JeTexas

How many miles did you have on the motor when the intermix began?

If the battery got tipped too much, water/acid could have sloshed out of the cells. You might just need a new battery.

If the temp goes up while you're at speed, it could mean clogged radiator, low coolant, dirty coolant, dying water pump or bad thermostat. If the temp goes up while you're sitting still, it usually means bad thermostat or dead radiator fans. If it were me, I'd check the coolant level and do a pressure test on the system for leaks. If that all checks out, I'd try a coolant flush and replacing the thermostat.

The transponder is the little black tube in the key head, not the electronics and battery.

Go talk to a service person at your local Porsche dealership. They have toolboxes full of replacement plugs to use in case one breaks while they're working on a car. The plugs aren't listed in the computer, but they can fish through and find you the one you're looking for.

Body shops produce lots and lots of dust - just think of all the sanding and fiberglass cutting, etc. You don't think about that though since your car is all shiny and clean when you get it back. I did some fiberglass work in my garage working on a Shelby replica, and everything is still completely coated in white powder. All that dust and the MAF is a recipe for failure - especially if your car's been sitting in it for a month.

Firestone Service Centers offer lifetime alignment packages for about $140. I get a 4-wheel alignment done every time I get my oil changed.

I went back over my records. Last spring not long after I got the new tires I started having high idle issues, which were tracked back to a vacuum leak from a broken oil filler tube. Just a couple weeks later I noticed the hanging idle. It's an intermittent problem, and I think it must have been originally masked by the vacuum leak. The kicker is that I just bought new rear tires in February. If I'd only known then. It feels really good to finally have a solution though.

Does the RTS mounting hole feed into the drain as well or do I need to plug it every time I remove the mounting brackets? I ended up with a rear passenger seat and floor full of water this weekend, and I wanted to make sure I remedy the problem completely.

Another alternative is to grab one of the many cigarette lighter to USB adapters out there and wire to that, but it adds about $20 to the project. Hopefully Apple will decide to stick with the 3G style charging when they release the new iPhone in June. I'm sick of having to switch all my wiring and adapters every time a new device comes out.

If the clutch switch isn't working, it wouldn't be cranking at all. They're only about $15 though, so it wouldn't hurt to change it just for peace of mind. Since you're having trouble with both cold starts and warm starts, I'm leaning toward battery. Usually if starters are dying, they have trouble warm when they get heat soaked. Another issue I've seen before is dirty fuel injectors can cause hard starts or the car to die once or twice before it runs smoothly in the mornings. But I'd check the battery first.

I checked my tire size. I do have 265/40R18 tires in the rear, and the manual does call for 265/35ZR18. I turned the traction control off, and the hanging idle is completely gone. The only thing that puzzles me is that I had those tires on there at least six months before I noticed the issue. I wonder if this is really a tire size problem or some other malfunction in my ABS/Traction control unit. But yes, turning off traction control made the problem go away.

I'm headed out to my car to turn the traction control off and see what happens.

Seems like you could just swap a window switch into the top switch location -- but I haven't looked at the back of either switch and may be oversimplifying things.

The window buttons definitely have something that stops the automatic roll-down/up if there's too much resistance because when my rubber is acting up and catching on the window, it will stop it halfway down.

As we all know, the early 996 and 986 are great sports cars, but lack a few amentities that it's nice to have, especially on long trips. There's no cup holders. On top of that, the cigarette lighters - even the updated replacement versions - don't work too well as power adapters. I have a couple different plugs that instantly pop back out of mine. Anyway, I was at the hardware store picking up some stuff for the house last weekend, and I realized that their project aluminum was the perfect size to fit in the gap between the upper and lower portions of my 99 996 cab's center console. The cost for a 4' piece of this aluminum was $7.50. I went by O'Reilly's and picked up an accessory power plug for $1.99. I already had the Belkin Tunebase for my iPhone that I used in another car, but the stock cigarette lighter in the Porsche couldn't hold it up. I popped the dash panel with the cigarette lighter off and put blade tips on a couple wires that I slid into the back of the stock lighter plug. I then ran the wires to a quick release clip and then to the new accessory plug. I've now got the Belkin Tunebase secure in my new accessory plug on one end of the aluminum strip. At the other end I'm either going to attach my power inverter or a cup holder, or maybe both if I can figure out something ingenius enough. Right now I just have a couple strips of tape holding the aluminum in place to keep it from sliding down into the dash. I'm considering using velcro to hold it in place, but I'm hesitant because when I remove it, you could see the velcro in the crack. I'm thinking a better idea would be to find some sort of rubber front I can put on the edge of the aluminum, so that it won't slide all the way into the crack. However, I'd love to hear any innovative ideas you guys might have. The whole point of this was to be able to add some convenient accessories in a totally non-destructive way, so that I can quickly remove it and there's no trace of anything done to the car. Thanks for any input on how I can improve the idea, and I hope it might be helpful to some of you.

Even 12 volts probably won't give you a start. As I mentioned before, batteries need to actually put out at least 12.3.

Ideally your battery should sit somewhere around 12.3V - 12.8V without the engine running... when it's running... you want between 13.5V - 14.5V You might be able to jump it, but I think your battery has died.

The testers they use at Autozone, O'Reilly's, Napa, etc. read your battery charge. Then they read your cranking amps. Then they read your alternator output. Then they test the voltage regulator diodes. You might be able to rent one if you don't trust their people to stand there and read it. If it is charging and then goes to discharge, my guess would be bad diodes, which are in the voltage regulator, but again, without running tests, it's all just a guess.

True. It could damage the computer. I'm used to working on pre-computer cars. I'd say drive it to the Finnish version of Autozone and have them test the charging system. They should be able to tell you immediately what the problem is.

According to the Durametric the throttle position is 0 degrees when the problem is occurring. The only non-normal reading is that the Air Mass is around 60 instead of 20 (not sure of the units on these measurements. I think kg/sec, but I can't find anything to verify that), which corresponds to the 2000 rpm idle. Then I hit 10 mph and the air mass drops to 20 and the idle drops to 800 rpm - back to normal. Of course, that's only with the A/C on. If I turn the A/C off, the idle hangs at 1100 rpm and tends to fall very slowly when I brake, no matter the speed of the car, but it then corrects itself to around 700 RPM when I get under 10 mph. I picked up a power inverter this weekend, so I can monitor the live values with the PST-2 this week and also the idle position switch while I'm at speed since everything checked out normal in the driveway.

Your voltage numbers look low to me. My alternator cranks out something like 13.6 volts when the car is running. I think you're going to have to get a new one. Try starting the car and then disconnecting the battery. It should keep running if the alternator is good. Don't parts shops in Finland do free battery/alternator testing like the ones in the states do?

I have the same problem on my 99 C2 Cab. I just lube the seal every few weeks with a dry lubricant. I think there's an actual window seal lubricant out there somewhere, but I haven't found it yet.

Can you actually drive the car with the hose removed to test it or should you only let it idle?

Just lost the water pump on my 99 C2 at 107,500 miles. Thankfully it gave out in a parking lot a mile from my house, not on the freeway somewhere. If I were you, I'd definitely swap the water pump.