Discovered this coolant leak recently on my ‘08 997.1 and am trying to figure out what it’s going take to fix it (searching on these terms gives a bunch of unrelated results). It’s a small plate held on with only two bolts so it will be easy to remove, but my question is do I need to drain all of the coolant from the engine first. Since it’s located near the bottom of the engine I assume coolant will come flooding out as soon as I loosen it. Anyone have experience removing this? Thanks for any thoughts.

 

Remove all coolant before you begin. The drain on the front console beneath the center of the engine will suffice.
After replacing the cover fill the engine using a vacuum filling system. Attempting to use gravity to fill the system is inadequate and can lead to air pockets that can create failures.

 

Mine did the same thing last year. 45K miles on the clock. 07 997.1 S Cab. Replaced the plate with a new one. All good.

 

Well if I have to drain the system then it looks like a good time to replace the front supply and return hoses that are showing some signs of weeping.
Guess I’ll be getting a vacuum system.
Thanks for the input.

 

Good point. Recently I had leaks at those one of the connections under the belly pan near the from as well, so had to drain again and replaced both couplers as well. So do them as well. ;-).

 

I admire all of you guys who wrench on your cars.

 

When you replace the coolant, OEM pink Porsche coolant mixed 50/50 with distilled water. Mix up enough in a clean / new 5 gallon bucket, pull the vacuum and put the feed hose into the bucket.so you can fill it in one shot.