Problems with my 997S

[Guest]

Technical help please. From new my car has had one clean exhaust and one black sooty one, on 2 occasions my OPC had the car back but said it is OK. 3 weeks ago the engine ate an exhaust valve on the sooty side, the valve and exhaust port were caked in carbon - the car is 18mth old with 12000 miles. The OPC replaced the valve and decoked the cyl head. They returned the car, it is still sooty and now they say it needs new pistons etc. Has anyone the technical expertise to pass an opinion ?
Whilst talking to the OPC they say the car, which is a Tiptronic, has been overreved on 35 occasions to 7900 rpm. My understanding of Tiptronic is that it is impossible to overrev the engine, even in neutral. Can anyone confirm this or give me a situation where it can be overreved.

 

[snarf]

Sorry to hear of your trouble. Sooty left tail pipes (why is it always the left?) is a known problem and has been discussed at length on Rennlist. Here is an extract -

"Finally a diagnosis. Cylinder no 4 turned out to be OK but no 6 is scored and my dealer talking to Porsche about a re-build versus a new engine. I obviously want a new engine. Given that I bought the car second hand at 18 months old, and that it is still under its original warranty, and has done less than 10,000 miles and apparently had the problem since new, would you accept a re-build?? . . . . Dr Mark
Artic silver/ blue 997 S
UK" Full story at http://forums.rennlist.com/rennforums/showthread.php?t=301467&page=2&pp=15 Allan

 

[Ronnie C]

My engine was replaced because of this problem. DrMark is the other person I know of who had his engine changed just before mine; again same problem. Definitely something you want fixed whilst under warranty. What production date is your car? So far my hunch is that this is a problem for cars made in late 04 and early 05. I hope I'm wrong, but suspect more people have this problem than they realise. Also, which OPC are you dealing with? I've made a number of posts on this topic on rennteam and rennlist. Have a look if you want some more information. Best of luck.

 

[snarf]

ORIGINAL: Ronnie C

My engine was replaced because of this problem. DrMark is the other person I know of who had his engine changed just before mine; again same problem. Definitely something you want fixed whilst under warranty. What production date is your car? So far my hunch is that this is a problem for cars made in late 04 and early 05. I hope I'm wrong, but suspect more people have this problem than they realise. Also, which OPC are you dealing with? I've made a number of posts on this topic on rennteam and rennlist. Have a look if you want some more information. Best of luck.

Ronnie, I don't have this problem but I like to be prepared so I hope you'll permit a few questions please: Just how sooty were your tailpipes, for example was it leaving soot on the bumper or was it just on the inside of the pipe, and what sort of oil consumption were you getting before the problem was sorted compared to now? What diagnostic tests did your OPC do and how difficult was it to get Porsche to accept there was a problem and fix it? How did you run-in your first engine - by the book or by the Motoman method (http://www.mototuneusa.com/break_in_secrets.htm)?

I don't suppose you have any before and after pictures of tailpipes do you?

Allan

 

[Mark Elder]

ORIGINAL: rallen
OPC they say the car, which is a Tiptronic, has been overreved on 35 occasions to 7900 rpm.

35 times! - how?
Can they explain how this is possible unless the tip is faulty and making bad change down decisions, in which case it's still a warranty job.
Have you noticed it doing this?

 

[OK1904]

My C2S manual (early 2006 build, March 2006 delivery) develops mild soot on the inside and the ends of all the exhausts (no PSE and therefore dummy pipes), if anything more so on the right than the left. Re the over-revving my car has a rev-limiter which kicks in at 7000 and I know this works! Surely the Tip has this too so any claim of 7900 rpm would be a fault within the electronics.

 

[Ronnie C]

ORIGINAL: snarf

ORIGINAL: Ronnie C

My engine was replaced because of this problem. DrMark is the other person I know of who had his engine changed just before mine; again same problem. Definitely something you want fixed whilst under warranty. What production date is your car? So far my hunch is that this is a problem for cars made in late 04 and early 05. I hope I'm wrong, but suspect more people have this problem than they realise. Also, which OPC are you dealing with? I've made a number of posts on this topic on rennteam and rennlist. Have a look if you want some more information. Best of luck.

Ronnie, I don't have this problem but I like to be prepared so I hope you'll permit a few questions please: Just how sooty were your tailpipes, for example was it leaving soot on the bumper or was it just on the inside of the pipe, and what sort of oil consumption were you getting before the problem was sorted compared to now? What diagnostic tests did your OPC do and how difficult was it to get Porsche to accept there was a problem and fix it? How did you run-in your first engine - by the book or by the Motoman method (

http://www.mototuneusa.com/break_in_secrets.htm)?

I don't suppose you have any before and after pictures of tailpipes do you?

Allan

Hi there, I'll try and find my posts on rennlist and rennteam regarding this as they pretty much answer all these questions and points raised - with photos of my pipes (oo-er) as well. I'm responding on a mobile device at the moment so let me have a proper search for my posts and photos when I get home.

A quick recap would be... ran my first engine in according to the manual, ie soft first 2000 miles never above 4.5k rpm. This is only my second ever car and first Porsche at that, so my knowledge at the time did not cover the pros and cons of different run in procedures.

The soot was very heavy, but only on the left hand side pipes. I have some photos on rennlist I think where they show before and after for about 400 miles. Soot went on the bumper and even today with a new engine, I have not been able to properly remove the soot stains from my first engine.

Coupled with the soot, heavy engine oil consumption was the other warning sign for me.

The engine in hindsight was less powerful, but that is not something you can tell until you get the new one in.

 

[snarf]

ORIGINAL: OK1904

My C2S manual (early 2006 build, March 2006 delivery) develops mild soot on the inside and the ends of all the exhausts (no PSE and therefore dummy pipes), if anything more so on the right than the left. Re the over-revving my car has a rev-limiter which kicks in at 7000 and I know this works! Surely the Tip has this too so any claim of 7900 rpm would be a fault within the electronics.

Rev limiter only stops the engine being "driven" over the limit, with a manual if you're doing high revs in fifth and intend shifting down to fourth but get second by mistake then the engine will over-rev and will most likely be damaged. I don't know whether this is possible with a Tip.

 

[snarf]

ORIGINAL: Ronnie C
Hi there, I'll try and find my posts on rennlist and rennteam regarding this as they pretty much answer all these questions and points raised - with photos of my pipes (oo-er) as well. I'm responding on a mobile device at the moment so let me have a proper search for my posts and photos when I get home.

A quick recap would be... ran my first engine in according to the manual, ie soft first 2000 miles never above 4.5k rpm. This is only my second ever car and first Porsche at that, so my knowledge at the time did not cover the pros and cons of different run in procedures.

The soot was very heavy, but only on the left hand side pipes. I have some photos on rennlist I think where they show before and after for about 400 miles. Soot went on the bumper and even today with a new engine, I have not been able to properly remove the soot stains from my first engine.

Coupled with the soot, heavy engine oil consumption was the other warning sign for me.

The engine in hindsight was less powerful, but that is not something you can tell until you get the new one in.

Ronnie, thanks for the feedback, - I look forward to reading your Rennlist posts. What did you consider heavy oil consumption? Porsche say that more than 1,000km/litre is in spec[&:] I think this is excessive.

Allan

 

[Rodney Naghar]

Rev limiter only stops the engine being "driven" over the limit, with a manual if you're doing high revs in fifth and intend shifting down to fourth but get second by mistake then the engine will over-rev and will most likely be damaged. I don't know whether this is possible with a Tip.

The tip won't let u over-rev up or over-rev going down.
On the way up it just changes up a gear, on the way down, it just won't allow you drop a gear or two if it means you will hit the limiter. U can try and manually override the gearbox as much as u like, it just wont comply.

I have no idea how any tip can be over-revved once let alone 35 times!

 

[Ronnie C]

ORIGINAL: snarf

ORIGINAL: Ronnie C
Hi there, I'll try and find my posts on rennlist and rennteam regarding this as they pretty much answer all these questions and points raised - with photos of my pipes (oo-er) as well. I'm responding on a mobile device at the moment so let me have a proper search for my posts and photos when I get home.

A quick recap would be... ran my first engine in according to the manual, ie soft first 2000 miles never above 4.5k rpm. This is only my second ever car and first Porsche at that, so my knowledge at the time did not cover the pros and cons of different run in procedures.

The soot was very heavy, but only on the left hand side pipes. I have some photos on rennlist I think where they show before and after for about 400 miles. Soot went on the bumper and even today with a new engine, I have not been able to properly remove the soot stains from my first engine.

Coupled with the soot, heavy engine oil consumption was the other warning sign for me.

The engine in hindsight was less powerful, but that is not something you can tell until you get the new one in.

Ronnie, thanks for the feedback, - I look forward to reading your Rennlist posts. What did you consider heavy oil consumption? Porsche say that more than 1,000km/litre is in spec[&:] I think this is excessive.

Allan

http://forums.rennlist.com/rennforums/showthread.php?t=301467&page=3&pp=15
My photos are post number 38 and 44.

I too think 1000km / litre is too much. That sounds a familiar quantity to what my first engine was using. If you ask around, you'll find some owners who have engines using minimal amounts and others using a lot, so Porsche will give a figure to cover as many as possible, but I know which kind of engine I'd prefer.

Some other threads you might find of interest:
http://forums.rennlist.com/rennforums/showthread.php?t=327875
Interesting engine reliability data.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Warranty Direct have just published a league table based on 450,000 insured vehicles in the US and UK. Porsche came 16th (2 below Ford!). What was striking was the number of engine based claims - 21 each year for every 100 Porsche policies sold. That's four times the claim rate for Jaguar. They don't specify what counts as an "engine based" claim.

http://forums.rennlist.com/rennforums/showthread.php?t=302938
05 piston ring failures - any new engines?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At least four of us have had problems with sooty tailpipes in 05 cars that have done less than 10,000 miles. Mine has a scored number six bore and needs a new block and piston and I am pushing for a new engine (Porsche adamantly refuse despite a dealer offer not to bill for 15 hours worth of labour - the car is still under new warranty).
I know of at least one of you who has been offered a new engine for the same problem. Are there any more of you out there? It seems it could be a worryingly common failure given that, popular though Rennlist is, the majority of 997 owners won't know about or visit the site.

If the story of soot and exessive oil consumption rings any bells please list your model type, year and mileage. It might help if we band together to get Porsche to do the right thing. I really am not happy being fobbed off with a partial rebuild for such an early failure. Note my car passed PIWIS and compression and leakdown tests and the fault was only found on taking the engine out and head off.

http://www.rennteam.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Board=997&Number=342625
I took my car (2005 997S - 4000mi) to the dealer about a week ago because of soot coming out only on the left tailpipe. The dealer reviewed the problem and indicated that there is a problem with cylinder no. 6. Because of the warranty, the dealer discussed the issue with porsche and are thinking of opening the engine to determine next steps (fixing existing engine vs engine change).

 

[Ronnie C]

rallen, what kind of overrev is your engine feed reporting? Stage 1, 2, 3 etc.

35 times sounds way high. Do you often change from high speed in a high gear to a low one, even jumping down sometimes? eg 6th blipping straigth down to 2 via 5, 4, 3?

Do you use the engine to brake much?

 

[snarf]

Ronnie, thanks for taking the time - interesting and definitely something to look out for before the warranty runs out.

Allan

 

[Guest]

Hi, thanks for the feed back. The Vehicle analysis log - 13 pages (everyone should ask for a copy) shows :

Range 3 - 47 overrevs ( the dealer says this is 7700 - 7900 rpm)
Range 4 - 35 overrevs ( 7900 - 8400)

I have been speaking directly to Clair at Porsche cars GB who has been very helpful in getting an answer to how the car can overrev. The answer is it cannot unless there is a fault with the Tiptrpnic or rev limiter. Of course there was no mention of this being a known problem but I will go back to her now to tell her I am aware it is. I will put my story on Rennlist.

 

[Guest]

Have not noticed any problems changing up or down, and have never felt the limiter intervene. The OPC have lent me a boxster which I took to the limiter and you know when you hit it.
Porsche have now confirmed that it is not possible to overrev a Tip unless the Tip or the rev limiter are faulty.

 

[Guest]

Further to this sad saga the OPC (nottingham) have written to me offering me 'trade' price for my car because of the 'minor' problems I have had - I have only been dealing with them for 9 years and we are on first name terms - but no more.
My car was one of the 05 Tiptronics that was recalled by the factory for a new gearbox, in Feb 06. I seem to recall this was because of a fault which allowed the gearbox to allow the engine to overrev - I had forgotten this in the excitement. Can anyone verify this or remember a different reason for the recall ?

 

[Mark Elder]

Well, it's clear where this story is leading.... another OPC trying to rip off a customer who unfortunately for them knows too much history. Me thinks they'll be fitting you a nice new engine.

Fight, don't take the "offer"

 

[peterfrost]

Just to add my views-I've run 996 -c4s and boxster S's.
My manual 4s showed 250 interventions stage 2 at about 10,000 miles of which I can only re-call 3 or 4 rev limiters-its like hitting a wall if your accelerating and the fuels shut off.None of these were downchanging which records seperately.The dealer wasn't worried and the engine never went pop,despite loads of trackdays with oil "regulation" dropping the pressure on corners.Many -particularly turbo's have interventions in the 1000's .I think it records power intervention by the psm as well,which is how I got so many.
997's may be more complex.

 

[Guest]

Rallen, I just had more or less the same problem with my car (2005 997S, 5000km).
I noticed soot on the leftside tailpipes about 2 months ago. Took the car to the dealership and Porsche indicated that the engine had to be stripped down. Cylinder 6 was scarred, and a lot of back and forth (dealership, porsche mexico, porsche latam and porsche ag), until finally they resolved to replace the engine.

Hope this information is useful!