Gmund48

Well you paid Kia Money for a 911 at 15K for a car that had a 80K sticker and you lost the gamble

I bought a 99 Cab wih full suspension mods for 16 and put 2K into it, I have done everything needed and have a great running car for the price of a new Kia, I live in the northwest and I am careful to keep the temps down. I also knew it would cost me 8-10 K if it went **** up

The Early 996s are a bargain BUT ITS NOT CHEAP TO REPAIR ! IF you are going to make payments
and do not have the funds you are better off with a Camaro

If you have to make payments be prepared, you could have even bought an extended warr if had less than
100K on it. You didn't do a PPI No Extended warranty and your complaining I am sorry Its not Porsches

I own 993s (3) 2 356s, several Early 911s and 12s a 77 ( which were less reliable than the 996 ) an SC and 2 collectable Carreras.

Porsches are not cheap to fix but they are great cars at that price

soverystout

+1 If I didn't do all of the routine maintence on this car it would be too costly to own. Folks who have little want/knowledge/skill to do the routine stuff on cars that are out of warranty (and expensive to repair) better have a nice stash of cash for the things that need to be maintained and for the the things that "might happen"

JRW-910

Now, that's the kind of reply I had been expecting. You are right on so many accounts. The early 996's are great cars and can be found cheaply. I even expected to do a bunch of repairs. My post wasn't about repairs... it was about catastrophic failures. These are two completely different things.

I also didn't talk about any air-cooled engines from Porsche. While I have never owned one, I have not read about any major engine problems with them compared to the 3.4L WC engine.

Finally, please tell me what shop does a complete PPI that includes an analysis of the structural integrity of the cylinder walls and heads. I will surely call them next time!

-JRW

CDLVancouver

I think pretty every shop will...just comes down to you wanting to pay 200 for a ppi or 500++ for a ppi.

mickdavis

Would a problem have been detected with a compression test? That is something that I was taught to do when inspecting a used car for purchase. I would think that it would also be part of a PPI by a shop or dealer.

JRW-910

I did not know this... exactly how is it done?

Even now, the compression is within spec... the leakdown on cylinder #2 is slightly high but within spec... they won't show you the problem... at least not in my case.

-JRW

txhokie4life

Note to self -- don't buy a 99 996 in DC :-)

I can live with the AOS, IMS (since it can be retrofitted), but the cracked cylinder liner/header
is what is really scary. Darn near impossible to detect and for the most part catastrophic.

Although not relegated just to 99's -- both Boxster and 996, I've seen/heard more about
the 99's having the issue than other years -- although I have seen other years as well (including
an 04 996! with a cracked cylinder liner).

m

Gmund48

Early cars chains, Maintainence and more maintainence MFI was great to drive but a pain to keep in tune
74-77 911s granaded at 50-70K miles total rebuild needed cars had 1 YR 12K mile warranty plus everything below
78-83 pulled head studs but if they made it they could run 300K but required a ton more maintainence Pop off valves Carrera tensioners needed
84-89 maintainence costs 3 times those of a 996 but pretty bullitproof valve adjust
yearly for $500
96-98 993 SAI light requires either a lot of luck or a 6K-8K drop and head cleaning
on USA OBD2 Models (luckily ok in Germany)

I just made a verbal deal on a turbo should be a great autobahn car

A Porsche is More reliable than most HIgh Performance Sports cars of any brand
I have driven a 99 with 230K on it with regular mainatainence

Buy a good car and maintain it Just don't think its a Kia

Catastrophic I have seen many times, in all these costing more than the car is worth, diferent Generations different Problems

IMS fix is a good Idea though thats the main cause

VGM911

+1

Grey Guy

AMEN!

jumper5836

The 996 while it has depreciated so much now and could be picked up cheap, don't let it fool you unless it comes with a new engine. It's a ticking time bomb on the wallet. Now it's so cheap that it's in the budget of a lot a people that would have never bought it while it was semi new, they would be better off with a 944 or pay a little more and get a 964.

Glad you at least got back some of what you put in to it. That Camaro is a beast.

500

The 3.4 cars typically seem to be the most talked about and there is no doubt that some do have issues. Unfortunately you are one of the unlucky ones. Although there are a lot of 996s that have been very reliable, that does not make it any easier when you are the unfortunate one. That said, at only $15K, you had quite a car. In your shoes, I would have considered replacing the IMS and then would have taken a serious look at some of the liner solutions that are out there (go check out Hartech for instance). It would not have been cheap, but it would have been a very solid motor.

These cars have a lot of good point too. Although it is fashionable to bash Porsche for bad engineering, I don’t believe that this is the truth. These engines are very sophisticated and were entirely new when they arrived on the scene. The bigger issue is that they have a high power density. That 1999 motor was rated at 87.1 hp/litre (a contemporary Corvette was 60.5). And today, that has grown to 102.9 today (for a base Carrera and 69 for a base ‘Vette). At the same time, fuel economy and emissions have significantly improved. Porsche has obviously learnt a lot in the intervening decades from the new water-cooled motors, and the 9A1 embodies a lot of the hard lessons.

Although many continue to give reliable service, there are definitely some things I would consider doing. For the earlier cars an IMS update is a very reasonable course of action, as a failed IMS caused tremendous collateral damage. Cracked cylinder walls are a noted weak point in the early 3.4s. That said, many 3.4s have gone much higher mileage with no issues (a guy local to this area is in the midst of a top-end on a 3.4 with +200K and cylinders are great). Your best bet here is being very diligent about the cooling system condition and warm-up/cool-down. Who knows how your car was treated before you got your hands on it? That said, there are surely some cars that develop issues for no real reason, it is the nature of complex mechanical devices.

As for a PPI, cylinder walls can be examined with a borescope, which is not unusual to do these days. The spark plugs have to come out for compression and leak down tests anyway.

Targatoo

Cool thread. The facts should be out there. Unfortunately, some topics on this forum become a little more like politics and religion and less like popular mechanics.

For $35,000, I've owned a car for two years that has had only one thirteen-dollar mechanical problem (a clutch switch). I could likely sell the car (in Canada) for more than $30,000. Therefore, the cost of ownership has been less than I could have expected from any other car on the market, new or used.

That said, there's a gamble. Sometimes when I read this forum I think that these cars are prone to catastrophic failure.

But then my father's Mercedes had a timing chain jump and the car was worthless. A few weeks later friend, and Rennlist member, had an oil line fail on his Saab. Also worthless.

The problem is that neither men posted these problems on a forum anywhere - certainly not on Rennlist. When an 10-year old Hyundai bites the dust no one cries or contemplates a class action lawsuit.

And people turn heads and take pictures of my 10-year old car. No one takes a picture of a camaro.

soverystout

Big +1
If the previous owner(s) would have done the following, a cracked cylinder would have been far less likely:

1. Change your Water pump long before it shows signs of failure (especially if your car still has the orignal WP - regardless of year or mileage! - These cars are at least 7 years old now)

2. Invest in the lower temp (160) stat - I don't want to get into an argument of whether it keeps temps lower or not - it does - no need to discuss.

3.Ensure the quality of your coolant and make certain you have the right mix for your region/driving conditions.

4. Make sure all hoses are in decent shape

5. Keep your radiators clean and ensure that all fans are working in both stages.

and then drive the Sh*t out of the car.

BruceP

FWIW, I just want to second a lot of what's been said here. As with a lot of 'exotic' used cars, the costs tend to be in having them, not buying them. We're dealing here with cars that are well over a decade old, and were produced in quantities of 20,000 units a year or less. There is simply no way to have the badge and the experience and not end up paying for it one way or another. I'm not even going to try rationalizing that, but it's true.

The other piece of advice I think makes a ton of sense is that everybody should simply walk away from a Porsche with no maintenance records. Part of the reason is obvious. Less obvious is that there are some expensive consumables on these cars. Identical examples at identical prices can be very different bargains if one is due for brakes and tires and the other isn't.

I'm sorry it didn't go well for the OP, but frankly, at current prices, even if you bake in some risk, 996s are still a bargain.