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We've had the same discussion in the 996 thread (except me as speeder, word for word, and Matt as Matt ;-) It just comes down to your level of confidence. The odds are pretty good the 997 will not blow up on you - no denying that. But in my book, *I* will be in the 5%, and therefore I prefer a fixable early Gen1 (impossible to know) or a Gen2. That's not unreasonable either. If you are selling them or looking for a deal, I imagine your priorities differ, as they are good deals and the odds are low. I want to keep it for a long time.
Like Speeder I have indirect but close (good friend) experience of those lunching themselves (on track, before my eyes)... I object a bit to the prices mentioned above. I said it before, today, it's closer to 20K+ to have a swap done - more if you do a clutch and water pump and whatever else. That buys a ****load of top end rebuilds and studs in the aircooled world. The IMS is more akin to a piston ventilating a case, which is not the kind of engineering cockups we've seen in Porsches of past....
The IMS suit would not help Steve. Largely it was for M96 engines, and only included very early 2005 997s with a low degree of accuracy, VIN wise. I can PM it to you in PDF form if you want... 997, you are on your own. So yeah, it comes down to your comfort level, nobody is right or wrong here and nobody knows the exact failure rate. The market however speaks by showing a 10K+ bump between gen1 and gen2s of close year/mileage. And I've owned 4 IMS cars without an issue - I just want my long term 997 to let me sleep at night ;-)
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