Boxxy

I recently changed my oil and decided to drain the turbo's, in the process I discovered a few things.

1. The dealer had clearly never drained the turbo's when they performed oil changes - I say this because the plugs were practically seized in place and it took tremendous torque to 'unstick' them (similar to jpflip experience ?). Of course the dealer could have removed them but just over torqued them during the re-install or perhaps that's the way they come from the factory ?

2. In my case the turbo drain plugs had no washers in place at all !! - and yes I checked very carefully that they weren't stuck to the plug or in the tank recess. I re-assembled everything per the correct torque settings sans washers and all seems well, no leaks. But I suspect I may re-visit this and install washers as shown above.

3. The amount of oil which came out was miniscule - so not sure if it was actually worth the effort / risk.

I just did my first oil change and I found the same results as timf. VERY tight plugs. Looked to be never having been take out before. No crush washer either.

I did it because I wanted to see if there was any unusual wear (e.g. metal bits) in the oil from the turbo reservoirs (the oil was fine, no metal bits). In my opinion, there as a fair bit of oil in there. So I'm glad I did it. Other than the original over-torquing by either the factory or whoever did it last, it was easy to do, so I will also do it next time.

Hi Loren,

2002 996 Turbo

Porsche PCM with NAV

The battery ran down when it was in the garage over winter.

Can you help with this unit? I don't know how to get the serial number from it. There is no TP button.

Thanks

Thank guys.

Will a Durametric help me read out what the switches are saying? I am fast thinking of getting one and this maybe a reason that pushes me over.

I'll be garaging it for the winter in less than a month and so maybe this will be a winter-time project (to dissect the rams and figure this out).

The spoiler failure light came on today after getting past 70mph. I see in the rear view mirror that the spoiler did come up. And when I slowed below 20mph, the spoiler went down again.

Do I have a microswitch problem?

I noticed that the bottoms of the 2 rams are damp with some sort of fluid. Not dripping just damp. Is this related? Is there any preventative maintenance I can do to avoid needing to replace the rams?

Edit: It's a 2002 996TT

A Turbo is a little more difficult than a Carrera, cause the lack of room between the water pump pulley and the engine bracket, to remove the belt, but it's possible and the way to go. It helps, if you remove the steering pump pulley first, before you get out the belt, and placed the pulley back with the new belt already in place, it will give you a little more room and overview on the belt possition and routing, at least on the right side.

Yes, I had removed the steering pump pulley. The belt is slack and loose. Just can't get it completely off the water pump pulley (I've gotten it mostly off but then the belt is pinched and the clearance around the other brackets and crossmembers is so small that it won't come out from that area. I'm thinking maybe there is a special tool or a trick. I may try again one of these nights. Maybe I have to position the belt just right. Or bend it just the right way to wiggle it out.

...like I said, this is a bad start. I'm planning to do the plugs and coils soon, that those seem to need the bumper and both intercoolers off(!) I hope I haven't overestimated my wrenching abilities!

Did you turn the tensioning roller clockwise - to relieve the tension?

Oh yes. Using a breaker bar and a 15mm socket. To be more clear, I did get the belt "off" the water pump pulley, but because of tight clearances, brackets and a cross-member of some kind going from left to right, I can't pull out the belt from that area. The belt is off of everything else but I can't pull it out. It's caught in the tight tolerances and I can't figure out out to twist it such that it can slide out.

assuming you have the K16 turbos, you SHOUL be getting .7-.8 max sustained boost. This is the boost when WOT in third or fourth gear....not spikes. If you are actually getting .9, you have been flashed (perhaps not well, but that is better than normal). If you do get a flash, K16 limits for power is about 1.0. Best to know what other mods you have (e.g., exhaust).

At what RPM will you see Max sustained boost in 3rd gear what at wide open throttle? I have a stock 02, non-X50. Saw 0.9 bar briefly in second, but was going too fast in third (vs speed limit) to keep my foot in it.

Did you see the DIY here?

Yes. This and the shop manual say similar things, basically "- Remove the belt from all drive wheels and lift up to remove. "

My problem is I can't get it completely off of the water pump pulley. Rest of the belt is off the other rollers it's just that there seems to be too many brackets and other things in the way. I wish I took a picture. There must be a trick or a way to twist the belt or something.

Sad. Used to do all my own work on my cars when I was a young man. 17 years riding a desk, raising a family and it's come to this. After like a hour of wrestling with the poly-rib belt, I can't get off the water pump pulley. There are various brackets and tubes in the way. I've got the shop manual, the Streather's book, various articles on the net, but for the life of me, I can't get it off the water pump pulley. I ended up putting the current belt back on, but it was really disheartening. You see, I have grand plans of doing all the maintenance on my new-to-me 996TT, bought new tools, variety of maintenance parts, etc., but this is not a good start...

Anyhow, anyone have a tip on how to get the belt off? (I've gotten it off all the other pulleys and rollers). Maybe I should jack it up and approach it from the bottom?

I may need to replace my water pump. I understand this will result in some loss of coolant. Porsche states that coolant need never be replaced and so one course of action is to catch the coolant that will run out and pour it back into the system.

On the other hand, I have some Prestone DEX-Cool stuff I bought at Walmart lying around (the Dex-cool is the more expensive stuff that supposedly is better for the aluminum radiators and is recommended by GM; whatever, I fell for it being only $5 more expensive than the common yellow jug Prestone.) '

Should I drain the rest of the OEM fill coolant and replace it with the Prestone Dex-cool? It's a new-to-me 02 and thus has been in service for close to 8 years. Other than this Porsche recommendation of never changing coolant, for the rest of my cars, 7-8 years of service would have seen at least 1 if not 2 coolant changes for any of them.

Being also a Boxster owner, I read this post on a Boxster board that came from an engine rebuilder. It sure sounded like sage advice for 986/996 engine owners. Can someone familiar with the innards of our TT engines comment?

In particular:

1) how hard is it to "pull the sump". Is that the oil pan? If so, just a lot of screws plus a new gasket when done?

2) Ignition coil packs. Is this truly harmful or is it that one won't get max spark and thus lose performance? How does one detect this? [by his post, it looks like detection is by visual inspection]

3) Vario-Cam tensioner pads. I don't hear too much about this. I have read that for some older engines (944/968), tensioner pad failure could mean catastrophic engine failure as valves hit the pistons. Not sure about ours.

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Quote:

We are learning that more should be inspected at 60K than just what Porsche recommends.. This includes a lifter inspection and an inspection of the variocam components as the tensioner pads are normally shot at 60K.

I have saved more than a few engines by pulling the sump at 60K miles and cleaning sealant from the oil pick up tube that had been partially blocking the oil inlet, thus reducing oil pressure.

By 60K most engines have a handful of lifters that have seized and at least the upper vario cam pad tensioners are heavily worn. Timing chains are also starting to wear and can have notable wear at 60K miles.

I have yet to do a single 60K service on a vehicle that didn't have at least 3 ignition coil packs that were cracked and required replacement.

Long story short, done right this inspection needs to go further than the "book" says to ensure you don't end up without an issue that can cut your engine's life short.

From what I have seen the Techs that are doing these inspections just go through the motions at the Dealerships.. They don't look at anything they don't have to per the directives and they certainly don't go any deeper than they have to looking for issues that can be noted and then solved with preventive measures before they break.

A car came to us for an IMS bearing retrofit recently and it had just had a 60K done by a Dealer in Texas..(700 miles prior) All 6 coil packs were cracked, it had a broken vario cam tensioner pad on the 4-6 bank and 6 noisy lifters. The Dealer didn't annotate any of these issues on the invoice but they did charge 1100 bucks extra to re-seal the cam covers. (and they still leaked)

Ensure who ever does these services doesn't just go through the motions and follow some generic check list. What was **believed** to be necessary at 60K miles when these cars were new isn't what reality has proven to be necessary. Having deep internal experience with these engines has taught us whats really necessary.

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I see. I guess if the IR gun type worked well, the race guys would be using them... Thanks for the explanation.

I'm still curious then how I can tell if the tires will wear funny if I don't have any equipment.

I think I know how to read feathering (i.e. wrong toe).

Wear caused by incorrect camber would be harder I think. Not until a fair amount of rubber was worn off.

Someone in another thread mentioned examining his tires using a pyrometer. In my like of work, I have access to an infra-red gun type pyrometer. Is this good enough? I'm thinking after driving around for a while (what is a while?) and then checking across the face of the tire. I'm thinking I might be able to spot one area of the tire hotter than another, maybe suggesting a change in the camber or toe.

I see when watching races on TV that technicians press something directly on the tire to get its temp. I won't have access to one of those.

I ask about the pyrometer because by the time I would notice abnormal tire wear, a rather significant chunk of the tire would already be lost. [No?]

White: I'm not a show-off (he-heh). So no burnouts with the tires or drifting, etc. Mostly daily driving with occasional fun rides in some nearby mountain twisties. I'm putting on a new set of Kumho Ectsa SPTs after seeing them them workout very well on my 986 and consulting a recent thread here about them for a 996TT (most users were of the same experience as me with them, though one user felt they were not good).

1999: I'm not after 100% grip and so I will look into your advice re: going towards the min camber allowable by Porsche. By min toe, do you mean "as close to zero as possible" [i.e as "straight-ahead as possible"]? Related, what sort of loss in handling could I see with this? My 986 is nimble and handles great; excellent feel of the road. I wouldn't want to end up with a "vague" handling car.

Could be too much toe in, or a combination of too much toe and not enough negative camber. The tyres should wear evenly if it it set up to the factory specs. I just changed my rears (Conti SC2s) after 7000 miles, and they were worn evenly across the tread. An alignment is only as good as the operator. Try another shop.

Wow, only 7000 mi? I've started another thread on mileage out of new tires but I find your lack of tire life alarming. Maybe you track the car?

New to the 996TT family. My 986 recently got 20-25,000 mi on a set of Kumho Ecsta Supra 712. It's actually at 20,000 now but there's still 15% tread left. No immediate need to change tires.

How will I fare with my 996TT?

My style of driving: daily driver in good weather. 90% commuting to work and city driving. 10% fun/spirited driving. No track/DE or jerk-like driving.

At what mileage are you guys experiencing the need to replace your shocks?

From my username, many would know that I'm a current 986 owner, but I'm also a new member of the 996TT club(!)

The 996TT I'm getting has new but oddly worn rear tires. After less that 4000 mi, the rear tires are excessively worn on the outer side of the tread but near new on the inside. As a Boxster owner, I find this odd because Boxster owners normally see wear the other way around (inside worn first due to negative camber of the rear wheels).

Is this outer wear normal for a 996TT?

The dealer has aligned the 996TT's wheels twice in the past 2 years with the new tires coming in between the alignments. The 2nd alignment was just earlier this year and I can't see it having destroyed the tires so badly. Part of me thinks that the 1st of the recent alignments was perhaps bad.

I am replacing the oddly worn rear tires when I take over the car. I am worried about future tire wear in the 996TT and ruining the new tires right away like the previous owner has.

Related, I'd like to also ask: is the standard wheel alignment harsh on the rear tires in pursuit of maximum handling? If so, is there a modified alignment setup one can choose to extend tire life at the expense of some of that optimal handling? And if there is such a modified alignment, what sort of degradation in handling should I watch out for?

Any news on the replace-just-the-bearing front? I'm glad there is now a proven solution (replace the arms), but I'd rather not spend $600+. Out of curiosity, what could the new bearings cost?

I have the same symptom in my 2001 2.7. I was thinking the soft top mechanism was loose or something like that but what you guys have said (noise at the right rear) sounds just like my problem.

I'm hoping there is a simple solution. Thanks in advance for any tips and pics.