I heard about boxster's catching on fire b/c of passengers or drivers throwing their cigarettes out and it getting sucked into the air intake slots on the side ... what would happen if something of this sort happened to our TT ... for example gum, cigs, mud, etc ...

 

I thought that was for Land Rovers only!!

 

It may be that the guy just went in too hard
to a corner and ran off the track into the
runoff area, which can be muddy if it is soft
dirt that got soaked with rain..

 

Wasn't this the guy who started the www.996tt.com page? I remember he mentioned he had some incident on the track a while back.

 

it looks like that is what happened

 

That's Blaise, the guy who hosts (or something to that effect) the Hobby Stage site/forum for Porsches a lot of you guys put your pics on. That particular day, he just went in the corner too hard and had to get towed out. He's a car nut. Has a tt, his wife a Boxster, a couple of F-cars, and the requisite AMG Benzes to round out the package

 

Ouch, I have seen plenty of cars get towed out of runoff areas like that before, better get the clay bar out.

 

The side intakes on the Boxster (one of them at least) run to the airfilter. The ciggy gets sucked in and the paper filter element could catch fire. On the TT (and GT2) the side intakes are for the intercoolers while the engine air intake is from the vent in front of the rear wing. Getting things sucked into the side vents would be no worse than getting things sucked into the foreward radiator vents... not good, but not the end of the world as there is no paper element to burn. I have worried when I have seen cigs come over the top of the car as I would not want them sucked into the rear vent.

 

Did you guys catch the April/May '01 issue of Christophorus? The feature article was a TT making the trip to Australia's northern tip. It was pretty neat to see it crossing rivers, ruts, and mud!