner-Rennsport Systems

John,

The abbreviated answer would be to buy a 996 Turbo as those have an excellent powertrain.

I would stay FAR FAR away from any naturally-aspirated 996 or 997 (except GT-3) before 2010 due to engine issues.

JohnCK2014

I have read more than I ever should have regarding the engine issues. Clearly the ims bearing is an issue in the 996s. I am unconvinced regarding the 997s. Do they fail? Sure. But engines fail for lots of reasons. I think the chances of a 997 bearing failure is not significantly greater than the chance of an engine failing for any other reason. I think the LN engineering people make a good product. But their business is to sell bearings. That makes them a bit prone to confirmation bias.

Amber Gramps

Perhaps you missed the memo..... Steve is one of the Porsche GODS.

race911

Beat me to it.

Hey, it's your money.

I just picked up a 550HP Ruf R Turbo conversion, done on an '03 Turbo. Ugly, compared to what came before and after? I guess. Working fine as a commute car so far.

Steve Weiner-Rennsport Systems

These engines have multiple issues, rooted in their basic design and manufacture. I advise all of my clients to avoid these cars at ALL costs.

JCP911S

First, Steve is a long-time and very knowledgable Porsche expert so his opinions should always be given weight.

Second, all cars can experience engine design problems... my brother's 545 BMW engine is a total POS... (and we're both long-time BMW owners) nice car when it runs, but at 100k+ mi it has motor issues out the butt... nothing serious, but expensive and annoying.

Frankly, in today's market even premium brands are under severe cost/performance constraints...

The initial owner leases the car on a 36 mo lease and then the car is re-cycled through a CPO program for 3 more years... this is six years, and 100k miles.

After that is it like a Terminator Replicant... it it engineered for a particular life-cycle, and then it starts to die.

The days of engineering cars to last forever are over.

But the good news is that, in most cases, these cars are better than ever.

A good article in Sportscar Market News highlighted the class action suit about the IMS bearing failure. It impacted 10% of cars. This was a huge disaster for Porsche, but it also means 90% of the cars did not have a problem.

So the math is this.... lease/buy a new 911 and take a $50-60K depreciation hit, or buy that same car 5 years old for $40K with a less than 10% risk of a catastrophic $30K engine failure.

In my experience a 5 year-old Porsche with 60K miles is still a pretty good car that should give you years of great, and trouble-free performance.

IMHO, for the same money, I'd go for a 997 over a 996 Turbo. It's a newer model, and has better styling and a nicer interior.

race911

What catastrophic engine failures have been reported on 9A1 engined cars? Because those are now the five year old models.

A quick check of Autotrader shows 4 '09s and 3 '10s even under $50K, with an 85K mile outlier at $38.5. Wholesale? I suppose, but when I was looking hard 6-8 weeks ago none of my sources were able to turn me on to anything.

redridge

sorry, but the 996 Turbo's are very good cars... the best car for the money out there. As for looks... well the OP thinks its a good looking car. Between the 3 cars mentioned, the 997.2 C4S is a gorgeous car and the the DFI engine seems to have minor problems (sludge).

JCP911S

I'm just pointing out the Cost/Risk/Benefit financial equation of buying high-end used cars.

Unless one owns a magic crystal, neither you, me, or anyone else can predict the failure rate of new engines that have not failed yet... 9A1 or not.

The 10% failure rate on the IMS bearings is documented in the Class Action Suit. I have to believe this is a worse-case scenario for risk analysis purposes... Porsche did step up here, and admit guilt, and historically, Porsche do a pretty good job of addressing engineering F-Ups and fixing them.

So my point is simply that a buyer must weigh the guaranteed loss of $50-60K on a new car vs some indeterminate, but probably way less than 10% chance of incurring a catastrophic $30K engine failure.

If the individual buyer is comfortable with that risk equation, then buying the used car that they want is probably a financially beneficial decision.

race911

Not sure where the $30K comes from. Friend is having a '99 engine rebuilt right now--from a broken crank. (He's our BMWCCA Chief Instructor, ex Club Racer, and original owner of this car that's seen ~15 years of not-terribly hard track use). Going to run him $15K, retail from a shop that really isn't doing him any favors.

Anyway, haven't heard of anything even remotely catastrophic in the 9A1 engines. Have one good friend with a Porsche specialty shop, and another racer friend is lead mechanic at a Bay Area dealer + just came off of being PCA Tech Chair. Neither seems to be worried as these cars age.

911Dave

With due respect to your knowledge and experience, Steve, I think these comments overstate the issue.

From all I've learned from researching the problem, the IMS failure issue has been shown to be almost completely isolated to '99 to early '05 cars. Late '05-on 997 IMS bearing failure, at least so far, has occurred with no more frequency than would be expected if there were no design flaw.

To say things like "avoid at ALL costs" and "stay FAR FAR away" isn't very well considered advice in my opinion. Even if the M97 engines sometimes exhibit some other minor issues, that doesn't make them any different than any other 911 engine Porsche has ever produced. All of them have their known issues. None of them are major enough to advise anyone to run away from a car. Even the M96 engine has a relatively cheap solution from LN Engineering that will avoid the IMS failure problem, so considering how cheap one can pick up a 996, it makes it a very viable and attractive proposition. The main problem with the 996 is its bland looks and hideous headlights.

I'm sure you know this and it was just a clerical error, but the 9A1 engine was introduced with the '09 model year, rather than 2010.

Amber Gramps

https://rennlist.com/forums/996-foru...ferrerid=89287