I don't. I've owned the car for 4 1/2 years and I've driven 75,000 of the 112,000 miles that it's accumulated so far. It feels bulletproof. The clutch will be replaced in a few months so I'll install the L&N Engineering IMS bearing retrofit at that time, along with a new RMS (even though mine's still dry).

pics?

Porsche’s Deadly Sin #1: 1999 Porsche 911 (996) 3.4 | The Truth About Cars

I have subscribed to this Blog for years and thought there review was enlightening to say the least. They don't pull punches for a lot of makes. I'm sure this has surfaced before on this board. Not a bad time to revisit. My opinion is the 996 had its problems and with each "improved" version they keep trying to "fix" what problems the earlier version had. Wouldn't it be time to just come up with a new, clean car? I guess that would end up costing $150,000 to start.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1288539296.jpg

Wow. Talk about yellow journalism.

Yeah, *Wow* is right....:confused:

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, (no matter how ignorant and misinformed it may be), but this guy seems to have written that article using only internet discussions and/or viral rumors to base all of his "expertise"...wait a minute... ;)

Well stated.

There are grains of truth intertwined in that piece but finding them is like sifting through vomit trying to find something appetizing.

LOL! A quote from the piece for those to lazy to click.

Porsche had been “fighting” failures of the watercooled engine, which appeared first in the 1997 Boxster, from the very first car that rolled off the line. Porous engine blocks, intermediate shaft failures… the watercooled boxers were junk. This is enough for a Deadly Sin — knowingly equipping every naturally-aspirated Boxster and 911 they sold from 1997 to as late as 2008 with failure-prone engines — but, as always, Porsche raised the bar in the customer-screwing department.

993 vs 996 is certainly difficult, but also not entirely fair. Good luck finding a great condition 993 for $20k. I paid $17k for my 61k 2001 Carrera 2, that car was in great shape with the sport package, Litronic lights, Cargraphic mufflers, Evo intake, and a spare set of turbo twists. Smoking deal for a lot of car.

Gee Paul, you have to have a major axe to grind with Porsche if you think that is a balanced article about 996's.

It's Sunday morning. Just some examples of the rubbish in that piece:


"...the problems range from oil leakage at the rear main seal (which is more or less universal) to cylinder head failure. In nearly all cases, the “fix” is the same: to purchase a complete rebuild from Porsche, at your expense. Figure on $15,000 or more for the “subsidized” engine."

First, there was a problem, but it was confined to a relatively small percentage of these engines. The vast majority of owners had zero problems. Second, If catastrophic engine failure occurred the engine was replaced under warranty. So the suggestion of "universal" failure "at your expense"—is yellow journalism. Full stop

"...the watercooled boxers were junk.... as always, Porsche raised the bar in the customer-screwing department..."


The blanket statement that the watercooled boxers "were junk" has zero basis in fact. Voted the best sports car many years running etc, many of these cars are still around with no problems whatsoever. Yellow journalism.

...During those years, Porsche worked with its dealers to deny warranty claims, place blame on customers, withhold knowledge of fixes, and generally burn every last bit of goodwill they had built up over years of…

Right. :rolleyes: Yellow journalism.

While waiting for his $75,000 Porsche to experience a $15,000 engine failure, the 911 owner could at least fail to enjoy the most dismal, fragile interior ever seen in a production Porsche. Buttons wore out, dashes cracked, radios committed suicide in new and interesting ways, and every single electrical component in the car seemed prone to intermittent, untraceable failure.

Good grief. Go look at some high mileage 996's at your local dealers. The interiors may be ugly, but they're not fragile. And "every single electrical component" prone to failure? What nonsense! Yellow journalism.

I saw brand-new 996s with cracked leather on the seats when the cars were still in dealerships.

Give me a break ... Yellow journalism.

Sooo...I guess my 10 year old 112,000 mile 996 with NO cracks in the dash or leather anywhere, NO buttons worn out, NO radio failures, NO random electrical failures, NO engine issues, etc., must be one of the RARE 996's that Porsche got absolutely right.:rolleyes:

Yea, that guy has no axe to grind, does he?

I read the whole article months ago.

Paul IS the resident Porsche hater here, btw.

They are great cars and at a great value. I recently went to the 997 side a 2006 with 16,000 miles on the clock, car stickered for $98,000 and I picked it up for less than half price. Performance is out of this world and you can drive it all day and not feel like you were beat up. The best of both worlds it to have an early one and a newer one, watch the 997's they are a great value also.

I like how that article states frameless door windows were shared with the boxster as a means of cost cutting. Sure, sharing development with another car cuts cost, but frameless door windows are not used to cut costs, they are a styling feature. They are actually more of a challenge to implement due to the dynamic sealing trim involved.


Jackass article.

Just remember that thanks to the Internet, any no-talent assclown can be a "journalist".

the 996 side of the forums here certainly talk about some of the common issues. just because porsche made it doesn't mean i have to get a boner over it. obviously the previous (and current) 996 owners are getting defensive about it.

it's a lot of car for the money, but it still seems like it's a gamble. if you buy with the understanding that it's pretty much a disposable car, then no worries.

might there be a reason that the resale sucks so bad on these things versus any other 911 produced?

I think it's definately car to buy and keep for a long time. not a car you would want to buy and sell after a only a year.

that's really nice! How difficult is it to lower a Cayman?

Pray tell, where did I say it was balanced????

It was about as balanced as a Rush Limbaugh report!

Well said...:)

The headlights? :p

The resale values of expensive cars in general has been horseschit in recent years. We had an unprecedented boom economy in the late '90s/early 00s followed by an (almost) unprecedented recession in the meantime. Porsche, (and Ferrari/Lotus/BMW/Lexus/Mercedes/etc.), sold more cars than they ever dreamed about in those boom years and the market is flooded with them in *just off warrantee* condition. Combine that with record unemployment and general downsizing of most people's lifestyles and expectations and you have the perfect storm for dirt-ass cheap used late-model Porsches.

They're not the least bit collectible, they sold a boat-load of 'em and they're a dime-a-dozen. You have to realize that a 1973 911S was about as collectible as an empty beer can in 1976-1980 and affordable to any guy with a blue-collar job. Of course Porsche never sold cars in the numbers that they did in recent years, so it was not quite the same as now. In the early 1990s when the 964 was out, Porsche nearly went out of business a couple years. I think in 1994, they sold about 8 cars in the U.S.

A little perspective goes a long way, but of course this is the internet...:cool:

No one HAS to like ANY car, but that doesn't mean that the car one dislikes is a piece of disposable junk. It just means that you don't like the car. That's all.

I have both types - air/oil cooled and water cooled. My experience has been that the 996 is a better built car than the older 911. Believe what you want, but this is what I've experienced over many years and about 100,000 miles of driving these cars. Yes, the engine in the 911 may have a more robust bottom end than the 996 (I'd say the 911 bottom end is almost indestructible, which is great for racing, but maybe a bit of overkill for a street car) , but in most other areas, the 996 is built to a higher quality and is stronger than the 911.

I'm intimately familiar with the values of 911's...i've been buying and selling them for a while now. Your logic is fine until you look at the values of 996's versus 3.2 Carreras.

Is the 3.2 (or SC for that manner) a collector car? Hardly. We spout on here daily that they're run of the mill cars. With 996's being non-collector cars and 3.2's being non-collector cars, based on your logic, why wouldn't the 3.2 Carrera being even cheaper than what it is? Or...looking at it another way, why is the 996 so relatively cheap?

The 996 is faster, better built, more reliable (or are they?). The 3.2 still is depreciating and so is the 996. Early 996 values are almost comparable to 3.2 values, if not comparable. One car is at least 11 years older than the other, yet both are still depreciating.

Do you agree that Porsche might not have gotten the engine design right? I mean, the IMS situation was "corrected" no less than 4 times during the life of the 996. It's estimated that 5-10 percent of the M96 engines are affected by these issues. Do you think 10% offers good quality assurance?

Don't get me wrong....i think it's a lot of car for the money, but when it really comes down to it, the car's reputation is what's killing the resale value. You can look at the factors of global economy, sales numbers, etc...which also affect the sales of a 3.2 Carrera, but it by percentage the 996 has taken a bigger hit.

To the average first time buyer of a 911, an old air cooled Carrera or SC is almost a collector car in the sense that it is relatively rare these days (supply) and is highly coveted by so many of us who grew up desiring one of our own one day (demand). That doesn't make it a better car. It just puts it in a position to command a higher premium.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/porsche-cars-sale/572637-fs-1999-porsche-911-project.html

;)

Huh?

"Other than
engine needs nothing.Good winter project.Price is $13K."

The 996 was horribly unpopular with Porsche "enthusiasts" due to it being the first water cooled car. This seems to have carried over to the used market, as the enthusiasts are the buyers for older used Porsches.

Reliability? Seriously? How many old 911s make it past 100k without a top end rebuild, a 915 rebuild, etc? They are great cars, but they aren't the Toyotas that you are all making them out to be.

Think the 996 was bad at holding it's value?
How about the Panamera!

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1288621839.jpg

Yeah, but you have to go to Nigeria to pick that one up.

Craigslist w/ no phone#? Yeah, that's real...

It's called "I get a dime for every email address I can spooge..."

My logic is still fine. If Porsche had sold about 3x a many 3.2 Carreras, (and they were all leased), followed by a mini-depression in the early '90s like the one we are having now, (and the internet was up and gunning then), there would have been a thread on Pelican in the mid-'90s about how cheap 3.2 Carreras were getting.

3.2 Carrreras actually did sell well, 1986 was a record year for Porsche in the U.S. up until that time w/ approx. 30k cars sold. (All models including 944s, etc.). I was selling them new at the dealer then. I'm not sure what you're saying about Carrera values, it seems that they are getting cheaper all the time but I don't pay a lot of attention. I guess to someone young enough they are "classic" or something, to me they are dated and yawn-inducing. I want more performance than my 996 had, not less. A lot more. (Next time around). :cool:

How much will any '74-'89 impact bumper car be advertised for with a failed or failing engine? I'll answer that: WAY less than $13K.

(Wait a minute. Air cooled 911 engines don't have problems. No time bomb chain tensioner issues that took Porsche 19 years to finally get right. No valve guide issues. No pulled head stud issues. No exploding air box issues on CIS cars, etc.):rolleyes:

Hey, no car is perfect. Other than a well set up 944

And yes, Panameras will be depreciating like a tuna-fish sandwich. I plan on getting a couple for Home Depot runs in a few years.

Not quite the bargain that Lee found, but here is another sub-20k 996.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1288639852.jpg

Seems to be hard to find a sub $20K 996 or am I looking in the wrong places?

The 997's are dropping like a rock too.

997 Turbo for $60K Try to find a 50k mile '94 Turbo for that price.

At this rate the 996 Turbos will be in the 20's soon. I'd love one. I think one problem with the 996's is that they don't photograph well. But when I see a nice 996 TT in person I can't help but think damn, nice car.