2005 Boxster Done Blowed Up

[Rant6]

Hi,
My 987 Boxster with 61,000 miles on it blew up this weekend. This car was my wife's daily driver, and so it got a lot of use. Over the past six months the car has been falling apart. It has been in the shop for several expensive repairs including new top transmission, new water pump, failed body control module, etc. I've owned a lot of cars (including five Porsches), and I have never seen a car wear out this quick. My all-original 914 is 39 years old,with 94,000 miles, and it still looks and runs reasonably well.

This car was not an IMS failure candidate. It leaked no oil, never had the rattle sound, and it was driven daily. Last Friday evening my wife was driving home from work, and she said the engine "suddenly got real loud like it was revving way up". She looked in the rear view mirror and saw a huge cloud of white smoke. Then all of the dash lights came on and the engine stopped.

I had the car towed to my local Porsche mechanic, and his initial diagnosis was that the air/oil separator had failed. This was corroborated with the white cloud of smoke, oil dripping out of the exhaust, and a failure code for the exhaust lambda sensor (due to oil buildup). He thought that he could clean out the oil and repair the AOS without a huge cost, but when he started working on it he found the engine was seized. I did some reading on the AOS failures, and I couldn't find any case where the engine had seized, and so I'm not exactly sure what happened. I had not noticed that the car was smoking prior to the event, but I really don't know how far my wife drove it while the oil was (presumably) being sucked out of the engine.

It does not make much sense to put a new $18k engine in a car that (last week) was only worth about $18k. Used engines are scarce, and they are still expensive, and so we have no choice other than to throw the car away.

There is a class action suit for the IMS failure, but this does not sound like an IMS failure, and so I don't think it is worth the time and money to have it towed 90 miles to the nearest Porsche dealer for evaluation. I called my Porsche dealer, and their advice was to buy a used engine. Gee, thanks. Kind of a bummer.

[BYprodriver]

Sorry for your misfortune! If indeed the AOS failed, sounds like enough oil was ingested thru the intake manifold into a cylinder to "hydro-lock" the engine. Oil or any liquid is non-compressible so usually the cylinder breaks & carnage ensues. It is easy to verify the cause by removing the sparkplugs & looking into the cylinders with a borescope. I don't know where you are located but I may like to buy the car as is.

[Rant6]

BYprodriver,
Thanks for the response. I think I am on the other side of the country from you (if you are in OC CA). I am in Daytona Beach Fl. I don't yet know the value of the car in its present form. I have had a couple of people give me links/phone numbers etc. for people that buy blown up Boxsters, but if your interested, you can email me at mdmasters911@gmail.com.

[txhokie4life]

PM'd you. I have an engine (not cheap) but I too might be interested in the car (to put that engine in).

I wouldn't expect you to hydrolock while running -- but I have seen them
do it while sitting. Then when you start the engine hydrolocks and a rod can be bent (or worse).

Mike