You know dal is correct. The transaxle codes are on top of the tranny and you can not see what they are w/o pulling the tranny. The cases are about the same IIRC. Maybe it didnt have the oil cooler line and so they thought it wasnt a turbo tranny? Some came without the line. Anyone else know more about the differences?

 

Karl - I think you are right - that's what the skunk did.

 

Dal: You know, the seller did drive the car about 200mi to deliver it to me so now I am definetly having some doubts as to the accuracy of my ppi.

Mostly I was worried about the compression numbers and the tranny...I plan on overhauling the suspension, exhaust, brakes, and adding the stage 2 kit from vitesse. If anything else breaks along the way I'll be fixing that as well. The car is going to have most of the interior gutted, cage etc for autox,de, and probably a couple of long distance races each year.

The inspection only took about 1.5hrs; how would they have been able to tell it is an NA tranny?

 

Here's a picture of where the ID stamp on the tranny is --http://www.clarks-garage.com/shop-manual/trans-04.htm. You can see it with a mirror and a light but it's super hard and difficult to clearly see. The tech might have just thought all Turbo tranny is suppose to have an oil cooler -- look underneath, do you have a coil of lines around the tranny?

Here's one way of figuring out if you have a Turbo tranny. Go for a drive at 4000rpm in 5th gear and see how fast you're going. The turbo trannies are significantly taller than n/a trannies so you should be able to back out the gearing if your speedometer is working. I can't remember the formula, but that info is somewhere out there...

 

What year is this car? As stated only the 86s came standard with coolers. The boost gauge being broken is nothing to be alarmed about. Buy an aftermarket one anyways, much more accurate.

 

Here's the spreadsheet you want: http://www.924.org/techsection/technical.htm. You'll need to enter the correct tire info. And I guess you probably want to go at 4000rpm in 4th gear (5th gear doesn't tell you much). If I read this correctly -- and someone will correct me if I'm wrong -- if you have an n/a tranny, you'll be traveling at either 69mph or 74mph. With a Turbo tranny, you'll be traveling at 85mph.

 

To take tire size out of the equation, you can also jack up the rear, put it in gear, and turn the engine by hand while counting the number of tire rotations. Then compare that the ratios of the n/a and turbo transmissions to see which you have. (I knew a guy who did this back in the 70's to return a muscle car delivered with the wrong gears -- which the dealership denied to no end).

The overfilled coolant and low compression may be telling you something. Watch the coolant for a while and see if it moves. Also keep an eye on the temp level. Head gaskets are not exactly a strong point on these cars. To have a claim against the seller, you'd propbably need to show that he intentionally misrepresented something about the car (without disclaimers in the sales agreeement). If, for example, he did get a PPI done and told you it was perfect even though it showed significant problems, then you might have a claim. Proving that would be the key to the claim. I wonder what would happen if you called the place he had inspect it, and ask them directly what they found?

 

Year model is an 87'

I will give that "road test" a try!

Tom: The head underwent a full rebuild 20,000mi ago, so I would assume it is in good shape, and the coolant temps do not fluctuate.

The ppi the seller supposedly had done is pretty much a moot point now. I never did find out where it was done and was never sent any paperwork. For all I know it could just have been a safety inspection


The car does seem to run well and I have a feeling that special tool is probably correct....This shop seems to have ALOT of 911's; only one 944 and it is an NA