Friday I ran a quick errand in the morning...left the lights on
Jumped in the car Friday night but of course the car was dead.

1-Neither Triple A nor Porsche roadside Assistance were able to open the hood to get at the Battery.
2-The flat head screw driver in between the hood and trunk latches near the driver's seat didn't work for me after an hour of trying.(it was very dark).
3-There was no red tab in my fuse panel as other have used to jump the hood open with jump cables.
4-Could not find the hood rip cord under the front wheel liners.

decided to have Triple A tow the car to the local Porsche dealer the next morning.
But the serviced department decided to take the day off. Glad I called ahead first.



Tried Porsche Roadside Assistance again. The very nice lady on the phone called me back an hour later to tell me they didn't have the equipment to open the hood and suggested I go to Wal-Mart and buy the necessary equipment.

No Wal-Mart within 10 miles of me but there is a Target a few blocks away.
Found this Black & Decker Battery pack with cigarette lighter plug for $60.
Walked back from Target directly to the Boxster and VOILA open hood.
The unit has to charge for a day before it has enough juice to jump start your car.
It fits Snugly in the rear shelf compartment,which is where it will always be.

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Neat, that would be huge to have in exactly the case you mention. I gather it's not enough to start the car, but enough to pop the hood then jump the car.

Do we not have some type of work around for the latch? I'm guessing it's a locking device like what an automatic has to stop you from leaving Park when the brake is not on. I would guess if I opened up the hood and trunk pop mechanism down by the foot well that there would be some plastic locking device that locks it out when the car is off. Could we just not defeat this and never have to worry about it? Has anybody done this or made a FAQ on it?

I honestly don't see any good reason to lock that trunk like that. If you have the door open you can steal the car pretty easily, when the door is shut you can't pop those anyway. I think I'm gonna open mine up.

 

1997-2000 have mechanical levers for the trunks. When you set the alarm a cam rotates to a position under the levers. This cam prevents the levers from being lifted. When you unlock the car the cam rotates back into the original position and you can lift the levers.

If the battery dies and the alarm had been on, then you cannot lift the levers. That is why Perfectlap tried to rotate the cam into the unlock position with a screwdriver.

 

yes it would be a great hack: Disarming the hood and trunk latches so that they are completely manual.
I guess its useful for people who drive around with suitcases full of diamonds and cash.

The black and Decker unit claims to be able to jump start your car on its own when fully charged.
And the built in flash light came in handly last night while I was installing some new pedals.

 

I already own one. Bought it week 2 of owning a Lexus RX400h. On day 3 of the Lexus, it died. What a pain in the butt. But just in case, it was a great excuse to add another useful toy to the collection.

BTW, Lexus has been free of issues ever since. It just sat too long without running while on the boat/at dealer prior to delivery.

 

Thinking out loud....

The trunk levers cannot be lifted when the door is closed. So if you lock your car with the remote you cannot lift the levers due to the fact that you cannot open the door. So why would you also need to lock the levers with a cam at the same time when you lock the doors?

I need to think about this.

 

I think its an anti theft deal, you know like a key for the arm rest compartment...

Theif gets into your car (doors are now open) steals your radio.... *but*
he can't open the arm rest storage (assuming its locked), he can't get at tthe bearer bonds you keep in the hood (you know just in case..) and neither can he treat himself to the beer in the trunk.

 

This is really funny. I'm at a two day seminar at the NJ Porsche training center, and we touched on just this!. did you know there is enough juice in a 9 volt radio battery to open the hood? it's suggested you getg a cheap cig lighter plug,, and just wire it to a fresh 9 volt, and put it in the lighter. That should provide enough to pop the hood.

 

where is the p-car trainning center in NJ?

 

better question:
why didn't Porsche do something about this after all these years?
Porsche roadside assistance was absolutely clueless as to how to open the hood.
Somehow the ball was dropped over and over because I hardly think I was the first person ever to have this problem. Tons of threads in the 996 forum about this too.

 

I love the 9V idea, I'm gonna have to try that out lol... After reading this and how annoyed you are with the whole deal I think I'm gonna hack mine so it can't do that. Hell I don't eve have a spare tire to steal so no need to lock the trunks...

 

I believe that it was mentioned above that this was an early design. Newer 986 (dunno about 987) models have a jump location inside the car at the fuse box. The unlock mechanism is also different (small toggle switch instead of the old lever that my 2K had).

Another simple trick is to have a dual ended cord that has cig lighter adapters on both ends. A bit smaller than the battery pack and fits better in my glovebox. I got one at the local pep boys. You can use this for a "jump" from another car at least enough to get the hood open. I'm really suprised that the P-Car roadside guys don't carry these. I've never had to call them for a dead battery so I dunno what their "usual" response to this would be.

Alex