Hello Boxster fans,

I am planning to spend about two months this summer doing a solo road trip around the US and Canada before starting grad school in September, leaving from NYC and driving west, then northwest, and then down the pacific coast and back across the desert and the south, seeing old friends and taking in the country.

I live in manhattan and can't currently afford to keep a car year round, but I love to drive and want to take a ragtop sports car on this trip to drive the backroads and maybe hit some tracks as well. I was originally thinking of a Miata, as I know they have a reputation for reliability, thriftiness, simplicity, and fun, but am now thinking of a Boxster as well.

My budget for the car, plus tires and pre-trip checkup / maintenence items is about $12-13k. I will have to sell the car at the end of August either here or on the road (fly home), and would hope to be able to recoup some large portion of the original purchase price.

My question: Is 12 thousand dollars enough to buy a hopefully trouble-free Boxster without excessive miles, decent paint, good A/C (for the desert), and a good maintenance history?

I plan to take a small toolkit and have done plenty of basic stuff like clutches, timing belts, fuel pumps, alternators, etc... on cars that I've had in the past before moving to NYC - is the Boxster a car that these sort of things are possible without huge expense?

Or should I just stick to a Miata?

 

find a boxster it's a great road trip car.

Eric

 

Find a decent base model Boxster with <100k miles for $8-9k and then pay the best Porsche independent [NOT dealer] mechanic you can find to perform $3-4k of maintenance. If you can find the right Boxster with maintenance done already then of course that's ideal, but I think it's unlikely given your time frame. You'll want recent clutch, flywheel, RMS, IMS update, water pump, thermostat, fluid changes, brakes, spark plugs, tires, battery, belts etc etc all documented. I spent a bit more than this last month and have 2200 trouble-free road trip, track day, and autocross miles on my 02 S already.

 

In my experience looking, $12K for a used Boxster in that age range is not enough to get a low maintenance Boxster. Plan on about $17,000 for a good one with good tires, no oil leaks, good body, good underside, nice interior, and a decent promise of trouble free miles ahead. I found those who want $10,000-$12,000 for one have lots of issues and would rather sell it than stick $5,000 into it. You get what you pay for. I looked at a lot of $12,000 Boxsters, and everyone was a money pit. Not that you couldn't get lucky, but I didn't. I ended up paying $17,000 for mine including taxes and plates.

 

That's exactly what you have to do if you expect to find a '99-'01 Boxster for $10,000-12,000 and want it to run well for thousands of miles. Those who have done all the above either want to drive it some more or want $15,000-18,000 for it.

 

$12K might find you a good Boxster one that can cover the distance with no serious issues. But you're going to have depend upon luck.

There are a lot Boxsters for sale but knowing which one is not going to require anything in the way of repair/service in the next 5K miles and 2 months of driving is impossible.

You pays your money and takes your chances.

I have driven my Boxster 4K to 5K miles or more one or two week long road trips more times than I can remember and while most of them were uneventful, there have been a few of them that weren't.

Sometimes the car requires repair, as in one trip the AOS (air/oil separator) failed 2K miles from home.

Another time, I hit some road debris and damaged the driver's side radiator. Again nearly 2K miles from home. (In another car I hit a frickin deer 600 miles from home...)

Other times I've gotten in the car at home and had the 1) fuel pump die backing out of the driveway; 2) heard what proved to be a water pump going bad; 3) had the coolant tank gush coolant all over the driveway while I was at the front of the car checking to see if the radiator fans were working; 4) (in entering the parking lot at work, 30 miles from home) the engine developing a very rough/uneven idle that proved to be a VarioCam solenoid and actuator; 5) after a couple of weeks out of the country tried to start the car and found the original battery had finally run down; 6) After replacing the tires finally was able to pinpoint a noisy wheel bearing.

Anyone of the above that happened on my driveway or at work could have happened 1K, 2K or more miles from home, as did the AOS failure.

But a Miata is no different. Really no car is no different. There's always a slim chance the car, new old, or anywhere in between, will develop a problem while on the road.

This is why I carry a cell phone and belong to a good (very good) auto club. And have a high limit on my credit cards.

But I think you would be better off with a Miata. I think you would have to stretch your budget too much to find a good Boxster, have to rely too much on luck to find a good Boxster, while finding a good Miata would be at least cheaper.

And you would have some money left over to fund a relatively major repair should be on be required. Also, should the car go belly up and you have to dispose of the car rather than fix it, you stand to lose less money since you would have less money in the car to begin with.

Sincerely,

Macster.

 

OP, no offense to anyone on this board, but given your parameters you need a ToyHonMaz, not a money pit.

BD

 

You will probably have better luck selling a 'ToyHonMaz' quickly at the end of your journey too, and for closer to what you have in it than a Boxster.

12K is probably a stretch for a nice reliable example. All sorts of stuff can come up on mid-life cars like MAF sensors, starters, AOS, brakes, clutch, expensive tires, etc.

You could do it though, you just need to be dedicated to the idea of taking your trip in a Porsche and writing off some extra expense to do it the way you want to. It sounds like one of my ideas so I can certainly empathize! Good luck on your trip.

 

probably need to spend $15,000 or more.

Get the Miata - better fuel economy, less hassle, way cheaper.

 

Thanks for all of the replies!

I impulsively bid on a 2000 Boxster S with 90k on eBay. I didn't make reserve with my winning $9500 bid, but I talked to the guy after the end and we arrived at a figure of 11k for the car. The seller also has the service books on the car. It's had the clutch, oil, and tires done recently. Seller says everythin functions, and it's all stock. The top and interior are in good shape, with the exception of a tear on the driver's side interior door vinyl (I priced a replacement OEM panel at $300) and a chip on one the factory chrome wheels (not a huge issue to me).

I have a family member who can check out / pickup the car for me next week and hold it til I can fly down in May and I told the seller I'd have an answer by Monday.

The car is in a small town without a nearby Porsche dealer or specialist, so it would difficult getting it checked out by a pro. Other than IMS failures (which I may look into getting retrofitted) what sort of things should I be looking for if I have my Dad drive down to check it out?

 

The used Boxster S you are considering is just a used car so a thorough used car check out goes a long way to helping one id a car he should not own.

A good used car check out check list can run several pages and take over maybe 2 hours to do.

Besides the usual things I like to advise the check out include a cold engine start followed by an idle warm up then a longish test ride then drive.

Briefly, one wants to get in the car. Turn off the A/C (this gets checked out afterwards). Turn on the key and verify all warning lights light up and then go off as the key is turned from on to engine start. This includes among other things (and this is very important) the check engine light. You want to make sure this is a working light.

Then let the engine idle. The idle should be reasonably smooth though fast (over 1K rpms). But the engine idle speed should drop smoothly as the engine gains some heat.

How one of these engines should sound under these conditions requires some experience with these cars to know what's normal and what's abnormal.

Get out of the car and walk around the car listening to the engine as it warms up. The engine should remain free of knocks, ticks, rattles, buzzes and other odd noises. Sure, there'll be some normal engine noises but there should not be any abnormal ones. Again this is where some familiarity with these cars comes in handy.

After the engine has idled maybe 10 minutes have the owner take you for a test ride. The route wants to be 15 miles or so long and allow you as a passenger to experience the car in all sorts of a driving situations. These include city/town driving with stop and go, blvd cruising and highway cruising.

Once the engine and drivetrain up to temp ask the driver floor the throttle in say 1st or 2nd gear just above idle and keep the throttle floored until redline or close to it. Then he should shift to the next higher gear and continue to floor the throttle. You want to confirm the engine pulls cleanly and smoothly from off idle to redline and can do this through more than one gear.

Have the driver demo the car's higher gear acceleration too. Say from 45mph in 4th to highway speeds, then 5th gear and 6th gear.

The whole idea is to subject the engine to as many various operating scenarios as possible, as it is likely to encounter to confirm in all cases teh engine runs well, and doesn't turn on the check engine light. In some cases, depending upon what is wrong, it can the engine controller 30 miles or so of mixed driving to detect a problem and turn on the check engine light.

Observe how the car runs, brakes, steers, rides, handles, feels. Note anything the driver does out of the ordinary (if anything) to perhaps deal with a bad clutch, sticky throttle, or wobbly shifter or even a bad synchro (like skipping a gear on the upshift or downshift).

The car should sound and feel solid. Again experience and exposure to these cars helps immensely.

After the test ride is over back at the starting point leave the engine idling and the A/C still off and check the engine is still free of abnormal noises.

Then you drive the car over the same route driving the car the same way and confirm your impressions developed during the test ride are accurate.

If you get back to the starting point satisfied the car feels ok and runs handles steers good then you check out all the other vehicle systems from lights to wipers, from heater to top, and so on.

Even so you really should have a PPI done cause you can't verify the car is not horribly bent and the alignment settings all used up to bring the car into alignment.

I like to get the car in the air -- especially after having driven it some miles -- to check for fluid leaks, signs of recent work, or bad repairs.

The tires should be in good condition ideally n-rated but oftentimes older Boxsters get fitted with non n-rated tires. The tires should at least be the right size and have the proper speed rating. Also, the tires should have even wear patterns.

Look inside the radiator openings for mis-matching leave/trash content, different colored A/C condensors (signs of accident damage/repair).

Verify all body panels gaps are even.

And so on. The list goes on and on.

I haven't confirmed this but you might find a used Boxster check list at Pedro's Garage, or search for Mike Focke's pages that has some very good used Boxster check lists.

Sincerely,

Macster.

 

The Boxster is a car. A very fun car, and one of too few with the engine in the right place, but still just a car. It's a fairly reliable car, comparable to the better domestics and close to Toyota/Hondas of the same age, but it's also 11 years old which means you're very likely to make it 5000 miles with no issues, but something could possible break.

The good news is- it's still just a car. If **** happens, you can probably fix it, as can virtually any mechanic. Parts may have to be ordered, but they're readily available and can be shipped overnight and and it just means an extra day or two along the way somewhere. I would not hesitate to drive a Boxster on a trip like that. Nor would I worry excessively about it- prep it like you would prep a ford or chevy or toyota and pack your metric tools just-in-case, and you'll be fine. It is an AWESOME car for a long road trip.

 

For a long road trip in a sports car, I'd take a Boxster over a Miata any day for one huge reason.......space.

I have amazed many before on just how much "stuff" I can fit in the two large trunks in a Boxster.

9.1 cu ft in the two Boxster trunks vs 5.1 in the Miata's single trunk is a big difference.

 

How's it compare to your 911 in terms of storage space?

 

The difference is the backseats vs. the rear trunk. I'm sure I could jam more stuff in the rear seats of the 911 vs the rear trunk of the Boxster, but the trunk in the Boxster is much easier to load and unload.

For a long roadtrip both the 986 and 996 have been good cars (I've driven both on trips of over 1,000 miles).