usmm1234

I've had my 964 for 16 years and luckily have never had a flat tire. I was on my way to the hospital to get an MRI for my bad back when I got a huge cut in the sidewall of my rear tire of my Cayenne GTS. I called AAA and they said it would be 1 1/2 hrs to get a flatbed there. Despite my back, I decided to tackle the spare. I have always just assumed these collapsible tires were a joke but I needed to get this MRI done. The jack and tool kit in the Cayenne is nothing short of fantastic! The only thing that was a little difficult we're the lug bolts. I had to put all 190lbs on the wrench. I uncoiled the nitto hose and gauge assembly and plugged it into the built in compressor under the passenger seat. Wha Lah! That tire pumped up pretty as a Krispy Kreme doughnut. I bolted it on and drove to the hospital with time to spare. Then I drove the 25 miles home. The next morning I installed my winter rims and tires. When I let the air out of the spare, it went right back down to it's original size. I'm totally sold. I immediately ordered one for our 997.2. These spares are very usable high quality weekend savers. We had a flat on our old 335i with the run flat tires and we were stranded for the weekend. The spare kit for the 997 is $1250, but that's cheap compared to run flat tires or long flatbed trips. Plus you can go ahead and get to where you were going. The moral of this story is, don't hesitate to use that collapsible spare.

westy66

I had a flat right at dusk one night. All the spare parts are well sorted and the air tool was easy to hook up without the manual. I could not get the tire to hold air. I twisted and turned it for 30 minites. The cayenne got towed to the dealer and they had no prob blowing it up with their high powered air system.

I guess ill see next time if it works.

usmm1234

Do you have the air suspension? My Cayenne has a substantial compressor built in under the passenger seat for the suspension. My 964 and 997.2 have small portable compressors which I have not tried. You have me thinking though. I am going to test it when my tire kit gets here. It's on a slow boat from Germany still.

J'sWorld

I have used mine several times but after the second time, upon deflation the beads would pop off while colapsing. In turn when you go to inflate it the on board compressor doesn't supply enough volume to re-seat the beads

BlazinPond

Interesting - thanks for posting.

How far can you reasonably go before potentially damaging your vehicle/drivetrain?
Say you have 21" OEM wheels and the spare is 19", would it create potential issues for that axle?

gnat

Our 996 C4 came with one. We call it the "build it yourself spare"

We haven't needed it yet, but I inflate it every few years to make sure it atleast holds air. Quite a shock when it goes from that tiny little thing to an appropriately sized spare.

The rim size doesn't matter (much). it's the outer diameter of the tire. Much like run flats any non full sized spare is only meant to get you to a safe location. Putting more than a few miles on it (especially on an AWD) can potentially cause long term issues with your diffs and/transfer case.

usmm1234

My Cayenne has a factory OEM spare to I am assuming the diameter is matched? I did turn off the PSM while I drove with it on there. As far as my 2 wheel drive 997.2. The Porsche spare tire kit for that car specifies that in the case of a rear flat. You must move a front tire to the rear and place the spare on the front. You must also shut off the PSM.

usmm1234

Do you have the built in compressor or the portable? The compressor that came with my 997 is tiny. I could see issues with it. There is also the option of having the road side assistance guy (AAA) install the spare for you. They generally have a good air supply.

gnat

Both our 996 and 958 have the portable compressor. It's not the greatest thing, but it works.

996FLT6

The collapsible was great the 1st time but the 2nd time the tire wouldn't hold air- could hear air leaking out from the beads : (. Mike

mcbit

That does surprise me as the wheels on the GTS have different offsets front and rear.

TomF

Very smart to inflate every couple of years. I got stuck in my C4 Cab late on a Sunday night on the Olympic Peninsula when my space saver spare would not inflate. Because it had never been used in 12 years, it was stuck and the tiny compressor wouldn't inflate it.

Ultimately, I had to beg a friend to bring his portable commercial compressor from 45 mins away to help us inflate the tire. Had the flat at about 7:30 on the Hood Canal Floating Bridge and ended up getting back to Seattle at about 6:00 AM...

I have the spare in my '08 CTT and will be inflating it at least every other year to make sure it works properly.

Cheers,
TomF

usmm1234

No, that's one of the reasons I picked the GTS. I own a sales rep firm and do a lot of driving. I needed an SUV that I can rotate the tires every 4000 miles. The GTS has 4 21x10 5 lug 50 offset wheels. I also have a set of Victor 20x10 50 offset wheels

mcbit

This was my GTS, the offset difference is fairly clear. It is specced with FR 2x 10J x 21 ET50 and RR 2x 10J x 21 ET45. Seems like there were some other options.

The manual however does specifically mention not disabling PSM when using the collapsible spare wheel, presumably due to the vast difference in grip between it and the standard wheels.

dryadsdad

I was surprised at how well ours in the 993 worked. We had an issue of inflation at a track day and we needed to get both fronts up considerably. The pump was perfectly up to the task. Not fast, but it did the deed.