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Edit: sorry for the incomplete typo title. Fat fingers and I accidentally hotkeyed "post" before finishing.
Anyways, here is the question:
Just picked up this 40 Jahre Anniversary Edition #533 and have realized it's got the wrong engine in it. By all signs, it does NOT have the X51 engine that it's supposed to.
I am bummed as this wasn't noted on the PPI I paid for and in my excitement to have the car, I obviously missed this expensive detail. However, I did still get the car for a good price and now that I'm coming to terms with this discovery, mostly want to know what could have happened and if there's any way I can source an appropriate X51.
As you can see from the photos, the car has the appropriate badging and the interior is definitely correct with the perforated leather. Engine serial looks like M96/0366215260 with no S designation and the intake manifold is definitely the standard plastic, so I'm guessing someone must have swapped out the X51 at some point.
According to the CarFax, the car bounced around Missouri through 2007 and then moved to Illinois in 2010 before being imported to BC, Canada in 2015 where the previous owner had it.
I will be asking the previous owner if he knows anything about it, but my guess is he may not know much as he was a genuine person and had very limited tech knowledge when we discussed the sale.
M96/0366215260 as far as I can tell
Last edited by TexSquirrel; 06-23-2024 at 07:56 PM.
Reason: Did not finish posting
I remember a customer that brought in his 30k miles 40th AE that he had just bought from his Cousin and the IMSB had catastrophically failed ( this was before the Class Action Lawsuit on the IMSB issue).
I remember we quoted him a price to rebuild the X51 engine, then a price to replace with a factory reman, .. Then he wanted to find a used engine and wanted me to swap all the X51 parts over to the standard engine..so I quoted him to do it that......then he finally found a used X51 engine ( but still had the frail single row factory IMSB) so I upgraded the IMSB and installed his sourced used X51 engine and sent him on his way...
A used X51 engine in good condition will be hard to find...Good luck !!
Can't you step back from the purchasing agreement due to it not being as advertised? Or does it have a clause along the lines of 'what you see is what you get'?
Can't you step back from the purchasing agreement due to it not being as advertised? Or does it have a clause along the lines of 'what you see is what you get'?
I wonder this myself, do Canadien laws protect you in any way ?
How was the car advertised ? - curious as to the current mileage
I doubt you can put an X51 back in for under $15k incl. the sale of your engine. They are rare & expensive.
I remember a post where someone had requested a quote for a replacement 3.4 and a replacement 3.4 X51. The former was about 15 grand, the latter around 30. Old news and not the right displacement but that should give you an idea of what to expect.
Can't you step back from the purchasing agreement due to it not being as advertised? Or does it have a clause along the lines of 'what you see is what you get'?
Originally Posted by Fracture
I wonder this myself, do Canadien laws protect you in any way ?
How was the car advertised ?
I've owned the car for about a month already and also put a bunch of work into it through a local shop as it had a bunch of deferred maintenance.
The car was never advertised - I connected with the seller through word of mouth as a friend of a friend heard he was thinking of selling. He thought the car was in perfect original condition but had also only done 6 oil changes in 9 years of ownership and had fairly limited knowledge of the car's technical details. We agreed on a purchase price prior to a PPI and when the PPI picked up on a coolant leak and cam solenoid oil leak we renegotiated. Disappointed that the shop didn't mention anything about the engine missing x51 features even though they clearly recognized it as a 40th AE.
Originally Posted by Haalex
How much did you pay for the car?
The car has just over 60k miles and I bought it for just under $32k USD after the dollar conversion.
At that price and given how much I've enjoyed the car as is, I feel like keeping it until it needs an engine rebuild (light bore scoring on PPI without symptoms) and then upgrading to the x51 when the engine comes out ends up being a fair deal and saves the headache of trying to reverse things with the previous owner.
Last edited by connect_yvr; 06-23-2024 at 12:16 PM.
Reason: Wrong mileage
The biggest challenge we all have is that we want and we want NOW. You have a great car. Take your time and figure out your next steps with it.
Maybe you collect x51 parts over the next 5 - 10 years and then rebuild the entire engine. Maybe you just opt for a 4.0+ rebuild and no x51. Maybe you just drive it and enjoy it and worry about it later. At the end of the day, you can do what makes the most sense for you.
I am curious; did you reach out to the indy that performed the PPI and make them aware that the car doesn't have the correct X51 engine in it? And if so, what was their response? That's a big miss.
I am curious; did you reach out to the indy that performed the PPI and make them aware that the car doesn't have the correct X51 engine in it? And if so, what was their response? That's a big miss.
No I haven't reached out. Definitely a big miss. They have a great reputation in the community here and did pick up a lot of issues with the condition of the car which helped me bargain down the price substantially, but their approach felt very cookie cutter and I wasn't really able to make specific requests with the PPI. I don't think I'm going to bother reaching out again as the car is mine anyways and I won't be going back to them for work after that experience.
This smells like lawsuit to me, but then again you say it has signs of bore scoring? Why buy it at all?
My understanding is that almost all M96s will have bore scoring on borescope at this point, unless they are extremely low mileage, simply due to the construction properties of the engine (Lokasil cylinder sleeve, asymmetric piston design with thrust-side friction point). The scoring that was seen is very light (images reviewed by two independent Porsche indys) and the car has no symptoms/signs (no sooty tail pipes, ticking, smoke on start-up; oil consumption and UOA TBD).
With light asymptomatic bore scoring, I'm hoping the engine will run just fine with proper oil changes for at least 5-10 years before any critical symptoms develop (I will probably average 2k miles per year max as I cycle for daily commuting and most community access and this is a second car), at which point it will need a rebuild, just as all engines do with enough age/running. This is a 20 year old car - I didn't buy it expecting it to run like new, nor was it priced that way. Knowing the history/flaws of the M96, I budgeted for this purchase with a rebuild in mind, so I still feel pretty good about my purchase despite some issues.
06-22-2024, 05:17 PM
New (to me) 40th AE with the "wrong" engine
