sydneyman

so i was washing the car a few days ago and went to move it so it would dry in the shade. When i started it up, i noticed a light knocking sound from the top of the engine... uh oh...

i got the car under the carport and used a screw driver (mechanic's stethoscope) to determine that the sound was loudest in the middle of my valve cover, directly on top. uh oh again... i shut the car off and had it towed to my indy today. Pete and I guessed that it was probably a worn pad that was about to let go so it was paramount to replace it before the chain snags on the pad holder and crack the tensioner... By the way, list price on those bad boys is almost 1900.00!!!! and a REBUILT tensioner is 2200!!!!!

But no-
Pete calls me back a few hours later to tell me that my exhaust cam has lost 4 teeth where the chain attaches... and the car was still in time! huuuuuuuuuuuge relief! although now the cam has to be shipped from Porsche in Germany and will be around a grand just for the part.


other than that, i found out my pool needs a new liner yesterday! My "doctors without borders" friend would tell me these are first world problems...

odurandina

looks like a 'while you're in there....' situation shaping up.

coulda been worse.

best wishes.

sydneyman

thanks OD! i have a feeling its going in that direction as well. oh well! and since you were kind enough not to say anything, i'll go ahead and say it: im probably looking at half a v8 conersion just to replace a cam!

odb812

My car was missing 5 teeth on the intake and 2 on the exhaust when I got it. That was a good enough excuse for a set of JME cams.

odurandina

my first thought was to post 3 letters.

sbc.


next to the Cayenne, ours is probably the best Porsche engine ever... yet, for mere mortals, it's still a big problem when something goes wrong. and no, i'm not wrenching this motor and breaking something. and despite that they are very reasonable to maintain, i don't have much patience for the Porsche 4 platforms anymore. by today's standards, it's an expensive, upper-middle performance, semi-exotic engine with many expensive, parts (that wear).

if you get a reasonably priced 346 c.i. LS1, you'll be driving an amazing car without a lot of expensive stuff that can break -- in a relatively short time....


btw, just a random thought.... per the V6 being discussed on the other forum, i purchased a high-mileage '85 bgn in 1989. not soon after, i sold the turbo V6 engine for a few thousand dollars and installed a freshly rebuilt chevy 350... the engine cost like, $1,500 and put out 325 hp.... don't yet know what that kind of power feels like in one of our cars, but i can only imagine.... a couple years later, a friend begged me to sell him the car after i had grown to love the road manners of the 944.

but i never stopped loving that V8 engine.

timing belt ? nope.

timing chain ? nope.

gear drive. bit of a whine at idle.

sydneyman

wow! was your timing intact? or did you have some valve issues...

and i thought about getting some cams from michael mount or somebody but my indy talked me out of it... hes a bit of a stickler for oem which is fine by me...

haha i know you were sweating trying not to type that.

fortysixandtwo

First world problem, eh.
http://www.quickmeme.com/meme/3q5fym/

wpb968

Sorry about your cam failure. I have a set of OEM cams for sale from my spare 968 motor in great condition. $525 shipped to you. Good luck with your repair.

Thanks,
Steve

sydneyman

making me late to work with that website... those are hilarious

thanks steve, i think i might take you up on that! I'll let you know today!

Chris

odb812

Timing was in tact, no other issues. I'm not sure how long the car was driven like that too. IMA replaced the cams and they were impressed with the way it was running despite the cam gears.

wpb968

Shipped cams. Good Luck!

sydneyman

thank you sir!

RajDatta

I have never seen a 968 tensioner break. Have seen that happen on an S2 tensioner. What normally happens is the chain snaps and everything goes out of time and bam!
I would see it as 1/2 full. Could have been worse. What kind of service history do you have? How many miles? original tensioner pads? etc..

kwikt

Wow, sounds like you got a deal on the cams thanks to Steve and this forum. It's probably not as bad as you thought. Now on to getting the fricken pool fixed most importantly

sydneyman

actually thats what my indy in Hendersonville said. he actually had an S2 block with a cracked tensioner in the shop! not only that, but it was cracked down one of the spark plug holes! pads and chain were inspected at the last timing belt change 20000 miles ago and they were excellent. in fact they were in great shape yesterday. im having all of that replaced anyways along with the new timing belt service. car has 91000 miles btw. he took some pics to send to me of what happened so im looking forward to seeing exactly what happened. he was very surprised to say the least to see so many missing teeth on the exhaust cam but still be in perfect time... 1/2 full indeed!

man you and the wife... if it was up to me id put a handful of dirt in the damn thing everyday until it filled up... but no shes got to have a pool! happy wife, happ... eh you know the rest...