jenxo

My 153,000 Mile, Cayenne S (2006) was leaking a lot of coolant.
I kept topping it up for a week or two, till I could get it over to my mechanic
When I took it in for him to check if it was a leaking hose or such. On drive in, I was following it, and I noticed some white smoke ( looked like steam) coming from both exhausts.

My mechanic just called and says he believes it is a gasket issue, and recommends I take to Porsche expert.

Need your expert opinions guys...
What options do I have ? Is this worth repairing, or sell as-is.

Looks like blue-book is $7,000-$8,500. ( I bough it 3 years ago for $16k)

CAVU

AllData lists this as a 21 hour job for one bank, 36 hours for both, and about $100 for the gasket.

Before you go much further with the cost vs sell analysis, give your dealer a call and ask them that if it is a blown head gasket, what is the labor and parts breakdown for one bank.

You won't know if it s only a head gasket until a mechanic runs the engine through a couple of checks.

Dan87951

If you don't see obvious signs of it being a blown head gasket, I would send a sample of your oil to be analyzed by blackstone labs. They can tell you if antifreeze is in the oil.

Do you see any obvious signs of a blown head gasket -- milkshake looking oil and oil in the antifreeze?

CTTS520

Hopefully you can rule out the head gasket and then search for leaks in other places.
If it was my truck and everything else other than the head gasket was in good condition, I would fix it and keep on driving. One less thing to go wrong.

deilenberger

Nowhere in the OP's description of the problem do I see where his mechanic said "head gasket" - what he said was: "says he believes it is a gasket issue".

Sounds like the mechanic knows he's in over his head and would like the OP to take it to someone who might know something.

The description "leaking a lot of coolant" by the OP to me means (1) the OP is not mechanically inclined or he would have known to stop driving it and get it fixed NOW. Don't potentially make a problem worse my continuing to drive it. (2) It might well be a coolant pipe (no word if these were ever replaced) which an incompetent mechanic might mistake for a gasket leak if they didn't disassemble and actually look. (3) Could be the coolant reservoir.

Both the coolant pipes and the coolant reservoir are COMMON failures on a 955.. and WAY more likely then a bad head gasket.

I think the OP should take his mechanic's advice - have it FLATBEDDED to someone with some Porsche Cayenne experience. And stop driving the damn thing.

Dan87951

He noticed white smoke coming out of the tail pipe which is a good indicator of possible head gasket problems.

deilenberger

White smoke coming out of the tail pipe can just be steam burning off out of the mufflers. One output of a catalytic converter is H2O, which is why all exhaust systems are now made of stainless steel. As the exhaust heats up, especially if the air is cool and humid - it's not at all unusual to see some what appears to be white smoke out the tail pipe.

White smoke used to be a sign of a failed head gasket - but now - not so much.

Again - my point is - don't immediately assume the worst. Headgasket failures on the V8's seems thankfully quite rare. I can't recall one being posted/confirmed here or on other Cayenne forums. It's sort of like what John Oliver said about "WebMD" - their moto "Everything causes cancer.." - people seem to like to assume the worst.

jenxo

This is all great advice. Thanks a lot guys.
My coolant pipes were replaced in 2008 by Porsche dealer, so, not that.
The smoke did seem more like steam than smoke.
I'll get with mechanic today, but I think he blew in air.
I was offered $5k for it today, as is. ( It does have 153,00 miles, but I recently replaced serpentine belt, battery, rear door struts (a pain to install) and a spark pug. I was about to sell it for $8k, before this calamity.
Came at a very bad financial time for me.

deilenberger

Could still be the coolant reservoir. When you say "leaking a lot of coolant" - is it visible on the ground? If so - where? You know where the reservoir is - could it be under that general area?

If so - the reservoir is immediately suspect, especially at 150k miles if it hasn't been replaced. It appears they all go sometime or another.

CTTS520

Just replaced my coolant reservoir and all coolant loss has been eliminated. In my case, it was slow and there was no visible leak or coolant on the ground. I replaced it because it was original and figured it was the cheapest and easiest place to start searching for leaks. Definitely got lucky. Once I got it out I could see that it was leaking all along the seam where the 2 halves of the tank were joined in the manufacturing process.

Wisconsin Joe

Generally, a bad head gasket will generate large amounts of steam out of the exhaust.
It will also clearly smell of coolant.

It will also "steam clean" the spark plugs.

So does the exhaust steam stink? Are you creating clouds that obscure traffic behind you?
Pull the plugs and take a look. Are they super clean?

A compression check and/or a leak down test will tell you quite a bit too.

Also, what do the coolant and oil look like?

Does the oil look like whipped hot chocolate? Is there a shiny sheen on top of the coolant in the tank?

There's a lot of places you can lose coolant. Head Gaskets are one. But there are others.

jenxo

This is absolutely awesome, it sounds like a have a chance at a just having to replace the reservoir!
I'm going to check :
Steam ( visible and smell)
Plugs shiny
Oil looks like
Coolant in tank visible sheen
And a few others...will revert in a day.

Can't thank you enough for this hope!

jenxo

...and yes, I should not have driven it, and yes, I'm not technically adept..but I am teachable and willing to learn.

5thlilpiggy

This guy in South America DIYed the headgaskets FWIW.

http://www.renntech.org/forums/topic...?hl=headgasket

It isnt a walkthrough per se, but it includes the workshop manual download and some issues he encountered on the way.

jenxo

Just got the car back from mechanic ( he didn't want to tackle a Porsche)
I don't see any smoke. I checked oil on dipstick and opened the oil cap on engine top and don't see any "milkshake".
Water does leak from under that main area. (Right side of engine compartment/passenger side)
Mechanic says he looked for cracked coolant tank and didn't see any leaking from it. He says it is possible it is from another pipe "back there".
This is sounding very promising. ( meaning it may not be blown head gasket after all)

Now I will try find a trustworthy local German Auto mechanic.