You had your box tested by Zim's. They are nice guys. Send it to Permatune. Tomorrow.

You were on us for not paying attention to your problem earlier. Your turn. Get that thing in the mail.

Sorry guys, I can be a bit stubborn at times, I like to work my way through things myself, comes from being an aircraft engineer I guess.

My frustration is not aimed an anyone here, more at myself for not being able to fix it.

The car is my daily driver and I have been relying on someone else to take mt to and from work whilst its been off the road.....also a source of my frustration.

That said, I am out of town next week so I will get the box in the mail to Perma Tune for testing.

Thanks all for your help.

Well, why didn't you say that. That explains everything.

I believe they have special secret ways to test under varying conditions. I sent mine to them in the 90's and it was back in a jiffy. Also, Lonnie spent a lot of time with me on the phone back then. I have a lot of respect for him.

I spoke to Lonnie this evening (thanks for picking up after hours) and my box will be on its way to him at the weekend.

Tonight I spent the evening checking continuity and resistance on all the wires in the engine compartment as follows:

12v at the Permatune with the ign switch on
continuity between the perma tune and the coil, both wires, ok.
checked the resistance of the perma tune as per the website, ok
checked engine earth resistance, ok
checked resistance between the chassis and the perma tune, ok
checked the resistance of the green wire 580, ok

At least I am getting to know the system quite well now!!

Hi Perma Tune,

I'm just back in town, did you have time to check the CD box yet? It arrived with you on Tuesday.

Many thanks,

Jim

Permatune
 

Hate to jump in unannounced, but this issue sounds similar to my plight.

'76 911 has intermittent start issues that tend to correlate with the weather/temperature.

I'm at the end of my rope as the car just came back from being at Midwestern Auto Group (MAG) in Dublin, OH. They had my car from 9/17/11 until 1/30/12. After being told it was fixed, I went and picked it up, driving it 40 miles home from their indoor heated facility. The very next day - a relatively cool 40 degree morning, went out to start the car to find I was still at square one with the exact same symptoms as when the car was driven to MAG by me on 9/17/11.

When the starting symptoms first started in late 2000 it was very different scenario than the present. My intermittent start issue back then happened on sizzling summer days where I would drive the car somewhere and it sat outside for a few hours. Such as after a round of golf. Around the same time I developed a fuel leak - one of the hoses coming off the fuel pump up front behind the tank.
I replaced the rotten/cracked fuel line between the pump and the tank and also put on a new fuel pump - a fellow that knew more than me immediately thought "check valve".

Another Porsche owner told me to remove the airbox cover and lift the plunger (on the right inside the throttle body) a couple times when I found myself in a pinch. When the hard starts would infrequently happen (maybe once a month or every 8-10 times I had the car out), I would go through this process, then the car would usually start within a couple of attempts with no further issues for an extended period of time.

During the 2011 driving season (I'm in Ohio) the prolonged starts became a little more frequent and embarrassing. My son was not thrilled when I had to go through the above process while leaving a family gathering. Cool cars are not so cool when they don't start. Throughout this period the car never died once it was started, at least not until summer, 2011. The cars failure to thrive once running has only happened a couple of times. Always at low RPMs, within a couple of miles after initially being started, and not necessarily dependent on the temperature outside. If the car is allowed to warm up for several minutes or more at idle, then I never have much difficulty.

Late summer 2011, my car issue evolved into the present state (same now as it was before I took the car to MAG in September, 2011).
Beginning late last summer, the car would be challenging if not impossible to start when cooler in the morning. If it was 50 or 60 degrees outside in the morning, I generally could get nothing. If it was going to warm up that day, then I would push it out in the sun for an hour at noon and it would often fire right up and run like a top.

If the car does start when it is cooler outside, then it is typically after several attempts where it cranks and sputters like it wants to hit, but stumbles - even for a second or two after the key is turned off. When it hits and starts, I usually have to stay in it to keep it running. The idle bounces back and forth from 500-1,100RPMs if left alone (and assuming it continues to run). This takes a few minutes to get to the point where it evens out to around 850rpm or so and runs well.

The car was taken to a local import garage early September, 2011 upon the recommendations of another "newer" Porsche owner. They did some diagnostics and checked for elecrtical/ground issues over a couple day period, but called me to say they could find nothing obviously wrong (other than the hard starts) and referred me to another place. They refused to charge me anything since they didn't fix it. What a concept!! So I bought the garage owner dinner for his trouble and drove the car home.

Shortly thereafter a Saturday came along that was sunny where the car fired up, so I called around to find MAG could take it that day & drove it up.


What I had done to the car prior to taking it to MAG.
- New fuel pump, replaced and repaired fuel line/leak.
- Swapped fuel pump relay with an extra one on hand
- New spark plugs, cap, rotor, points, fuel filter, air filter
- New starter, new battery.
MAG added a new alternator and external voltage regulator to car.

While the car was at MAG, I made 2 extra trips beyond delivering and retrieving the car.
- First was to drop off an external voltage regulator they said was toast along with my CIS fuel pressure meeter (MAG could not find their own meter within what I would estimate is a 50MM inventory complex). So I offered to bring my own test meter purchased for <$150 to them to use versus their idea of shotgunning for a WUR at $1,200 + install cost to me they thought it "might" need. After draining the fuel tank and adding new gas, MAG tested the fuel pressure reporting it was OK at 2.2 bar cold and 3.4 bar warm - saying I did not need a WUR after all.
- Second extra trip was to drop off an alternator they said it did need.

The last trip was to pick it up as they said it was all good.
--- In truth, it is no better now than it was back in September…
**The only difference I see is that the generator/alternator light on the instrument panel doesn’t dimly glow (strictly at lower RPM levels) as it had done before.

So my thought was to send the Permatune (black box off with $20 to have it thorougly tested by the manufacturer.
Does this sound like the next logical step?

If that is not the culprit, then I'm going to take it somewhere else. In the back of my mind, I'm still not convinced this is not related to the WUR or cold start valve.

Hi Woody,
Wow, you have been through the wringer on this one. Here are my thoughts:
It never hurts to send us the unit for testing, you do not need to send the $20.00 just send your Perma-Tune (and coil if you want to) here:
Perma-Tune Warranty Dept.
3 Grace Court
Center Moriches, NY 11934
Please include your contact information with it.
Being a '76, I assume you have the 3 pin Perma-Tune and that there is a fresh coil on the car. Here is a link to the information on diagnostics and troubleshooting. Since you had the glowing alternator light, had to replace the fuel pump, starter and alternator, pay special attention to the "Ground Circuit" section. I know this sounds simple but it is often overlooked even by really good mechanics.
www.permatune.com/T-ignition-Porsche-911.html
Some of these cars had coaxial primary wiring. This wiring has a white outer jacket, braided conductor then an insulated wire inside of that. Refer to the picture here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shielded_cable
If this wiring is crispy and brittle, chances are this is the source of your problems. It is easily replaced with standard automotive hook up wire. Rewire the ignition box point to point, the pin outs are on the Perma-Tune link above.
Hope this helps.
Lonnie

Guys,

Just wanted to publically thank Perma Tune and Lonnie for his help so far, he has gone WAY over and above what I could have expected of him and I greatly appreciate that.

Hopefully when I get my box back on Monday all will be fixed.

Thanks Lonnie,

Jim

I have to agree with Perma-Tune in that they are getting a bad rap. I have a silver unit in my 71T and had ignition issues. I thought, based on the treads regarding P-T, that the unit must be bad. My Indi swapped it with a bench Bosch and the problem remained. It turned out to be a distributor problem and not the P-T unit. The unit went back in and have had no problems since 2005.

Just my experience nothing else.

Great service from Perma Tune and Lonnie:)

So what was the answer?
 

I imagine our man is back on the road? Was the CDI unit ultimately exhibiting a problem? Did it show up on bench testing? Did we ascertain whether a fault in the car wiring cause the CDI issues, or ultimately just wear and tear?

Yep, back on the road and no problems since the permatune was changed, did have an issue with the battery a little later but I dont think it was related.

Car is a daily driver so I also completely rewired the ignition system in the engine bay and relocated the coil to avoid future issues.

Once again thanks to Perma Tune.

Hello from Germany!

Sorry for hijacking this "older" thread, but on my troubleshooting-www-search I stumbled over this thread, rich on infos.

Well, thing is, my regular 1979 911 SC broke down several times now consecutively, exactly since I put in an as working-offered PermaTune (silver edition).
I purchased it from a friendly US-eBayer willing to ship to Germany.

It seems it has a timeperiod/temperature issue, as:
a) it happend with two new coils (one BOSCH, the other BERU)
b) car restarts after aprox 1 hr cooling (with any of both coils)

Peripheric ignition parts are as new (exchanged/refurbished autumn 2012, few miles since then).

Fuel is on, new BOSCH-pump June 2013, valves eject fine.

The car runs great, when I put my BOSCH-HKZ back in.

Maybe any of you know the "bug"?
Maybe Allen/Permatune may sugest something?

Thanks in advance!

Flo

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