Wachuko

Ok, here it goes. This is a long post but I promise that after I am done with this there is going to be a good post for future use, at least I hope. I have been reading a lot of the posts here, in
http://www.smartgroups.com/message/l...96258&ref=send
, and in
http://www.pcapotomac.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi
regarding the 964 and a top end rebuild. I have found estimates of getting this done, surveys that have helped me determine the likelihood or need for a rebuild, etc. Great stuff! I still have a few questions.

My car is a 1991 C4 Cabriolet with 40,275 miles. The car was serviced, for most of its life, by AMAG since it was originally imported into Switzerland (thanks Adrian Streather for the initial hints as to where to start looking). A letter to AMAG gave me all the service history of the car while in Switzerland. Clutch, pressure plate and flywheel were changed three times during a 4 year period. The distributor has the ventilation kit installed. After that the owner moved to the US and the car had a speedometer changed from kph to mph.

Here is the information from the plate in the engine area:TS-No. 1P50-37---AMAG-No. 026676

Here is the information on the car from the Certificate of Authenticity from Porsche:
Identification Number: WP0ZZZ96ZMS451067
Model Year/Type: 1991 911 CARRERA 4 CABRIOLET
Engine Number: 62M04287
Transmission Number: 3M00645
Exterior Paint Color/Code: GUARDS RED WITH BLACK TOP-G1V9
Interior Material Color/Type: BLACK PARTIAL LEATHER/LT

Optional Equipment: VERSION FOR SWITZERLAND, TINTED WINDSHIELD,AIR CONDITIONING

The car, at some point, received a change from the narrow body to the wide body, some other cosmetic changes (17inch Turbo wheels, tear drop mirrors), and lowered (although I do not know how to determine the suspension setup).

The PPI came out without any issues. And the wide body conversion was not done due to a crash or accident. There were no apparent signs of body damage/repair. I was told that it was completely respray/repainted when the conversion was done.

I have this tendency of changing all I can change when I buy a car to feel confident that I would not have any major problems later. So after taking possession of the car I did an oil change, valve cover seal replacement, valves adjustment, detailing of the engine, changed all the oil hoses that are next to the oil tank area, hood shocks, etc. While doing the valve adjustment a head bolt broke and went flying in my garage. The car had only 32k miles at the time and I had only had it for two weeks! That was approximately 1 ½ years ago. I kept using the car with always the worry of a road breakdown. That has taken a lot of the fun and enjoyment. I would like to be trouble free or at least have peace of mind when I go out for a drive. (BTW, I want to thank Bill Wagner for a lot of the answers to questions I have posted in the Potomac region website, regarding this and other issues).

Ok, so to have peace on mind and fully enjoy my baby for years to come, I have decided to fork over the cash (or credit cards) and get a top engine rebuild done. It scares me to see stories like Thom's. So, unless there are other recommendations, I will most likely use the authorized Porsche dealer here in Orlando to do the work.

The car is never on the track, since is a Cabriolet, PCA requires a roll cage. I am always with the family and a roll cage would not allow me to carry my daughter in the back. So racing considerations are not an issue.

The questions:

1.What is involved in a top end rebuild?
2.Do they automatically change all parts or only if there is an indication of damage (valves, springs, piston rings)? Or better yet, what do they automatically change and what is changed only subject to inspection?
3.Head bolts. I asked about having them (the Porsche Authorize Service Department here in Orlando, FL) install the Raceware bolts and the answer was that they could install them but any failures due to the bolts would no be covered. The Porsche dealer will only warranty the work if they use genuine Porsche parts (why am I not surprise… . Any input on this? It is a two-year warranty that would be at risk.
4.This is one of the most important questions I need your help with. Since the engine is out. What preventive work should I get done? From reading I got the following: clutch, change the distributor belt (if it is with Porsche they would change the distributor unit, what are we talking about in terms of $$$?), change gearbox fluid, differential fluid, steering fluid. What about oil sending unit, alternator, oil return tubes, top and bottom valve covers (are these covers prone to wrap like on the early 911, any other sensor that tend to break/fail with time, any other items????????
5.Any advantages of going with an independent service shop? The one that I asked would charge me a different hourly rate if I brought the parts vs if I had them provide the parts. They should have a fixed rate. Have not check any other service shops.
6.I am probably missing something here. Please comment in any other area that requires attention.

Thanks!
Jaime O. Diaz (a.k.a. Wachuko)

Wachuko

I stopped by the Authorized Porsche Service Center and asked the same questions posted here. Here is what I got as a response.

In respect to parts. They were telling me that I am probably overdoing it. If the car is running fine, not smoking, not leaking oil, etc. Then all I need to do is replace all 24 head studs (791.04 -20% discount=632.83), get a engine gasket set (US$232.49 -20% discount=US$186.00), crankcase gasket set (US$71.07 -20% discount=US$56.87) and about 30 hours of labor. If I add the clutch to the list is another US$480.00.

So I am looking at close to US$4,500.00 for everything.

They also told me that they have customers that are running their cars 20-40k miles without changing one or two broken head bolts. It all depended on how I treat it the car and the condition (oil leaks, loss of power, etc). That I could probably continue to use the car without any major concerns. But if it was for my peace of mind that they were more than willing to get my business.

Now the not so good news. Since my car is an European model (gray market car) they cannot give me the two years warranty because they lack the backing from PCNA to provide this warranty in European cars. They would stand behind their work but cannot provide the two years. x() !@#@%@#%@# I asked them then of what was the difference between getting the work done with them or with an independent service provider. All I got was the assurance of a Porsche authorized service department and if I was to sell the car later, the documents that all work was done at a Porsche authorize shop.

Thom Fitzpatrick

I say blow off the dealer, find a good independent shop, and use the RaceWare h/w.

I drove somewhere between 1000-2000 miles on 2 broken studs (opposite sides of the engine), and found significant leakage between the head and cylinder when we tore it down. It slowed the car down slightly, but didn't sound like a hoopty or anything.

Bill Wagner

Hi Jaime:

Thanks for the compliment, but I think you've helped me more than I've helped you (you gave me the maintenance schedule right after I got the car in January plus info about doing the valve adjustment...thanks again!!).

I think the shop is right in that the work you originally requested is a bit on the over kill side. The only problem I would "pre-emptively" fix on my car would be the replacement of the Freudenberg dual mass flywheel, but it sounds as if it may already be replaced by a LUK on your car anyway (that would need to be confirmed, but I suspect a failing Freudenberg is why you see so many clutch/flywheel jobs showing up on your car).

Since the dealership won't warrantee their work (I would call PCNA for confirmation of that...it is after all still a Porsche and it IS in North America ) it might be a good idea to shop around with independents. You'll need to check the local independents out CAREFULLY. Up here in Northern VA I recently had a problem with one of the local independent shops. If you looked at the PCA site posts about them, they appeared to walk on water, but when I mentioned I had problems with a shop in that area (implying them) I got a barrage of e-mails, some of which were horror stories, about that shop. People won't post stuff like that publicly, I assume out of the fear of lawsuits. If the work done in Switzerland was done by a Porsche dealership (i.e. Porsche trained personnel) I think they would really almost have to honor their warranty claims. It's not like the Swiss version has a Chevy V8 in it

I would check your engine serial number and see if car has the updated cylinders. Most '91 models do as the change occured in the early part of production. If you don't have this info already, here it is again:

62 M 06836, M64.01 for manual transmission

62 M 52757, M64.02 for Tiptronic transmissions

Any car with a serial numbers that precludes or matches the serial numbers above will not have the cylinder head gaskets installed.

If possible, go with the raceware studs anyway. I think someone on this site posted some instructions for installing them (apparently they need to be "prepped").

Hope this helps,

Bill Wagner

Iant

Jamie, Quick question to follow this up, I to have a Porsche imported from Switzerland. Adrian(thanks Adrian) pointed me in the direction of AMAG to follow up the history ect. I got an email with details of when the car was impoted INTO Switzerland but AMAG referred me to the 2 dealers who had carried out the servicing on the car to find out any details on the servicing. Is this what you did and if so how did you go abaout it?
Thanks

JeremyW964

If you are interested in a little travel - I use a great wrench in St. Petersburg. He is working on my C2 as we speak. Let me know if you are interested - I know people ship him cars from all over.

Thom Fitzpatrick

What is this 'prepping'? I bought RW head studs and rod bolts for my engine, and the instructions that came with them didn't mention any 'prepping' - is the RaceWare guy still on here?

Bill Wagner

Thom:

Sorry I didn't get back to you earlier.

Raceware makes many different studs, so this may not apply to a 964 engine. I read in a post (where I don't remember) that Racewares needed to be, I don't know how to describe it, maybe "torque stretched" where you have to do something like torque them down to a specific setting prior to actually using them, back them out, and when ready use them they will be pre-stretched, which I think is supposed to stop the studs from coming loose as they heat. The post said the process was outlined in the RaceWare instructions, so if yours don't have the instructions, they may not apply at all.

Do a site-search or call RaceWare if you're worried. I don't remember where I read that post....sorry.

Good Luck,

Bill Wagner

Wachuko

Iant, in my case, all the work was done by AMAG so they provided the service history up to the point where the car was exported to the US.

Wachuko

Ok, folks, I asked around. In several of the shops close to home (JeremyW964, thanks for the offer but I would prefer to have it close by, I want to see how it looks and take some video or pictures along the way), they give me a different price if I provide the parts or if they do. Overall, the price is about the same as if I go with the Porsche shop... so... I will drop the car this Monday at the Porsche shop and will post the results.

Thanks again!

Wachuko

Some photos of the work in progress... Let me know if you cannot access them...
http://communities.msn.com/WachukoToys/shoebox.msnw

Wachuko

Let me try posting a photo directly...

Wachuko

It worked! Here is another photo... first frame is the culprit that started it all.

Wachuko

and another one...

Wachuko

Ok, so far so good. It is sad looking at my engine scatter all over a workbench.

The folks at Porsche have been very patient with me. I was there yesterday all afternoon and this morning while David was dismantling the engine and he was answering all my questions letting me know how everything looked as he was taking stuff out. He takes stuff out clean it, put it aside, keeps dismantling and cleaning. It will look very nice when it is done. Excellent folks!

The clutch is in perfect condition and they told me that I do not need to put a new one in. But I guess, since it is all out and there is no additional charge for putting back the old one or a new one(except for the cost of the parts, of course), I will go ahead and have a new one put in. The flywheel is the updated version and it is in perfect shape.

Head temperature sensor is the updated (two wire) version and it is in top condition.

The heads are the original heads. What they told me is that they should sit back and seal without problems. No need to replace them for the new style.

Valves look good.

There is a broken exhaust bolt/stud that will also need replacing.

There were no additional oil leaks in the rest of the engine. Nevertheless, they will replace all seals along the way.

There were 12 studs out already and 8 new installed when I got there this morning. The new ones are thicker and treaded almost all the way (all but about a ¼"- ½").

I will provide a list of parts and their part number that were used. I will do when all is done.

I want to thank everyone for giving input to stuff I should replace since the engine is out.

Please keep the suggestion coming…