asellus

I hope you eventually see the irony in calling someone a keyboard tough guy follow immediately by puffing your chest and inviting someone to a physical altercation.

Please, show me the statistics that illustrate this "quite a few" metric you're quoting. I'll save you some time and let you know that people posting about it on rennlist are an extreme minority of Porsche owners -- I'm talking about an unbiased sampling. You know, the information Porsche has at their disposal.

Guzzgreg

Correct. I have spoken to a number of people from the POC who all say these are absolutely serviceable transmissions and you can replace parts on them. If they had come to me and said simply look this and this wore out, they shouldn’t have but they did, we will FIX the parts and it will cost you 3 or 4K. I would not have been pleased but I would have then said ok it’s out of warranty I live with the cost. But They do not fix they replace. That is my major complaint being as this is a know problem.

Guzzgreg

Never said a PHYSICAL altercation...READ discuss is what I said. But in any event if you read my original post I said the SA said this is not uncommon and that they just last week had a Macon with low miles with the same condition. AND the fact that there is a long thread about how to fix this “problem” should be enough to tell you that this is happening enough that there needs to be info on how to service and fix the problem. If you do a search the post comes up and is very informative by PV997.

Bxstr

Unfortunate that this happened, never like reading these stories and I understand the frustration. When you buy a car like this, you expect it to be reliable throughout a reasonable amount of time or mileage. If this happened at 100-200k, that is understandable. But at 23k, that is very early. Someone I know had their transmission fail at around 300 miles on their brand new PDK Cayman.

I would first talk with the dealer and make sure you're getting a refurbished unit. That should be much more reasonably priced. I would also check and see if they're willing to price match to someone online like Sunset or Sonnen Porsche Parts. I think I have seen refurbished PDK's through them for around $8k, but don't quote me exactly. Then you'll have labor.

Not that it makes you feel better, but at 78k miles the DSG transmission in my Audi S4 needed to be replaced. The dual clutch transmissions are great. They don't fail often but when they do, it is extremely expensive, in my case it was 6 weeks without my car and $11k, which was covered under Fidelity warranty. Our family had an IMS bearing go on a Boxster years ago and that was completely out of pocket.

The mechanical aspect of the PDK is probably fine. It is probably a sensor inside of the transmission that is faulty and Porsche refuses to repair these units. Until someone is repairing these for a reasonable cost, sub $5k, I will not be buying one unfortunately, even though I really do like dual clutch transmissions. At least not without warranty.

Again, hope you're able to get it covered and keep us posted.

asellus

Oh I'm well aware that the small number of people who have had PDK failures are very vocal, and many of them, like you, do not wish to abide by the standard Porsche procedure of "make sure it's the PDK, then replace it as a whole". As such a lot of research done by a few people has revealed a few suggestions on potential issues.

Unfortunately, you're not going to convince a Porsche tech to go off-book and start taking apart a PDK to replace individual components. It's simply not worth the time to train and supply all the techs for that. That's why they huck a new transmission at it, send the broken one to a central location to be repaired, and reissue it out to the next guy who needs one. It's just how these things work at scale.

Look at VANOS on an e39 M5 -- the most common failure is a broken solder joint, but they'd just replace the whole $2600 unit if it had problems. BMW never acknowledged this BUT they did make a change in later years, adding a set screw plate on the solenoids to keep them from vibrating so much and breaking solder joints. I'm sure Porsche has identified some common failure points and made updates to the transmission accordingly. This is one of the main reasons why people make the argument to not buy first-year car models.

Purekoryo

It probably is something like a sensor or something within the valve train that’s stuck.

It’s out of warranty. Just go to several different shops and ask around. I’m sure you’ll find one that’s willing to diagnose further. Hell it may be something as simple pie.

There are quite a few folks who’s making 2x more torque from their modded / tuned cars and haven’t heard of any catastrophic failures. Just that it slips at certain point which obviously is a given. So we know these are tough mechanically. But just like any other German cars, it can be very finicky.

I have a foxwell diagnostic device and I remember seeing a few features where it allows you to test and diagnose PDK. You may also want to just have a shop flush out the fluid and see if they find anything. If not, again it may be something A LOT cheaper than $16K!

Worst case scenario, check out eBay. You may find a slightly used one for $3K-$4K and pay a shop $1.5- $2K to swap it.

I feel for you though. I recently traded in my old 718 GTS for a used 2018 991.2 GTS and already having water pump / overheating issues at only 26K miles. Luckily I’m under factory warranty and the SA immediately eluded that its not uncommon to have internal water pump leak and get into the vacuum system where it controls vital components like the coolant shutoff valve and PDK cooling!

At the end of the day, I absolutely agree that this is completely unacceptable for a 100K+ car and having the reputation of being one of the most reliable high end automobile.

Just keep calm, be tactful, think forward on actionable solutions.

Purekoryo

BTW: I had plans to tune my car next year but this gives me more reason not to! Probably better off focusing on suspension mods.

Guzzgreg

Thank you.

Guzzgreg

Again from my research it seems to be the hydraulic portion of the Tranny not the mechanical, so I’m waiting to hear from someone who has done the repair I described to get feedback before I move forward.

Purekoryo

Keep us posted. Hopefully just a stuck check valve! Has the fluid been changed? Not sure what the PM time interval is but lubricants generally degrade (oxidize) exponentially at around the 5 year mark.

asellus

https://pictures.dealer.com/porscheo...c236bb8451.pdf

Good idea, but it looks like their published interval is 120k/12yr. At least it isn't a "lifetime fluid" !

Purekoryo

Wow! That was unexpected. I thought it’d be something like 60K miles / 6 years.

asellus

Same. I recall my .2 being 60k but just checked my booklet.. it says 120k as well. Maybe I just told myself I'd do it at 60k instead.

NJ991

This is one reason why I didn’t want a PDK for long term any more. It’s not serviceable (supposedly) and comes with a hefty price tag to replace. I would only own one of these newer Porsches with a warranty. I’m hoping PCNA comes through with a favorable decision for you. Regardless of age, 23k mile failure is unacceptable.

My991

Seems that the MT backup switch breaks more frequently (won’t pass state inspection) and they swap the transmission for that too. Just keep your fingers crossed that it’s not you next.