christallon

Hi,

I saw an ad for a set of 993 cylinders with an earlier "pre-head gasket set of 964 pistons". Apparently the difference between the 993 pistons and 964 pistons is the wrist pins, therefore I'm told one can use the 993 cylinders and earlier pistons without an issue. My car will eventually require the update from the notorious "no head-gasket senario" so I thought I'd buy these and put them away for when they are needed. Is this what you would do in my shoes, or should I just pony up for new P's and C's. The set is tempting at $600. I imagine brand new they are quite north of that.

Thoughts?

Cheers.

ilko

If the car doesn't leak I wouldn't bother buying parts for an engine rebuild just yet

Just to clarify, not all early cars had the issue with oil leaks. Some cars were not broken in properly and developed leaks. Others are fine. Which one do you have?

race911

There are enough parts floating around that I wouldn't really worry about squirreling away what you may never need. And I'm funny in the respect of not mixing up p's and c's.

christallon

I don't know yet. Picking up the car next weekend. It is the earlier 91, so no groove, this I do know. PPI showed 2-4% on one bank and 6-8% on the other. Compression at 5200 ft was 150-160, so at sea level more like 175-185 across all 6 cylinders.

race911

Someone who is more current than me can help you out more correctly, but the early 3.6L engines I had to do from owner abuse, the machinist I used was able to touch things up for one reuse. The one guy who raced his, and was Mr. I-can't-shift-to-save-my-life, it was really, really iffy to to it a third time. Was mainly about the metal transfer from cylinder to head. It's slightly beveled to seal into the head.

Obviously, this all became a moot point in the mid '90's when it became common practice to use the '92+ p's and c's. (And the early cylinders, with an AASE spacer behind the cylinder on a bored spigot 3.0/3.2/3.3 case with a 74.4 crank made a slick, cheap 3.5L 8.2:1 engine.)