When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
I bought my car 2.5 years ago with a lift not working but I did not care as the car came with a recent CPO and I therefore got it fixed under CPO shortly after purchase.
1 year later I did the service at the local P Zentrum, mostly to extend again the CPO another 2 years. Among other things, they re-enabled the TPMS (was deactivated by previous owner as he used other wheels).
Fast forward to june this year, we did a road trip through the Alps, Switzerland, France, Italy and back to Switzerland.
During this trip both failed again.
Lift will not go all the way up and you cannot get the car down. The only way to have the car go back down is to exceed the speed threshold. On rough roads with work in progress that can be quite nasty.
TPMS on the other hand decided to suddently show 3 wheels completely flat on start up and display a warning. Pressure was correct after couple of seconds on display but warning never left.
Still an amazing trip
Ohhh, the Stelvio! I may not ever be there with a great driver's car, but I plan on taking my road bike to Italy and staging myself out of Bergamo for 3 weeks. A couple of guys I raced with when I was younger ended up getting picked up by pro squads and racing the Giro d'Italia. They both said the Italian Alps and Dolomites are not to be missed.
You will not miss much with the Stelvio, more so with all the other passes around. It depends a bit on the time of day and the season but there is too much traffic (not only bikes) to really have fun on the Stelvio. The beginning is quite fun but it become too narrow, very quickly, hairpins tend to be a struggle with the other cars, we had to stop may times while others had to reverse to make it etc.
I promised myself next time I go up there, it will be on the bike, very early or late. To echoe another thread here, I really wish the .2 GT3 had the holes for the roof racks for this next trip. It will have to be another car
The lift in my 997.2 was replaced under warranty years ago. It has recently began the issue of not showing the "lift" lamp in the dash and staying in the up position until at speed. It's a bit annoying, but I use it very infrequently. I just try to enter and exit driveways at a 45 to avoid scraping too much.
1. often
2. but should it fail, you might faint when hearing the cost of repair. no, seriously....
3. if you are getting lift b/c you fear the front lip scraping, dont. that's cheap plastic. b/c if you actually drove the car at speed TRUST me your brake ducts, underside of front bumper (painted part) they will all damage. those are way moer $ to fix the the front lip and that lift will NOT help you whatsoever. when are going 50mph on a canyon road and see a dip, it's TOO LATE to raise the front and you will bottom out and hit bottom of front bumper and take out or scrape your brake ducts.
I removed my lift in perfect working order. I was trying to cut weight for NASA TT2 class. It is 13.5 lbs. It is simple to remove/install once you remove the belly panels. Mine is for sale here in this forum and in the classifieds. When you see what it is, $18K is absurd.
If you live in big cities where steep carparks are a fact of everyday life, it's the difference between getting in and not getting into a carpark. And you simply won't be able to park AT ALL if you refuse to go underground.
Flip side: FAL at 115% tax comes out to a $20k option for us in HKG, which is about 10 front lip replacements...
One can have 10 lips sitting in the garage, but what's the price you'd pay for having a pristine car at C&C? Or a perfect social media page... according to some folks these cars are made for IG not to be driven...
1. often
2. but should it fail, you might faint when hearing the cost of repair. no, seriously....
3. if you are getting lift b/c you fear the front lip scraping, dont. that's cheap plastic. b/c if you actually drove the car at speed TRUST me your brake ducts, underside of front bumper (painted part) they will all damage. those are way moer $ to fix the the front lip and that lift will NOT help you whatsoever. when are going 50mph on a canyon road and see a dip, it's TOO LATE to raise the front and you will bottom out and hit bottom of front bumper and take out or scrape your brake ducts.
Thank goodness for this thread! I flew down to LA to buy the $95,000 .2 GT3 listed here, and due to the diagnoses on this thread and elsewhere, I realized that the owner had a FAL that would not lower while using the button w/o hitting 50mph.. He had been parking it in the "up" position for the past year, and I decided to pass on the car as a result. I just didn't want the FAL issue to become "my" problem with the car being sold at asking price. My drive home was in a Hyundai instead of a GT3, but oh well. Next time, I know to schedule the PPI before buying the plane ticket.
In my search going forward, I will probably look a car not optioned with FAL.
Thank goodness for this thread! I flew down to LA to buy the $95,000 .2 GT3 listed here, and due to the diagnoses on this thread and elsewhere, I realized that the owner had a FAL that would not lower while using the button w/o hitting 50mph.. He had been parking it in the "up" position for the past year, and I decided to pass on the car as a result. I just didn't want the FAL issue to become "my" problem with the car being sold at asking price. My drive home was in a Hyundai instead of a GT3, but oh well. Next time, I know to schedule the PPI before buying the plane ticket.
In my search going forward, I will probably look a car not optioned with FAL.
Quick thought. Was everything about the rest of the car right? Color, spec, options? Yes, there are more to find but for me if I found the "right" GT3 I'd have a hard time passing on it with a bad FAL. Or is it more of your just getting started with the search and the car wasn't the ONE? Just curious..
Quick thought. Was everything about the rest of the car right? Color, spec, options? Yes, there are more to find but for me if I found the "right" GT3 I'd have a hard time passing on it with a bad FAL. Or is it more of your just getting started with the search and the car wasn't the ONE? Just curious..
The car was nice, but most GT3's are nearly always very nice. I was worried about the FAL issue requiring a lot more attention in the future. I just didn't want something like that to become "my problem" later on, especially as it wasn't advertised as such, nor discounted to reflect the issue.
If we are talking about "the one"; it would be that Atlas Grey model for sale here. Sadly out of my price range. She is certainly a stunner; that is arguably the best looking 997 of any model I have yet seen.
I have had the car nearly 6 years and driven around 27k miles. I use FAL every time I use the car as I need it to get out of and in to the underground garage. I keep it up for as short a time as possible, and never drive faster than 10mph when it is up.
Fingers crossed, never had any issue. The one "issue" I had was when the car would not go down and repeated pressing of the button did not make the light go off -- turns out passenger door was not shut fully. FAL does not go down unless both doors fully shut.
I also suspect that repeated use of the FAL, with no patience, can cause problems. I'd say the system can probably overheat, excess humidity depending on where you live, and the system just getting overwhelmed. The button has to be pressed once. Sometimes it takes a bit longer to go up depending on the state it was in, had it been recently used or not, etc. The owner that's not aware that it doesn't work if the door isn't closed might get frustrated, repeated use without time for it to recover, etc.
One might also consider-is it better to use it only when absolutely needed, or frequently enough to keep the system working so it doesn't atrophy(?)
The longest thread on this subjects narrows down that one of the causes is a pressure switch. It's relatively inexpensive and some people are trying to get the direct manufacturer price/order from Germany.
I did a double check on mine after the complete new unit was installed, especially to make sure the hose connectors at the unit and shocks were still tight after months of install, just in case.
My system has been working, and I use it probably more sparingly than before, and my car isn't a daily driver, still under 20K miles-
The sensors go bad way more than the actual lift goes bad, but Porsche does not want to diagnose - they just want to require us to buy the entire system for $15K.
Attached is the schematic showing the pressure switch with an Up and Down position. As described on page 26 of this document, if the car does not lower when the dash button is pressed, it is likely the dash button or the pressure switch that is at fault. Unlikely that these are $15K parts, but if someone got charged that much under warranty or out of warranty for the parts and labor, it would be helpful for them to post their invoice here for others to see.
07-14-2018, 04:19 PM
