Porsche Cayenne Reliability and Problems
 

Hi
I would like to share my suffering and the bad experience I had with my Cayenne Turbo 2005 hoping someone from Porsche will realize that their cars quality became worse and worse and need serious action, my car done only 60KMiles the last 7 years were a nightmare, every couple of months I had a new problems, I did not enjoy driving my car, most of the time in the garage , see below list of problem I faced so far:

I have my Cayenne Turbo 2005 since 7 years now so far done only 60Miles the last 7 years were a nightmare, every couple of months I have new problems, see below list of problem I faced so far:
1. Petrol / Gas leak from gas filter replaced
2. AC Compressor replacement
3. Car start cutting engine reach to stall, Fuel pump left and right replacement
4. Coolant Water leak (T plastic pipe crack right between fire wall and engine very difficult to reach)
5. White smoke comes out of the engine compartment (Engine oil leak from head cover gasket right engine side)
6. White smoke comes out of the engine compartment (Engine oil leak from head cover gasket left side)
7. Big bombing noise comes from beneath armrest (turns out to be the drive shaft bearing support was broken)
8. One month coolant leak from coolant reservoir (replaced with new one)
9. Lose braking brake paddle became very heavy (turns out that one of the vacuum hoses link between the brake booster and vacuum system
10. One day cold water drain right on your foot while driving (AC derange blockage)
11. Cabinet roof start falls down,
12. Middle consul paint comes out
13. Door handle from indie & window switch lose color
14. Engine compartment bonnet chock holder replacement
15. After a while trunk problem when you open the trunk door the trunk will not held open because of the chock need replacement
16. Clicking noise coming from the left front end every time you applied the brake (turns out to be the lower wishbone ball joints and rubber bushings are worn out need replacement)
17. Left wheel bearing replacement
18. Left axle boots in & out replacement
19. For sure I have to replace right wheel bearing, lower wishbone and axle boots very soon as well
20. Passenger side power window not working (power window regulator replacement)
21. Left Turbo oil leak (no way to solve this problem)
22. Driver and passenger seat back side panel come out with all clips are broken (used Silicon to fix them back)
23. AC dash board display missing characters
24. Rear left speaker need replacement
25. Trunk glass window need new chock holders
26. Car not starting at all (steering wheel sensor defect, push the steering to it is default passion and switch off the auto steering position feature)
27. Head light, turning indicator light sometimes working sometimes no, headlight wires inside the head light compartment making short circuits (all wires lost the insulation and wires are naked now touching each others,
28. Front grill (front bumper) get cracks without any one touch them (need replacement
29. It seems that also I am having very little coolant leak comes from Radiator (but still I did not fix because it is very less leak, and also I need to take a break)
30. AC controller rock button is almost cracked
31. Rocker buttons in the middle console also almost the base is cracked,
32. The middle console cub holder shatter cover is broken
33. Sun glass box look is broken
34. Ac cooling became weak
35. Headlight rubber casket need replacement
36. Trunk glass door wiper broken need replacement
Remember I did not mention regular maintenance like brake pads, spark plugs, accessory built, tires, oil replacement, filters, adding 1 liter of engine oil every 600miles, adding coolant, bulb changing in regular bases, battery, I am also worried that sooner or later I will have Air suspension problems it is a matter of time only.
I feel sorry for Porsche, my car had no accident always under shade, taking very good care, no hard driving, treating my car like my little baby.
Shame on Porsche engineering, silly defects, I am wondering if Porsche are happy with using low cost bad materials,
look into any Korean or Japanese car makers, why do not you learn from them. You can hire staff from Korea or Japan

Wow! I thought Id had problems over the last 10,000 miles. Mines a 2004 with about 70,000 miles on the clock.

1. New battery
2. New steering column (steering angle sensor failure)
3. New rear propshaft.
4. New tailgate & tailgate window gas shocks.
5. New Main fuel pump in tank

why not sell it and buy a japanese car?

That list makes bad reading. This can't be normal surely?

That's insane......for any car. I'm sure anyone would be upset having been through that. Wondering if the first 3-years of that car's life were extremely hard? You've put 60k on it, what is the total mileage? Just curious.

I've also had about 75% of those issues in the last 50k miles. Nearly everything on your list is 'known' problems, discussed for multiple people on this forum. For me, at least, the difference here is that I fix them on the Cayenne. When a majority of this sort of nonsense happens to a chevy or ford, people will do the bare minimum to keep it on the road and ignore the rest.

Wow.......that list is really shameful and painful.

Out of curiosity, what was the initial 3 years of history on the vehicle when you bought it ?

When I read thru all the receipts on my 955 CTT before I bought it, I did get a bit fearful, but then learned most of the things done were 'the biggies'.

+1

I am very sorry for your misfortune.

I would guess that this Cayenne was ridden hard and put away wet over and over. The previous three years...leased, and or multiple owners? Maintenance performed at all? What is the history of accidents and damage?

I suspect there is a lot more to this story. This is an unheard-of amount of issues with a very well-built car.

-TomF

My List:

1. AT Filter / Fluid
2. AT Valve Body
3. IGN Coils, plugs, air filters + oil chg all done at once
4. ALU cooling pipes
5. Cowl drains clogged, firewall sheetmetal / body filled with ~30L of water, shorted MBWH on Driver side, had to go through each wire individually until I found corroded section and repaired (had P/N interlock and couldn't drive for a week, had to dry it out etc...) - cleaned cowel drains took 1 min and all the water sitting in it poured out...
6. Trunk struts
7. Hood struts
8. Front diff Noisy - (i have a used one to swap it, but its F*@#$ too... need to rebuild one).
9. Door rust...
10. Wierd wind noise at high speed on driver side, probably from a missing trim piece.
11. little trim piece at bottom from of passengers door flew off one day... $70 for a new one!
12. My favourite - scored cylinder walls resulting in full rebuild of my motor... yay.
13. Cracked flex pipes on both sides, requiring new flex pipes (exhaust)
14. Dipped beam headlight fun.
15. A few parking sensors no longer functioning...

I'm sure the list goes on...

JR

1: this is why I purchase extended warrantees, walk in tell them whats wrong, get a loaner, return to pick it up, $100 deductible & and reg maintenance I've asked to be done, and drive home.

2: it's a highly almost over engineered vehicle, it's not perfect, no vehicle is. It will have issues no matter where it was designed, parts were made, or where it was put together before it ended up in your garage.

3: 60K in 7years? HAHAH thats it? mine is a little over 2 months ... not 2 years... 76 days in my garage old in my driveway and it's got 10,670 miles as of today on it and had 1... 1 software issue that was resolved in90 mins with a software update. and 1 oil change so far, and going in for it's 2nd this coming Friday.

4:Sounds like it wasn't driven enough, long enough and only used for short trips, and if it was case. I'd expect more issues than what you've listed above.

5: I came from Range Rovers to the 14 CTTS night and day in vehicles, if you want a higher maintenance vehicle purchase a Range Rover. I promise you and would bet you a large amount of hard green cash you'd be flipping out if you owned one of those. I've had 3, it got to the point where the service manger flat out told me " Don't call, just show up we'll fix it or get you a loaner".

just my 2 cents...

here is an updated 2015 ratings....

Honestly, any vehicle built post 2000 that requires anything outside of oil changes, tires, brakes and fuel, prior to 75-100k miles should be a little disappointing. Some may disagree, but it's the truth.

I fully grasp this isn't the case with the Cayenne, or many other makes/models, but a car needing nothing before hitting 75k should really be no amazing feat.

Fiat is super consistent in those JD Power surveys......

I kinda disagree, if you want a vehicle that will be a 20 min a day commuting vehicle, that barely gets up to operating temp, you shouldn't be driving a performance vehicle, you should be in a yaris or corolla. These vehicles are designed to be on the highway at high speeds until the tank is empty. Not puttering around town barely getting used. A Porsche is a long distance marathon runner, not a soccer mom or dad.... going from point a to point b and sitting around all day. It's like your body, no exercise... it's going to fall apart and not perform as expected.

Buy a yaris or corolla not a performance vehicle . Now that is the truth...

It's worth noting that the 2015 results are from the JD Power 3-year dependability study, whilst the 2014 results were from their 90 day initial quality study, a completely separate study. That said, I like the 3-year study as a better indicator of expected relative reliability.

The OP's troubles are excessive, and it may partially be due to bad treatment prior to your ownership.

The point made about short trips being murder for these cars is a good one. Because of the "integrated dry sump" design, the V8 and new V6 Cayenne's have a much higher oil capacity than many vehicles (~9.5 quarts) and thus take a long time to get to operating temperature. Watch the oil temperature for a number of trips and you will see that you really need a decent length of trip to get the oil up to temperature AND enough time to take care of moisture and other dilutants. Definitely not the right vehicle if your normal usage has lots of short trips.