OK there are so many of us with the defective cup holders with arms swinging out so fast... I have found the problem! The gear that is connected to the mechanism that slows down the opening cracks! Now if we can only source the gear to replace it.... then it should be a very cheap fix!!

 

That is a job for someone with a 3D printer ...

 

Interesting to see this Thread. Several years ago a 997 owner 3-D printed the small cupholder Hinge piece which are notorious for breaking and offered them for sale to RL members - I bought a few
I assume this small Gear can be 3-D printed as well.
Having these small parts available eliminates need to buy a complete cupholder.

Here's a photo of those Hinge Pieces:

 

Yes a pretty common issue indeed. The problem seems to be the design of the cog- as you will have noticed the centre hole is "square-ovalish" so the material is thinnest at the "corners" and eventually fractures.
Someone on thingiverse has designed this gear and a few other cup holder parts and made it taller ( there is room to do this in the cup holder) so it is intrinsically stronger. I have printed some in PETG (would have preferred ABS but my printer does is not capable of printing that)and so far have held up well. There is a fellow on US eBay that sells these too

 

OT but the surface of the material the Gear is photographed on looks just like my business checkbook pattern. I shoot photos on it all the time.