Westcoaster

Way to go GearDriven, very nice ride! You won't be sorry for choosing the 987.

As for the windstop, I have it on mine and think it works well, but as suggested try to take a ride with someone who has one and judge for yourself. In fact there wasn't one on my 986 so I added it and found it quieted things down in that car.

Can I fit the 19 inch wheels froma carrera on my 2007 boxster? my tires are 18/235/40 on a 8inch rim and 18/265/40 on a 9inch rim. The Carrera tires are 19/235/35 on a 8 inch rim and 19/295/35 on a 11inch rim. The front tires should fit fine. But would the rear tires fit. I know I would need spacers to get the correct offset, I'm more worried about the wheel rubbing on the inside or sticking too far out and looking dumb... Will there be any negative effects with PSM or ABS?

If you contribute to the forum you can gain access to the TSB's that have the information you seek... 19" wheels will fit if they have the correct offsets:

Front: 235/35 ZR 19 (87Y) 8 J x 19, RO 57

Rear: 265/35 ZR 19 (94Y) 9.5 J x 19, RO 46

From what you have written, those wheels are from a 'wide body' car, the Carrera. Having said this somebody may chime in and say they have done it with the wheels you quoted... But

It is easier IMHO to stick with what is specified by Porsche, no 'gotcha's!"

Yes, nice photo, BTW what colour is that, Macadamia?

Will these read the OEM Porsche sensor?

I heard back from Orange Electronics, this system will only read the included sensors, not the OEM Porsche units.

Also would EPE http://www.epe.com/

or Rensport http://www.rensport.com/

be able to read the DME? or should I really try to find a dealer?

Dealer, why take the risk of uncertainty?

My logic in suggesting a Porsche dealer is to have the factory's representative give the car a clean bill of health. You want to have the peace of mind that if anything comes up after you buy the car there would be no question that it should/would be covered. I could hear it now, you arrive back at the dealer after a few months of ownership with a problem, they say 'if you had brought it to us first then we could have advised you on that problem but since you didn't...' I would go further and have them back up their inspection in writing to the effect that there a no issues present to preclude normal warranty coverage.

The perfect scenario is a car bought from the dealer and blessed with a CPO, this ensures that they have certified it as ready to go and completely eligible for all warranty coverage, the additional 2 years of coverage wouldn't be a bad thing either.

As for the paint, a bodyshop is the best source for that kind of inspection and I beleive that any problems with body/paint resulting from repairs after delivery wouldn't be covered by the warranty anyway. The dealer doing the PPI should be able to inspect the car for previous accident damage.

Get a PPI done at a trusted Porsche shop/dealership. Get a print out from the DME (dealership) and look at the over-revs and ranges (6).

I agree, when spending this kind of money a PPI from a Porsche dealer would be a prudent move, I'd also ask them to advise you of anything they find that would not be covered under warranty or would void the factory warranty(over revs), this way you know what will be covered (or not) and what you will have to absorb.

Decided on the 987 huh, I think it is a wise decision.

Al

Here is the concours prep document I spoke of, pages 27,28 talk about the engine but the entire document is an excellant read!

http://zone8.pca.org/Articles/concours101.pdf

BTW, I have cleaned the engine on my car a couple of times, usually I vacuum first then either a light list mist of water or a damp cloth to allow me to clean all visible surfaces (at 22,000 km it wasn't too dirty), then the appropriate surface treatment for the various parts of the engine and bay.

Hi all,

I just opened up the engine area on my Boxster and it is in a need of a cleaning or dusting. My question is, can you carefully wash the Boxster engine on low pressure with regular car wash soap? And is it normal for the engine area to look so "dusty"? It is a '98 that has 95k miles and has been check thoroughly for any RMS issues -- and luckily, it is one of the ones that escaped the issue but the engine looks dusty/dirty as hell.

Thanks in advance

Hey there and welcome, Careful cleaning with regular soap is fine, as usual with any engine electrical components should be protected from water, no hi-pressure sprays and nothing caustic.

For the most part a dusting is really all that is needed, search on concours prep and you will find the information and recommendations you need.

Timbo, you've got me (regarding alignment) since both discs exhibit the same problem!

When you say "so common on Boxster's" I wonder how often it is seen over here, I live in Victoria which has a similar climate to England and haven't see that before on the dozen or so brake jobs that I have done (not that I have done many Boxsters).

It is interesting that the pictures that Tool Pants posted all came from the UK!?

Did the Brembo site mention that certain cars were prone to this or that certain environmental condition were at play?

Thanks for the vote of confidence RFM!

Disc brake systems are designed to allow all contact surfaces to come together with even pressure, the pads should contact the rotors evenly across their entire surface. To have this system work correctly the calipers and the piston(s) have to move freely as brake pressure is applied and they clamp onto the rotor and self align to the friction surfaces.

My comment about alignment was in reference to this.

timbo: you said that the pad was

Very uneven and cracked

I would have expected that there would either be friction material missing to correspond to the area of the rotor that appears untouched or that the backing plate for the pad was not flat against it's mount.

As for moisture IMHO, a few minutes of brake use should eliminate all traces of moisture from the pads. I still beleive that uneven wear like that is the sign that either the system was re-assembled incorrectly, something is broken (jammed or seized, either a piston or slide) or the brake pad is defective and the material is breaking away.

Very uneven and cracked, despite this the pedal was good. Don't yet know much this will affect braking as I haven't had time to bed them in. This is my first Boxster and have felt that quite a bit more effort is needed on the pedal than other cars I have driven, but I read here thats normal.

Interesting, both pad surfaces should be the same, full contact. In this case there would appear to be 'something' out of alignment.

So from the picture, the left rotor, it would appear that the pad was only making partial contact with the rotor? What did the pad look like?

Yes I agree that everything that goes into building a car cost the buyer something... however that being said, I think that the ability to monitor the tire pressure from within the cabin is a positive thing.

As for checking the tire pressure the old fashion way, the system is supposed to be fairly accurate (+/- 1 psi), most hand held digital gauges are a bit better maybe +/- 1/2 psi so for most of us it would be at least a good way to monitor things and prompt you to keep the pressure correctly set. On the OEM system (and likely the aftermarket) alarms can be set which would alert you to dropping pressure before it become dangerous, a good thing.

The choce of tire should not be affected by this option, but I have read where wheel selection could be as the sensor stem needs to be compatible with the hole in the wheel. This could affect wheel selection, but with the growing popularity of TPMS the situation should soon not be a problem.

thanks for the feedback!

Will these read the OEM Porsche sensor?

Are there any 'aftermarket' sensor kits that can read the Porsche OEM sensors?

In other words if install a set of wheels that have the OEM sensors already in place, are there any of the aftermarket kits that can read them?

Thanks!

I don't think it is "good legislation" to make people buy something they don't want nor need.

Unfunded mandates are not something I would endorse.

Wouldn't this be a standard feature now, like anti-lock brakes? You wouldn't actually buy it... at least separately.

I thought that I read somewhere that the warning light issues mentioned earlier were only to do with the

newer (987) cars. My 2001 S has never had a problem. What models were being referred to?

Warning messages about 'dipped lamps' (burnt out bulbs) seemed to appear with the introduction of the 987. I get those messages on my 2006.

BTW, just a suggestion, add the year of your Boxster your signature, a lot of questions are model dependant and this would save a bunch of time. :)

Tah My suggestion would be ordering a new H7 HID kit that will sit properly.

I've installed plenty of these but not sure if the factory nissan ballast is gonna be compatible with those after market bulbs?

Guess what, this is EXACTLY what I did yesterday. I didn't think I'd ever get an answer here and finally got a decent picture of both bulb bases. Didn't look like they would fit the same connectors so I ordered the CQ Lights 5000K complete kit.

Thanks for the advice anyway, sounds like the best idea. (especially since that's what I decided ;) )

Tah......Your new kit should come with capacitors in the line......I bought the same kit and it was missing the capacitors...they provided replacement harnesses at a later date. Note the problem that I'm having with the kit (see this entire thread).......perfect lighting, but usually my oil and batt idiot lights come on when the HIDs are turned on. Let me know how yours turns out.

Bob

Bob, no problems with warning lights on my 2006.

BTW, what capacitors? My kit looks exactly like the pictures on the CQ Light website; bulb, ballast, ignighter... no capacitor. What are they supposed to do?

great quality control there!

much quicker/faster,awsome gear box,better braking,better handling,sounds better

Once U've driven a S, would have to admit that it is a totally different car even if U don'tl ike to,,,

Ah most important thing, no more getting smoked by S2000 or 350Z at the traffic light

A base Boxster at 240-245HP should hold it's own against the 237HP of a S2000, only 20lbs separate the two in weight and the Boxster's have a definite torque advantage...

I have a 987 with 17" wheels, the color is a usual silver, but I see from the picture below that silver is definitely different. When I looked at the center cap price in the look-up, the name was "GT Silver"?

So are there different OEM colors out there?

Thanks

Can this be done, I don't recall RCA outputs from the CDR23 deck, would it be possible to use 'hi-level' speker utputs or will this mess with the OEM deck?

Thanks for feedback and any horror stories! :D

Yeah we missed by a year, it became standard due to federal legislation for 2007 models IIRC.

Was thinking the same thing providing they did in fact not include directions to in the owners manual.

Curious, did you read post #3 above? It is in my manual...

You left out the all important year of your car but... my 2006 manual has the process outlined, and since you are contributing member you could download that manual and look at pages 203-206 and that should get you started.

Just about 2 years in a base 2006 987, happy? oh yeah but if the prices were the same or even close I would have bought the S. Why?

All things just mentioned, engine, trans, HP, bigger brakers, stiffer suspension, S on the trunk, bigger EGO!... opps did I say that!?

Seriously, depends on what YOU like and want, read the reviews, the base car is just as fun as the S but gives some things away at the limits of handling and acceleration so if you are not a 10/10'ths kind of driver then you won't miss the differences.

Hey Steven with a nick name of "GearDriven", I am thinking that performance might be a consideration? B)

Al