GPGolden

Hello - I have searched and searched and can find nothing in forums. In my few months of daily (meaning hourly) research on 997s I keep seeing the following entry in carfax reports. Numerous times. Does anyone know what this is? And why is it so frequent?

No-start/hard start condition checked

Thanks.

BoomC2S

If it is a manual transmission, it could be the Clutch Interlock switch failures. Mine failed twice. I believe 17k and 28k miles. $30 part and relatively easy fix. My car has 39k now, and no issues.

GPGolden

Thanks. They are manuals I am researching.

Fahrer

It could also be the cable from the battery to the starter motor. This was an issue with some early 997s. In addition, it could be a weak battery.

Petza914

+1 that it's more likely this. The crimps in the original cable were not done properly and build internal corrosion and resistance. The problem shows up where the car is very slow to crank or won't crank after a short drive, like when you run to the store down the street and then go to restart it. If you're test driving a car with this on the carfax and no record of a repair to correct it. 5 minutes into the test drive, park the car, let it sit for a couple minutes, then try to restart it. If it is very slow to turn over or won't this repair should be part of your price negotiation. The cable itself is relatively inexpensive, but the labor is hundreds of dollars as that cable winds around many components of the engine and you have to go right by the AOS to replace it, which means depending on the mileage on the car, if the AOS has never been replaced, you should do that at the same time, especially on a used car where you don't know if the PO ever had the oil overfull, which can contribute to premature failure of the AOS diaphram. Murphy's Law says if you don't change it when doing the cable, you'll be doing it again a few months later.

GPGolden

Thanks Petza914! This is helpful.

pires

Agree with above.. I too had the slow crank and shop found it was increased draw from the starter.. replaced starter and harness which is a known problem and all is well. Was about $1K and starts on first crank over now

captainbaker

Former slow starter checking in here. In my case the battery and cables all checked out fine. It was the actual starter that was slowly going dead. Same symptoms as above. New starter and it fires up quickly every time.

larrysb

I've seen that on CarFax. On the particular car I was looking at, (2013 SL65 AMG with only 4000 miles on it) the actual issue was the owner hardly ever drove it and the battery would go dead. The dealer showed me the actual service records. They'd go out, charge his battery and get it started and finally installed a battery maintainer for him. Kind of crazy to have a $250,000 car that gets driven less than 1000 miles a year.

GPGolden

Thanks all.

PTEC

I believe this is actually the correct answer. There were multiple revisions to the clutch switch before the no start issue was completely resolved. The starter/alternator cable issue has not popped up yet on 997.2 cars. 997.2 has a different cable than the problematic 997.1 part.