Yep! I drive the car so the bearings get a work out
Here's part of my view. The car sits? The bearing if leaking set the ball bearings up to take a dry spin on start and have a mark which is the beginning of their downfalls. Whatevers.

You make me feel like I'm not the only one getting tired of IMS this and RMS that. AGGHHHH!!!!!! Exxon Valdez or what

 

Excellent point, best explaination yet.
The sealed bearings grease over time gets washed out with engine oil. When the engine sits for prolonged periods the oil the worked its way into the bearing runs out. The oil that ran out needs running engine time to get replenished. This period is probably when the bearing is most likely to fail.
Anyone else want to chime in on this theory?

 

My understanding is the bearings are all sealed from factory. Double row bearings initially and later single row bearings. If the car sit's for a while corrosion, etc "could" damage the bearing and cause the grease to exit the bearing. Dry bearings and you have a big problem. This appears to be the redesign of LN bearings since they are not sealed and are lubricated by the engine oil not the sealed grease in the original bearing. Another theory could be that you run the car at constant high temperatures and the seal in the bearing wears and the grease escapes causing again a dry bearing. Does clean oil at 5000 miles intervals decrease the breakdown of the bearing seal. Who knows....while postulating contributing theories I am guessing a little user abuse and long service interval don's help the bearings shelf life. If we all examined our engines and found bone dry engines at the engine-transmission junction would we be better off? I have often asked myself if the folks that have engine failures examined their engines to see how dry they were prior to the failures. The story that your are putting along 30 mph and "bang" engine failure seems hard to believe considering there are thousands of these cars on the road and Porche has consistently use the IMS for decades. Like Jake said these are only “wild *** guesses”.

 

Porsche has used an IMS since the 4 Cam Carrera engine, in the day it was called a "layshaft". The same design is found in the 911 starting from day one, with the same function as the modern day IMS.

The difference is the fact that 4 cam Carrera engines and aircooled 911s used plain bearings to support their versions of an IMS. These plain bearings are inserts that receive lubrication from the engine's oil.
The IMS used in the M96 uses a roller bearing that is sealed from the engine's lubrication.

Until Porsche applied this roller bearing and sealed it up failures like are being seen today never existed, even with poor maintenance.

The future will hold some radically new parts for the M96 with a throwback to yesterday in their design, but it won't be coming from Porsche.

I have many, many different ideas about what impacts the IMS bearing failure, but I dare not mention them in public...

 

Called the local dealer,they said IMS not a issue except on a couple early Boxsters and not to worrry. No preventitive maintence procedures. So no problem ? !

 

No problem until it happens to you.

 

That is sort of stunning. I bought my car independently, but know the guys at the local dealer including sales manager and service advisor. They all recommended an aftermarket warranty specifically because of IMS/RMS!

 

Ask them to put that in writing and give you a warranty.

 

I haven't seen an aftermarket warranty worth it's cost yet. I hate dealing with them and no longer honor them, too many hassles and tired of being stiffed!

 

That dealer should be ashamed. Besides not knowing their asses from a hole in the ground, they seem to have fallen prey to the habit of lumping all M96 engine problems over a decade and a half of development into one bucket, which is partly why there is so much hysteria.

AFAIK, the only major problems specific to early Boxsters were porous blocks and slipped sleeves, in addition to which they had more than their share of rear main seal failures (some of which ended up as engine replacements because of errors made with a Porsche diagnostic tool, and this didn't help the rumour mill, either).

I wouldn't let these guys touch my car, if I were you. Sorry to be so blunt, but the misinformation on this stuff is galling sometimes...

 

I've spoken to a dealer also, both directly with a tech/parts guy + a service advisor who said they'd seen two failures in the last 6 years or so. The advisor told me I could get a warranty if I was concerned with the durability of the engine to put my mind at ease, but he also said that he believes likely worst case it would come in handy for the air oil separator...

I instruct for the PCA amongst others, and I'm personally on my second 996. I have several friends with 996s and Boxsters that are regularly tracked and/or daily drivers. I've seen an RMS, an air oil separator a window regulator, a door latch and a seat belt buckle. That is out 6 cars I know personally, and over a dozen I've come in contact with and see regularly. I may be forgetting something small, but that's the extent I've seen. I have to imagine this issue is getting a bit blown out of proportion. I find even 10% VERY hard to believe. My last 996 (a 1999) was THE most reliable car I've ever owned, and needed absolutely nothing over the course of almost 40k miles. Just sharing another data point...

 

The whole problem is no one knows...
I've heard of engines going in for service and an IMS problem being found and the Dealer swapped the engine without even telling the customer. Thats fairly bazaar and hard to believe, but I know two people that had it happen to them after their cars were out of warranty..

I wonder whop paid the bill? Porsche

 

A broken record, but............Porsche would not pay for the bearing upgrade on my 2003 C4S, but they paid for the labor and for the IMS/RMS seals and new IMS flange/bolt assembly three times after it occurred at 60K miles on the car - one time out of warranty.

To replace the IMS bearing it was about a $ 1200 service/parts to break down the engine and install the LN Engineering upgrade, which I decided against and sold the car. I figured Porsche would only pay out of warranty once and I had low confidence in the car's reliability at that point relative to this issue. Once you lose confidence in reliabilty in a car, that is it..........for me......and I have been pretty tolerant, i.e happened to me 3 times.........too many....

The IMS leaked on me 3 times in 22K miles after 60K miles on the car and the design with the weak OEM bearing caused the seal leaking issues/tears according to dealer techs, etc.

As mentioned, Porsche paid all the costs once out of warranty and acknowledged the design challenge. (Guess that is why new base 997.2 engine does not have IMS design, eliminated, after 10 years of having fingers crossed that incidence of this ocurrence would not be too high and Porschephiles would be flexible in accepting the issue.....)

In Germany, my friends tell me, the engines were swapped out very readily........closer to the home base I guess.......

In the end, my service tech/s advised me to sell the car, especially since once a car has this issue, it seems to be a repeat problem, if bearing is not upgraded in their experience - this is feedback from large or experienced dealers - Champion - FL, J. Ellis and Hennessey - GA, Tischer- MD and Newport Beach dealer service contacts. A pretty broad sampling across the country in my questioning and informal survey of the issue albiet not scientific, but don't expect Porsche to publish the numbers of failure on this............

I asked them all the percentage of cars with the leaking issue related to the IMS/RMS and the average response was about 3 in 10 cars with 1-3 owners dealing with the issue, others not fixing. Some people will live with the leaks.........therefore people think the issue is not a major one.......basically under reported......

Porsche NA warranty advisor did not disagree or agree with the statistics...............speaks volumes for doing a PPI on any car but especially a 996..........IMHO......

 

.....

 

Come on Jake...I have to call BS on this one. Do you really believe this? P dealers swapping customers engines without their knowledge, even out of warranty. Why? Perhaps the secret agent government officials that contacted you were onto these dealerships and they got rid of these engines to destroy evidence. LOL Your stories keep getting better and better.

Let me get this straight. Disgruntled 996 owners who contact PCNA for assistance with blown engines are told to get lost but others without even having knowledge of their impending IMS problems are secretly having their engines replaced by dealerships. Am I missing something?

Maybe Santa Clause paid the bill. Did these mysterious engine swaps occur on Christmas Eve? If my IMS does go, I hope it grenades on Dec. 24th.