IMS Failure
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Not worth it... as you say, Porsche has not provided any numbers so it's all guess work anyway. You can say the same about the plastic cooling pipes exploding in Cayennes since 2004. But, clearly what ever the magnitude is... it should not happen and / or it should get a 10 years warranty to show that Porsche cares - even after the 4 year warranty has expired - and the issue would have gone away, quietly. No more to say on it.
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I don't want to get into a flame war but I would suggest that the people (besides Porsche) who have the most reliable information on IMS fail rates are the extended warranty people, and if you look at the way they price extended warranties on M96/M97 engines, it would not appear that they think it is remotely as high as 10%. I typically see powertrain warranties from the reputable companies going for about $2,500 for 4/48 (that's in the ballpark of what I was offered on my 2005 C2 with 50,000 miles). Now, given that the cost of an engine failure is going to be ~$20,000, you could just do the math and see that even if the only thing the warranty covered was IMS, they'd barely be breaking even at a 10% fail rate. But, of course, it covers much more (including parts which are more likely to fail), the overhead for the broker, and also builds in a (presumably) hefty profit margin for the brokers. Using those prices as a benchmark, I'd say the extended warranty people must have pegged the fail rate at less than 1%.
I'm not saying that is the rate, but they certainly have better information than any of us, any of the magazines, or any of the vendors (and even if we put aside their motivation to sell their product, they're obviously not dealing with a representative sample, so it could skew their impressions).
There are something like a half million M96/M97s on the road. If there was a fail rate of 10%, that would mean ~50,000 blown engines, which seems like a pretty big leap from 50-100 anecdotal online reports, and probably a pretty major story that Consumer Reports would have picked up on (instead of naming the Boxster the most reliable car of the decade)....
(None of this means that I think Porsche shouldn't stand behind their cars, of course. Either this is small enough of a problem that they should be able to cover it as an immaterial expense, or a large enough problem to justify a recall. But I do think it goes to some of the hysteria on the internet message boards.)
I'm not saying that is the rate, but they certainly have better information than any of us, any of the magazines, or any of the vendors (and even if we put aside their motivation to sell their product, they're obviously not dealing with a representative sample, so it could skew their impressions).
There are something like a half million M96/M97s on the road. If there was a fail rate of 10%, that would mean ~50,000 blown engines, which seems like a pretty big leap from 50-100 anecdotal online reports, and probably a pretty major story that Consumer Reports would have picked up on (instead of naming the Boxster the most reliable car of the decade)....
(None of this means that I think Porsche shouldn't stand behind their cars, of course. Either this is small enough of a problem that they should be able to cover it as an immaterial expense, or a large enough problem to justify a recall. But I do think it goes to some of the hysteria on the internet message boards.)
Last edited by neotorque; Mar 21, 2012 at 05:18 PM.
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I don't want to get into a flame war but I would suggest that the people (besides Porsche) who have the most reliable information on IMS fail rates are the extended warranty people, and if you look at the way they price extended warranties on M96/M97 engines, it would not appear that they think it is remotely as high as 10%. I typically see powertrain warranties from the reputable companies going for about $2,500 for 4/48 (that's in the ballpark of what I was offered on my 2005 C2 with 50,000 miles). Now, given that the cost of an engine failure is going to be ~$20,000, you could just do the math and see that even if the only thing the warranty covered was IMS, they'd barely be breaking even at a 10% fail rate. But, of course, it covers much more (including parts which are more likely to fail), the overhead for the broker, and also builds in a (presumably) hefty profit margin for the brokers. Using those prices as a benchmark, I'd say the extended warranty people must have pegged the fail rate at less than 1%.
I'm not saying that is the rate, but they certainly have better information than any of us, any of the magazines, or any of the vendors (and even if we put aside their motivation to sell their product, they're obviously not dealing with a representative sample, so it could skew their impressions).
There are something like a half million M96/M97s on the road. If there was a fail rate of 10%, that would mean ~50,000 blown engines, which seems like a pretty big leap from 50-100 anecdotal online reports, and probably a pretty major story that Consumer Reports would have picked up on (instead of naming the Boxster the most reliable car of the decade)....
(None of this means that I think Porsche shouldn't stand behind their cars, of course. Either this is small enough of a problem that they should be able to cover it as an immaterial expense, or a large enough problem to justify a recall. But I do think it goes to some of the hysteria on the internet message boards.)
I'm not saying that is the rate, but they certainly have better information than any of us, any of the magazines, or any of the vendors (and even if we put aside their motivation to sell their product, they're obviously not dealing with a representative sample, so it could skew their impressions).
There are something like a half million M96/M97s on the road. If there was a fail rate of 10%, that would mean ~50,000 blown engines, which seems like a pretty big leap from 50-100 anecdotal online reports, and probably a pretty major story that Consumer Reports would have picked up on (instead of naming the Boxster the most reliable car of the decade)....
(None of this means that I think Porsche shouldn't stand behind their cars, of course. Either this is small enough of a problem that they should be able to cover it as an immaterial expense, or a large enough problem to justify a recall. But I do think it goes to some of the hysteria on the internet message boards.)
But I do agree there is a a stigma around this that perhaps Porsche could have prevented. I just hope these guys read the Porsche forum (I bet they do ) so they have some more ammunition to go to their management and revise future warranty plans. Because, as you can see, 13 years after the initial launch of that water cooled engine, people are still talking about it and I can do without that "gotcha" when the time comes to sell my Porsche (hypothetically speaking) . It reminds me of the Unintentional Acceleration problem that nobody ever proved against Audi but that nearly wiped the company out and that was less than a hand full of cars they talked about. Perhaps the California Toyota disaster almost 2 years ago is another reminder of how finicky customers ( and the government) can be.
Last edited by hroussard; Mar 21, 2012 at 05:46 PM.
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If it is a Service item, it should happen on ALL cars and there should be estimate at what age/ mileage that is likely to happen, like you would see that item pop up in the 30k miles / 60k miles / 90k miles Service Book for the Owner. So I am not sure that this is a Service Item in the traditional sense of the word. I am not buying that. Having said that, this is all gone and bye-bye as we no longer see that issue on new cars with basically the same engine / lay-out and with even more power.
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Last edited by hroussard; Mar 24, 2012 at 03:19 PM.
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From: eden prairie, mn
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IM Bearing Failure
Fortunately I got bumper to bumper when I got my 04 but still concerned about the IM Bearing and a couple other "known" issues. Ran across IMS Guardian Add in Aprils 2012 Excellence(page 21) - it also directs to Tech Article on the IMGuardian they did in Nov 2011Excellence mag. Good stuff - Once you see it you realize it makes complete sense to track. Checkingnow on price and discussing with my Porsche mechanic.
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If you look at the numbers of effected cars/owners and query many, many dealers like I have you come to the conclusion that the "problem" is less than 1% of cars produced. One percent would be extremely high. My dealership, for example sells over 60% of the P's sold in Colorado. They've NEVER seen an IMS failure - as have most of the dealers I've spoken to nation wide. I've had extended warranties/service agreements on all three of my Porsches and (as stated earlier) every single warranty provider I've spoken to knows of the IMS issue and how miniscule it is. Also, while there is no solid evidence for it, most believe it is most common on vehicles left to sit as rarely driven garage queens and then when sold to someone who actually drives it, it becomes an issue.
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I have one on my '99 and '08. No issues what so ever. I have it up to 100,000 miles.
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Come over to the striped side. You'll love it. Amazing responses from our club members. And, if you don't like it, peel it off. Easy.
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No prob on my 03 Cab. 3 year 36k warranty for $3k.