Does Cayman suffer from infrequent use

[Teucer2000]

Hello - I'm thinking of buying a late model Cayman and I'm fortunately that it will be a second car. The downside of this is that the car may only be used once a week or so - I've currently got a MK3 MR2 that is eight years old and still only has 25000 on the clock. I have read somewhere that Porsche car suffer from infrequent use. Any thoughts?

 

[BrianJ]

Hi, if by late model you mean a Gen 2, I would have thought weekly would be fine, as long as you give it a decent drive (eg at least 30 mins) to exercise all the parts and charge the battery. Particularly on the Gen 2 cars there isn't really anything to worry about if used weekly. Just do all the sensible things you would do for any car - let it warm up properly before revving/accelerating hard, use the brakes firmly from a decent speed at least once on each trip to clear surface rust from the discs, and don't do lots of 200yd trips with cold starts each time. Again, like most cars, Porsches seem to go wrong more frequently when they don't get used for months. Many people use a battery conditioner if the car is not used regularly, but I haven't yet found this to be necessary with decent weekly use. Hope that helps, and enjoy your car!

 

[chrisH]

I agree with all Brian's comments. Definitely get a battery conditioner, you can get this from an OPC for about 35 pds even if they don't supply the car and it comes with a 2 year warranty. You can get them elsewhere for a few pounds less but with only a 1 yr warranty. In my experience as the S has a higher rating battery it lasts longer between charges but using a conditioner after one week is a good precaution if you leave the alarm set. The alarm WILL drain the battery after a few weeks on the non- S and if the battery volts gets too low you can't disarm the central locking with the key blipper and you wont be able to get into the car to charge it. I believe you can use the key but you can't open the bonnet as the bonnet release is solenoid operated. (Yes, I know the alarm drops out after one week to try to prevent this, but a conditioner is still the best way to avoid being locked out)