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On a 997 you will see rust form around the tandem pump, exhaust hardware and turbos for the most part. Washing daily in winter sounds like a chore. Buy a Jimny for winter and keep the Turbo for summer hoons
I have a 2004 cayenne turbo that spent 68,000 miles in Southern California, and a 2016 cayenne s that spent all of its time in Ohio. The 2016 is very crusty underneath even though the 2004 has been in Ohio for 35000 miles it still isn’t even close to being as crusty. The new style brine chemicals aeem to be much more corrosive than before. It doesn’t appear they the new cayenne has the same fasteners as the old one does, the newer bolts seem to be very rusty, especially the exhaust bolts that probably will break when attempting to loosen.
The electrolytic corrosion from road de-icers never sleeps, thorough underbody rinsing is definitely needed. With a 997 and all of the flat under panels and a car that is low it’s almost impossible to rinse the important parts, but the bottom of the plastic will be clean. Driving it in some spring rains will help.
Worth googling "brine corrosion" and read up on how much more damaging brine mix is vs. traditional road salt. Much more corrosive, particularly if you store your car in a heated or at least climate controlled garage. Around here, it's all brine lines because it saves the state and local gov't money and is considered more environmentally friendly than road salt, but the additional damage to personal property is effectively just a hidden tax - that and the sorry state of our road conditions, which have added "pothole" season in March and April that means it's hard to drive anything short of a tank until May unless you're prepared to replace wheels and/or tires. I expect my near new winter/daily driver (Tacoma TRD) will be toast in 6-7 years. Personally, I never understood the joy of winter driving in a sports car, but YMMV.
I drive my ‘12 997.2 TT to commute in the winter months. I put on about 1800 km each month from November to April here in Toronto. It’s a great car - except when the snow is about 4” and they haven’t cleared it yet. The car becomes more like a toboggan. Winter tires are essential.
I wash my car weekly and I haven’t noticed any unusual corrosion. Here is a recent picture of the wheel well. I would have though that is where rust would show first. This is after 5 years of winter driving.
That’s crazy clean for 5 winters unless the slippery-slope is not linear... if you know what I mean.
Imagine year 7-8 it just rusts to hell? I doubt that’s how that works though haha.
I've learnt my lesson on my Honda S2000. Never drive a car you love in the winter months. It was fine for 12yrs and the last 2 have been an absolute money pit and a nightmare through hidden rott/rust on the body followed by repairs.
I figure that the cost of my rear tires alone is somewhere between 7 - 10 cents per kilometre. If we were rational economic actors when we chose cars we’d all be driving Corollas.
No one will ever say at my funeral anything like “ he had such great cars but he never drove them”.
There was a great article on Panorama some years ago about a guy in Denver who out 500,000 miles on his 996 turbo. I found it inspiring.
That’s crazy clean for 5 winters unless the slippery-slope is not linear... if you know what I mean.
Imagine year 7-8 it just rusts to hell? I doubt that’s how that works though haha.
I've learnt my lesson on my Honda S2000. Never drive a car you love in the winter months. It was fine for 12yrs and the last 2 have been an absolute money pit and a nightmare through hidden rott/rust on the body followed by repairs.
Did you ever rustproof it ala Krown? And wash regularly? Trying to figure out the causal factors here. 5 years into my 2008 BMW 128i’s life I started rust proofing it. Same for a 2000 Civic. And both are still alive and while they have problems here and there none are related to rot or rust. I’m sure the S2000 is lower to the ground though but still.
Did you ever rustproof it ala Krown? And wash regularly? Trying to figure out the causal factors here. 5 years into my 2008 BMW 128i’s life I started rust proofing it. Same for a 2000 Civic. And both are still alive and while they have problems here and there none are related to rot or rust. I’m sure the S2000 is lower to the ground though but still.
Washed and waxed regularly yes but i don’t know what you meant by rust proofing. She started rotting inside out by the rockers and between cavities of the rear fenders.
Repair was to cut out portions of rockers, weld new metal in and paint. For rear fenders they had to separate rear fender metal from metal rocker on the wed portion, gain access to the rear fender cavity, then treat the inside with rust proofing spray, seal it shut, re-weld , repaint.
I’d hate to go through all of this again. S2000 will stay with me forever but if I see the 997 rot like that I might have to just move on to another one.
Washed and waxed regularly yes but i don’t know what you meant by rust proofing. She started rotting inside out by the rockers and between cavities of the rear fenders.
Repair was to cut out portions of rockers, weld new metal in and paint. For rear fenders they had to separate rear fender metal from metal rocker on the wed portion, gain access to the rear fender cavity, then treat the inside with rust proofing spray, seal it shut, re-weld , repaint.
I’d hate to go through all of this again. S2000 will stay with me forever but if I see the 997 rot like that I might have to just move on to another one.
I’ve NEVER heard of damage that extreme on a modern car after only 12 years of winter driving. Did it literally sit in salty snow/slush all day when parked?
Visit https://www.krown.com/. Its messy but I’ve used it on two vehicles and it held up well. See recent findings from the University of Windsor which concluded it works better than doing nothing. Not sure its the most advanced science used in their study but I’ll take it (good ol’ confirmation bias) https://www.newswire.ca/news-release...691009851.html
I’ll probably have my 991.1 sprayed before and after winter and washed like crazy inbetween.
Also how would you judge the quality of repair? Car looks okay from the outside, ie is it non-obvious the work has been done?
I drive mine in the winter, but only if there was a heavy rainstorm that washes away all the salt. NYC loves over salting the crap out of the roads, and unless we get a downpour that cleans the roads up a bit, I don't take it out. That and the car has summer tires on it, so unless it gets up to mid 40's I tend to not drive it either.
I drive mine in the winter, but only if there was a heavy rainstorm that washes away all the salt. NYC loves over salting the crap out of the roads, and unless we get a downpour that cleans the roads up a bit, I don't take it out. That and the car has summer tires on it, so unless it gets up to mid 40's I tend to not drive it either.
I think that’s the way to do it. A good, smart happy medium and extends the life of your car.
Mine lived in New England most of its life and wasn't coddled, so it saw snow and salt for a while. As far as I can tell the negative impact is mostly limited to rust on some of the fasteners/nuts and the VTG actuator rods/assembly. It may not look as pristine as a 10k-mile AZ car underneath, but the service history and my experience with it don't make me think it's actually worse for wear.
(Some penetrants/lubes on the actuators cleared that up pretty well btw.)
Update on mine, shortly after this post I took it in for a plugs/coils service and the mechanics recommended replacing the turbos due to corrosion. Their flanges and attachment points were pretty corroded and they weren't sure they could attach them back to the car correctly.
So, yeah, if I ever get another Porsche it's going to be from the southwest.
Update on mine, shortly after this post I took it in for a plugs/coils service and the mechanics recommended replacing the turbos due to corrosion. Their flanges and attachment points were pretty corroded and they weren't sure they could attach them back to the car correctly.
So, yeah, if I ever get another Porsche it's going to be from the southwest.
So that escalated rapidly. Your first post was from 2018, with some rust on the fasteners. Now replacing turbos. Sorry to hear that. My car lived in NJ for part of it's life(fingers crossed).
09-15-2019, 04:07 PM
