blundgren77

Yes, hindsight being 20/20 I should have, but I didn't. Although, after owning a Boxster, hearing the stories from this forum, and talking to other PCA members in my area, it appears that most Porsche's lately are more at home on the back of a flatbed, than on the track. :-/ Really makes the decision to get a 2013 Boxster tough, when I've had nothing but problems with this one.

Last night coming home late down a back country road (typical time for Murphy to show up) my 2001 Boxster (43,000 miles) let out a little bit of an intermittent chirp that lasted for 2 or 3 seconds, a few times. Sounded like a belt slipping, but nothing major, or drastic. The 3rd or 4th chirp was followed by a thud, and an immediate lighting of the charge light. I knew the belt broke. No power steering - no nothing. Seeing as how I was about 12 miles from home, I elected to continue, seeing as I was in the middle of nowhere. I keep an eye on the engine temp, and it climbed, but slowly. About 4 miles from home, it finally got up to redline, and I pulled over, and shut it down for about 5 minutes. After restarting, I managed to limp it home at 25 to 30 mph, but it was certainly at red-line most of that 4 mile trip. I got home, shut it all down, and although the engine was running, it didn't sound "right". (obviously overheated) I had some steam coming from the car when I pulled into the drive. I haven't torn into anything yet (doing that after work tonight), but the question is - with driving it at redline for 4 miles or so, how badly could I have messed up the engine? I realize these engines don't like overheating, but how much will they take? I plan to dump engine oil, full coolant flush regardless of what problems I find. Is there anything else I should do to make sure by baby is healthy, besides start investing in the Porsche Special Tools to rebuild it? Thanks! BIll

Here's what I'm after. This is a picture of the drivers side. It's just under the cowl, and the battery cover overlaps this, and the little "T" nuts that hold the cover, lock into this and bite down, to hold it down. It just snaps in. Passenger side is the one missing.

I'll take a picture tonight, since they're worth 1000 words. The cams (posts) that you turn on the cover are fine. What I need is a little white, rectangular clip that snaps into the body work under the cowl covers, that the black posts lock into and bite on to hold the cover down. it's about a 3/4 inch wide white clip that snaps into a larger rectangular hole in the underlying metal under the cover.

Ahhhhh, it's spring! Time for Boxstering! This was bugging me last year all year long, but never got around to fixing it. The battery cover on my 2001 Boxster has a part missing. It's not the cover itself, but its the little plastic hold-down "nut" that is where the little 1/2 turn cams would lock into. The passenger side clearly has a little white plastic part that the cam locks into, and when you give it a twist, holds the cover down. My drivers side, just has a hole where there should be something, but apparently it's broken off and fallen away.I have the little screw part in the cover - just nothing for it to lock into when you turn it. I checked the PET to try to find it. Group 8, Illustration 813-20 shows the cover, and the cowl cover 996.572.561.01. The drawing shows the battery cover plasitic screws and them going into the cowl cover, but no where do I see the little plastic bit. It's definately not part of the cowl cover, as I can remove the passenger size and the white piece is still in the metal-work of the car. Any ideas what that little plastic clip part number is, and can it even be replaced?

Oil anywhere but inside the engine, in any large amount is probably cause for some investigation. :) Doesn't look all that major. Could check the Air Oil Sep maybe? Maybe even pull the throttle body and see if there is oil and crud inside of it. If there is a ton, could be AOS. But you'd really have to look to find the source. From the picture, it appears its all after the t-body, and not before, and heaviest just after it. How loose were the clamps? Even if it was the AOS though, hard to imagine it leaking out of, intead of into the intake, and the car not "smoking" a as it burns oil. Is the car using any oil at all?

Check out this thread. Some good discussion on smoking http://www.renntech.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=30223 Bottom line - these engines smoke. My 2001 doesn't do it often, but I can set my watch by it in the early spring and fall. When it starts to get cool outside - I get smoke. Call it a puff...call it whatever. I get a white "puff" or steam and/or oil. With that in mind, in the above thread, there is good discussion on steam, versus smoke. Based on everything you've changed already, it sounds normal. If the throttle body is clean, the AOS is doing it's job. Since the cylinders lay flat, oil can leak past and pool overnight. People see the smoke and think that a car of this "prestige" shouldn't do it. I had a buddy of mine with an older 911 that said "if the car doesn't smoke when I start it in the morning, I know it's time to check the oil." :) As for the .3 you overfilled - there is lots of debate on here about that as well. It may have added to your smoking...but it's such a small overfill, I don't think you have anything of concern.

The PS reservoir is in the engine compartment on the drivers side, up close to the firewall. Once you get the convert. top into service position, you can remove the engine covers and you can't miss it. It's a twist cap, and has a dip stick in it. You can top it off from there. The factory fill is Pentosin CHF11S usually, but that fluid was superceded with CHF-202, whcih can be used to top off an 11S system w/o issue. I have not been able to find it anywhere like Autozone, etc. I got mine at the local dealer, and didn't get overly charged (shockingly). I tried to get it at Napa, but my local one told me they didn't store-stock it, and since it wasn't all that common, i'd have to buy an entire case for them to get it for me. lol :) Keep in mind it comes in 1 quart metal cans, and under most driving, to "top it off" only takes a little bit. That can will last you a LONG time unless you track the car or have a leak. Bill

Well, first you need to get the convert. top into "service mode." I can't remember if that's in the 2006 owners manual or not. (Porsche eventually removed the steps from later model years.) If its not, you can just search here on the message board. The process is the same. Basically, you "partly" open the top (so that it's about 6 inches from being closed, and the clam-shell cover is at an angle). You then unsnap the felt rear liner of the top from the rear retainer clips, release two small cables, and pull the top up manually until it "clicks" into place, just aft of the seats. Then you can remove the engine covers and access the air box, which on a left hand drive car is on the left side, just inside the air scoop. The search feature on this board is really good. Just search for it here. The procedure, and even the air filter replacement has been covered many times.

When I changed my black Boxster logo to a titanium one, I used the dental floss method to remove it. It works great. Any residual gunk that was there, I used Goo-Gone (Not the new "ultra powerful" stuff - just the regular stuff). Worked great, and didn't hurt the paint. After that, I used Scratch X over the entire area to remove any goo-gone schmootz. :) Then, where the logo was going on I used just a soft cloth and rubbing alcohol to clean the area well so there would be no waxy residue. I put down some ledger marks on the car to help me align the logo. To do that, I just used a sharp, white Crayola Crayon to make some tiny little dots on the car to keep things straight. The crayon will write on the car, and when you're all one, it wipes off with no effort, and leaves no marks.

When I put my Boxster away for the winter I did an oil change and sent a sample off to Blackstone. Got the results today. Everything looks AWESOME. 0W40 had lots of life left, all the values were in spec, and they detected no fuel dilution or antifreeze at all. They noticed a higher than universal average of copper though. The comments in the report said nothing to be "alarmed" about, but they would look at it again on the next sample next year. The universal average according to them is 5ppm. I had 11ppm. The comment blackstone made was copper in the oil would be from copper and/or bronze parts in the engine wearing. (duh!) Every disassembly picture I've ever seen of Boxster engine pretty much has large chunks of steel and Aluminum. So any idea where the copper could be coming from? I'll be anxious to see what it looks like next year, and I'm not overly alarmed about it. More curious than anything.

While getting ready to put my 2001 986 to bed for the winter this past weekend, I wanted to siphon off the washer fluid, as since I had no idea how the porsche fluid was prepared, I couldn't guarantee it wasn't mostly water and might have frozen. The washer bottle has a large opening, but it tapers and you can't just use a baster or something to pull fluid out. I could have tried to create a suction somehow, but I got to thinking, and reached into my old box of RC airplane parts for this: http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti00...LXMA93&P=ML It's a hand operated fuel pump for filling up RC airplanes. It pumps like mad, and uses a small diameter rubber hose. I simply fed the tube down into the washer bottle, put the discharge hose into an empty bottle and started cranking. Emptied the entire bottle in about 2 minutes. The company has electric versions of these pumps also. Best of all, since the pumps are designed to pump Nitro fuel, they are pretty much bullet proof and nothing will eat them. I could see this working to siphon off brake fluid (getting past that pesky little ball in brake fill) or anything else you want to remove from the car. And less than 20.00. :)

The manual control for the spoiler is down on the drivers side, next to the wheel well. There is a cut-out in the fuse panel cover, and you can press the top of the switch to raise, and press and hold it on the bottom to lower it. As for changing the extension and retraction speeds, or temporarily disabling it, I'm pretty sure that you'd need a PST2 or PIWIS for that. There isn't anything on the car to do it that I'm aware of. You can manually lower it though with the switch. One thing you could do is when you have the bike rack on, simply pull the fuse for the spoiler. You may get (others may be able to confirm) a light on the dash with the fuse pulled once you are past 75. The car may still call for the spoiler to come up, and with the fuse pulled it won't, so you may get the spoiler light coming on. But once the fuse is back in, it should be fine and clear on its' own. Other may have other ideas though.

Awesome. Thanks Loren!

Getting ready to store the car for the season this weekend. This is my first winter owning the car, and I'm about 99.9% sure the dealer I bought it from filled the washer with Porsche concentrate. Since I drive it on good weather days only, I've never had a reason to use the washer fluid much, so never topped it off, and thus - never bought any yet to read the label. :) Does the stuff contain any anti-freeze substances? Or for storage this winter (unheated, but garaged) should I drain/sypon it, or top off with some good 'ol regular blue washer fluid/antifreezing solution? I don't want to come back in the spring to a cracked fluid bottle from it freezing. Bill

Aside from spending well over 10,000.00 for a PIWIS, Durametric is the best bet. If all you want to do is scan a code, yes, there are alternatives that can be less expensive, but why? If you're only worried about the code, you might as well take it to the dealer, because just knowing the code may not give you any actual values, computer data, or anything else to help you find and fix the actual problem. A plain code scanner for these cars is about as useful as trying to work on one with a phillips screwdriver and an SAE socket set. The new features available in Durametric are more than just scanning a code and resetting a light. With the right interface cable and a few lines of Visual Basic code, I can do that myself. The real value from these tools comes from understanding the low-level logic and all of the addressing from the modules, that makes the values represent something we as humans understand. Not to mention, reverse engineering all of the addressing to do things like add the OBC hack, activate the ABS pump for bleeding and all of the other stuff that Durametric does, takes a great deal of understanding, and isn't going to be available in a 100.00 USB cable and CD-ROM. Like most things with these cars, adn the tools required to work on them - you get what you pay for.

Dirt simple. :) Just remove the battery cover, and then you have to undo one torx screw in the cover next to the battery compartment on passenger side. The torx screw terminates into this little rubber "compression nut" so as you losen the screw, it will eventually just pop out. Once you have that cover off, the filter will be right there. Just reach in and yank it out. On my '01 986, getting the new one took a little effort as it slides back and then drops in about 1/4 inch and the fit in there is somewhat close, but it's not hard. Just put the panels back, and just snug up the torx screw (again, it's an expanding rubber plug for the nut, so don't tighten too tightly) and the battery cover and it's done. The filter basically just sits in there. BTW - on my car, I opted for the non-charcoal filter. Mahle has a replacement w/o the carbon thats less than 30 bucks. I figure since the car is a convertible anyway, who needs carbon filtered air in the vents? :) Hope that helps.

Nosing around tongiht on Porsche's website for tech info, I found the link for the PET online, which led me to a link for the PIWIS tech info site. I was able to sign up for an account successfully, and put my VIN in. Looking around, I was able to see workshop manual links, and, had I put money into my account, I could have downloaded the documents for $1.80 US each. However, the amount of material didn't seem right. There was a lot of interesting stuff out there, don't get me wrong, but I've always heard that the WS manuals were thousands of bucks, and thousands of pages. But, on the website, under "engine" it wasn't that in-depth. Maybe 40 or 50 links. Same for just about all of the other groups. Is this stuff on Porsche's website actually the WS manuals, or is it "some" of the manual pages for the most common things you'd want to do? Very interesting either way. Thanks!

Bill I don't know about in a 2001, but in my 2004, the filter and pump were all one unit. It was an easy replacement, BTW. No pressure in the tank. I did not have the proper tool to remove the ring, but was able to improvise easily. Also replaced the gasket around the ring at the same time. RFM has some instructions out here somewhere that were spot on. Thanks. Yea, in 2001, there is a dedicated fuel filter on the bottom of the car. I belive 2003 and after, the filter no longer needs changed (unless it's plugged) and is a part of the fuel pump assembly in the tank.

If it's just a poof of white smoke when you start it up for a short duration (on mine it's just a poof usually, or maybe a couple of seconds) first thing in the morning, that is completely normal, and is based on the engine design, and the fact that our cylinders are horizontal. There are plenty of posts on that very topic. :) Now if you're spraying for mosquitos every morning for 2 or 3 minutes straight, or if it does it on every start up even when warm, thats different.

I haven't personally but others on here have rebuilt engines without issue, and Jake Raby at Flat 6 Innovations pretty much has written the book on the process of ripping some of these engines apart and getting them back together again better than new. The only kicker is the need to either buy, and/or make some special tools to hold, insert, and remove various parts of the engine, timing chains, and etc. LN Engineering is a source for pistons, rods, and other goodies for these engines. http://www.lnengineering.com/ And Flat 6 is at: http://www.flat6innovations.com/ Might be worth a call to him to run what you've found past him (sometimes he's on this forum also) and see what his take on things is. Not impossible - just major PITA. :)

Greetings. 2001 Boxster. Getting ready for some end-of-season maintenance before putting the baby away at the end of October. Figured while the car is jacked up and I'm changing oil, I'd change the fuel filter. I have the instructions from the Bentley manual, but just curious about one thing: when I break everything lose, is the fuel feeding the filter under any great pressure, or any pressure at all? Am I going to be drenched in a shower of gasoline, or is this pretty straight forward, and I just need to have some rags/small pan to catch some light flows until I get the new filter on and be quick about it? Thanks! Bill

So funny you mention this. I was at my local P-car dealer (also sells VW), with my better halfs VW for some warranty work. Service manager was showing me this brand-new VW they had in the bay getting pretty much re-wired. The cars owner bought the car new and put on a little over 1400 miles, and suddenly all sorts of electrical things started going wrong. When they opened up the car to start troubleshooting they found the problem. Lady left the car out one night (starting to get cool here in Wisconsin) a few weeks ago, and forgot to close the sunroof. A toasty warm car must have looked very inviting for a cold mouse, and somehow the mouse got into the open sunroof rails between the slides and roofline, and decided to gnaw way at wiring. They found a ton of chewed through wiring and a dead mouse - all of which wasn't covered under warranty. :) 900.00 later the lady had her new VW back. :) So, I guess if you are sure it's coming from the top, it's not impossible. Any place a mouse can get it's head, it can get it's body, so even the smallest gap between the sunroof rails, if it was left open, is a potential for a critter to make your baby his condo. :) You'd probably have to take the liner down to get at the area and see if anyone decided to make a home. That's what the dealer had to do to the car I saw. How you go about removing the liner though I'm not certain. Might be work a PM to porschelibrarian. He's got access to the shop manuals which might shed some light on removing it without messing it up.

If you can get your hands on a power washer, or even a hose-end soap dispenser, try a little Simple Green and hose the bottom of the car down, wheel wells, and along the front air dam where the little critter likely hit. Small woodland creatures tend to "tuck and roll" under these cars, and with the plastic bottom pans, somewhat "smear" along the bottom. :) hehe The Simple Green is a nice gentle degreaser and cleaner, and should help break down any skunk oil, and it has a decent smell. I hit a raccoon with my Boxster a few months ago, and that worked for me to get rid of a little odor a few days after the "incident." :) I used my power washer with the soap hose in some simple green, and used just light pressure by laying down along side of the car. Once I got all of the plastic washed down, things were better.

I emailed Durametric to ask them about the Beta version 6.0 stuff. Namely, a lot (if not all) of the coding change features will only be available if you have the Enthusiast version. For those of us with Enthus. packages, I was curious if there was an upgrade path. They answered that, as well as some details on 6.0. Figured I'd pass it on. ============================ We offer an upgrade from enthusiast to professional for the difference in the price of kits, you can send back your original kit at any time and receive a full credit of what you paid towards the purchase of a professional version. Starting with Durametric 6.0 there are a few features that are only available in the professional version. The main thing is "Coding" this is the ability to modify the settings in the control modules to enable options or change the vehicles behavior. The Porsche 9x7 has approximately 10 times that amount of coding that is available in the 9x6 cars. In the 9x6 there are only a few things that can be turned on and off, with the factory tool. In the 9x7 almost every module has some form of optional configuration. So once we release coding for your car we will offer some coding capabilities but it will not be anywhere near what is available for the 9x7 cars. The most common request we have had for the 986 Boxster is the ability to turn on the On Board Computer. We have spent a huge amount of time on this one thing and still have not solved it. If we do solve this we will offer it in the enthusiast version even though it is technically coding. Durametric 6 is a really big update with improvements in almost every way that the tool operates and the enthusiast versions will greatly benefit from the update.