fpena944

Of course I'm out of town on business and the wife just called me upset that the Cayenne has left her stranded. It started telling us oil needs changed about so we were going to do it next week.

Now it tells her Oil Needs Changed Now and won't start for her. I made sure it was topped up before she left and she put about 150 miles on it. She's nowhere close to a dealer, are there any quick fixes?

Have no ideas except for disconnecting the battery and hoping it resets itself. Help!

fpena944

Thought it might be the battery so suggested that she find somewhere to get it tested. Autozone was gracious enough to show up and test it but couldn't find the battery. I found out it is under the seat so that's not something a store is going to be able to replace. They got the car started but now my question is, does anyone know a European car service mechanic in the Summersville, WV area that can do a battery install?

Would it be safe for her to drive from there to Charlotte, NC with a dying battery as long as she leaves the truck running? She can just park it then and I'll take it to the dealer if that plan works. Thoughts?

deilenberger

Tough call. Apparently there are no Porsche dealers in WV.. who'da thunk it? Closest dealers are at least 100 miles from Summersville.

Without knowing if the charging system is working - can't make a call on how safe it would be for her to drive it home. You can display system voltage on the multi-display-gauge on the dash. It will actually charge better if it's in sport mode (about 1V additional)..

IF she has enough fuel for the trip (so she doesn't have to shut it off to fill it up) - about 250 miles - and she's up for an adventure - probably could be done.. but if you want to keep the Turbo and not end up replacing it with a Lexus, I'd suggest you get her the best hotel room you can in the area, and wait until morning to figure out what to do.

Probably be best if you drove up there to handle it. In my experience (47 years and counting) wives don't like these sort of adventures.

TexasRider

Yeah I think a call to the dealer is in order to see if there is a bypass.

With here in the middle I am going with D-berger advise above. Get her situated and in a rental if you have to and then you can sort it out.

fpena944

Thankfully she wasn't alone as she was meeting her parents there (they came in from Pittsburgh so they were just as stuck as she was) so once they got the car started they went for a drive and made sure it seemed ok. Car drove fine but she didn't turn it off and try to turn it on again yet.

They checked into a hotel so they're going to give it a try in the morning. If it starts she's going to try to get home but if not I told her to have it towed to the closest dealer and take a rental home.

Ugh, I don't get back in town until Friday night. Of course it had to happen when I'm away - we use this car every day so what luck something happens now.

Glad it started again though!

She thinks she's cursed as this is the third time she's been stranded by battery failure on three different cars! She said something kind of funny today, "It doesn't matter if it's a $3000 car or a $120,000 car - It's going to break down on me!"

So this weekend the question for me will be, dealer or DIY?

TexasRider

No fussing from me Fernando - but while me and you might drive ours down to the fill point, or over the time or service mileage , when hers comes up and says service in 1000 miles, or to gets a service request, I get on it. I tell her you don't want me to get in this car and find it under a 1/4 tank because I am going to be a ugly--ier Texan. I'm not saying you did either - Im just espousing.

Just so I don't have to think about problems that. It still happens sometimes.

Junk in the road - flat. Uggggh.

Then just a few weeks ago she calls me and the tire on her rental car is going down at Grandmas house. I call Number One brother and say get some boys on this right now and he says we are on it. Whew.

I think about the "F" word in my Cayman too.

Anyway man I'm glad she's all safe and has got help and you'll get it straightened out.

wkearney99

Batteries have always been a maintenance item. In older cars it got ignored because not much depended on them. But with modern vehicles they're as critical as anything else in the engine/drivetrain.

If I get 5 years out of a battery I consider a reasonable duration. Try owning a boat, when you have FIVE to replace every few years....

The battery being under the seat helps with lower the vehicle center of gravity and that helps with performance handling. It's not as easy to replace as one held down by a simple bracket in the engine compartment (or trunk). But it's not impossible to DIY.

Is there something she's doing to shorten the life of batteries that's causing their early demise?

ScootCherHienie

It seems a little early for a battery failure in a 958, especially in your mild climate. With the battery being inside the car and not subject to severe weather extremes, you should get 8 years or so on the factory battery. That said, changing the battery is something you can do easily enough if you are used to working on cars at all. There are online videos for changing 955/957 batteries, may be one for 958 also. Driver's seat tilts back when you remove the front bolts (move seat forward adter you tilt it back some to get it to tilt farther back so you have more access to the battery. Tilting the seat-back forward helps also. But need to determine if alternator is working well before assuming it is the battery. If you can set the multidisplay to show voltage, you should be able to tell if the alternator is OK... it should read 14-14.5 volts or thereabouts and not go much lower than that if it is working OK. If you are getting a number closer to 12 volts, that's an indication the alternator isn't charging the battery fully (assuming the enging is running of course). Check the battery voltage before you start the car also... that should be in the 12.5-12.8 range. Have to put the car in "On" mode without starting the engine to do that (not sure how that's done if you have keyless system). Another test is with the engine running, turn on A/C to max, turn headlights on with high beam, turn stereo on moderately loud, turn on electric window defogger (back window, maybe front if it has electric defog in addition to A/C defog vents), and maybe even use electric windows while making this reading. With everything operating, rev the engine to 2000 rpm or so while observing the voltage display. If it goes down to 13 volts or less, you could have an alterntor that's not working correctly. Sometimes when a battery fails to start the engine and you park the vehicle for a period of 8 to 12 hours, it will sometimes start on the next attempt if the battery is good... it can restore a little charge with some "rest" and that may be just enough to start the engine once.

fpena944

At work now so don't have a lot of time but she thinks maybe she left the car in the accessory position while parked at the hotel and that may have killed the battery.

The car started fine this morning and she's on her way back home. I told her to use our backup SUV in the meantime until I get home and I'll check it out. Maybe it was user error? Who knows but I'll get to the bottom of it and make sure it doesn't happen again.

Usually we take long trips together but timing didn't work on this instance. If it would have happened at home it wouldn't have been a big deal as tow trucks and Uber are everywhere but in a small town a different story!

I'll let you all know her feedback when she gets home.

TexasRider

Once I had mine in and said change the battery too. The techs said Why? Oh just because I don't want any problems and a new one will be better.

Fast forward a few weeks and we are in San Antonio. I come out and turn it over. Nothing. The new battery was dead as a door nail. It was defective for some reason as everything else was working correctly and no lights etc were on.

The techs got a good laugh out of that one when I got back.

As you probably know the battery prep and initial charge has a very big effect on battery life. Hmmmm - I should have told those techs eating my donuts that exact same thing.

deilenberger

Good info on checking voltage - butttttt..... Porsche included the charging system into the modifications to maximize MPG. In "regular mode" the system will almost never go above 13.5V charge. RPM doesn't matter - its being limited by the ECU. In "sport" mode (press the button on the console) the alternator then puts out full output - and you will see a 1V jump in charging voltage. You may even see 14.7V max.

Took me a while to figure out what was happening and why.. anything to max out the corporate fleet economy saves Porsche money.

wkearney99

Running automotive lead acid batteries down does harm to them. It'll shorten their expected lifespan, sometimes by quite a bit. The systems in more recent vehicles will attempt to kill power should it detect voltage dropping below a certain point. But generally you really want to avoid leaving the vehicle accessories on without the engine running. If this has been a habit, that might explain past battery woes...

fpena944

Well she made it home and the car has started a couple of times since then.

I'm going to attribute this to user error but nonetheless will probably change out the battery anyway just to make absolutely certain that there's no issue there. We're planning on taking another road trip (this time I'm driving!) in 2 1/2 weeks so I don't want any incidents.

Scoot - Thanks for the detailed writeup. I'll study your response and depending on whether I have time this weekend or not I may just tackle this on my own but if need be I'll drop it off at the dealer.

Thank you all for helping with long-distance troubleshooting - I'm glad this story had a happy ending and if it was something she did then she can be more mindful of what she's doing going forward. Lesson learned for everyone