Another IMS tale of woe...
#31
07-31-2017, 01:06 PM
A friend of mine had to have his turbo 996 engine rebuilt, but he said they had dialed in way too much boost ( 750hp!! ).
It took months to be rebuilt at an Indie and was quite expensive. When I told hime what I paid he said I would not have saved much by going elsewhere .
He tracks the car with extensive modifications.
Interestingly, with less power he has improved his lap times presumably because it has smoother more predictable performance.
I realize this would be out of my price range - no track time for me. ( heck - it's a convertible anyway...)
It took months to be rebuilt at an Indie and was quite expensive. When I told hime what I paid he said I would not have saved much by going elsewhere .
He tracks the car with extensive modifications.
Interestingly, with less power he has improved his lap times presumably because it has smoother more predictable performance.
I realize this would be out of my price range - no track time for me. ( heck - it's a convertible anyway...)
The Turbo engine came from the 1999+ GT3 which itself was derived from the Le Mans winning engine developed for the 911 GT. This engine was fitted with titanium rods and IIRC its power output was in the 500hp range.
So I'd hazard a guess that if one pushes one of these Turbo engines to the 500hp level he probably needs to think about some better rods. At least.
#32
10-13-2017, 04:43 PM
Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Nashville
Posts: 54
Rep Power: 22 
Sorry to see you have a problem with an engine fitted with one of our IMS Retrofits. At that mileage and especially as you had just had the oil changed and there were no symptoms (if the bearing was on it's way out, I would have expected some debris in the filter), I'm wondering if the IMS was a secondary failure, even if an IMS failure at all. I would have expected you not to have been able to drive it (big oil leak likely) and it would have been making noise and likely would have jumped time having been driven to the dealership.
Was this installation registered and have a serial number I can look up for more details on the installation?
Was a forensic inspection done including teardown? Any scored cylinders? It's taken some time to corroborate our theory, but in most every case we've seen one of our bearings fail with mileage, there have been scored cylinders, poorly fitted cold air intake, or a dry (non-oiled) washable air filter, all which lead to contamination of the oil with high silicon content.
You are not too far from Flat 6 or LN - I'm sure we can do much better for less than the dealer and do updates at the same time. Shipping is cheap and easy. We're not so much in the engine business here, but if Jake does the work, we can get to the root cause and obviously we'll do our best to make this process as painless as possible and I'd help out where I can.
Was this installation registered and have a serial number I can look up for more details on the installation?
Was a forensic inspection done including teardown? Any scored cylinders? It's taken some time to corroborate our theory, but in most every case we've seen one of our bearings fail with mileage, there have been scored cylinders, poorly fitted cold air intake, or a dry (non-oiled) washable air filter, all which lead to contamination of the oil with high silicon content.
You are not too far from Flat 6 or LN - I'm sure we can do much better for less than the dealer and do updates at the same time. Shipping is cheap and easy. We're not so much in the engine business here, but if Jake does the work, we can get to the root cause and obviously we'll do our best to make this process as painless as possible and I'd help out where I can.
What would be the warranty on this?
#33
10-13-2017, 06:29 PM
A great outcome and seems very reasonable compared to some figures I've seen. I guess we'll never know if it was the chicken or the egg.
Best of luck with it!
Best of luck with it!
#34
10-13-2017, 08:47 PM
Best to check and confirm with LN but if I remember correctly the warranty on the retrofit is two years/24,000 miles. Also, for the warranty to be effective I think the installation had to be registered with LN so you might want to check that too.
#36
10-30-2017, 03:10 PM
Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Nashville
Posts: 54
Rep Power: 22
Thank you again for this information.
From what I was told this was “ factory rebuilt” and I guess it could have been sitting in storage somewhere.
It certainly looks new.
Anyway, I am not getting ulcers over this - will just drive it and enjoy it.
From the info I now have, will look at replacing the IMS at 60k if I still have the car.
From what I was told this was “ factory rebuilt” and I guess it could have been sitting in storage somewhere.
It certainly looks new.
Anyway, I am not getting ulcers over this - will just drive it and enjoy it.
From the info I now have, will look at replacing the IMS at 60k if I still have the car.
#39
12-12-2017, 05:47 AM
Or...spend the extra dough and have an oil-fed bearing (e.g., LN Engineering/Flat 6 Innovations/Jake Raby IMS Solution) installed that alleviates ANY possibility of an IMS failure. Expensive, yes...but MUCH cheaper than an engine replacement (or even a Turbo version 996).
Last edited by Cybernaut12; 12-12-2017 at 05:51 AM.
#40
12-12-2017, 06:18 AM
FYI, an IMS retrofit still uses a balled-bearing (albeit improved ceramic hybrid ball bearings) and may still fail. Warranty of a retrofit is 2 years or 24,000 miles with a recommended replacement at every 75,000 miles or 6 years. If you want true piece of mind, you need the "IMS Solution," which uses a plain (no more *****), oil-fed bearing.
Last edited by Cybernaut12; 12-12-2017 at 08:42 AM.
#41
01-10-2018, 02:48 PM
Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Nashville
Posts: 54
Rep Power: 22
Warranty
The dealership gave me a 2 year unlimited miles warranty - by word of mouth, for what its worth.
I decided to do an early oil change ( today ) at my Indie at 2600 miles on the rebuild.
My technician said he found it interesting that I received a short block.
He said that when this issue first came up he was working at a dealership and they would be shipped a complete engine with headers and all, and would just bolt it in and reconnect - a very quick process.
They said it was to keep labor down.
I guess that's not done any more - they used all the old bits on mine and, $8512 of labor later, it was back in place.
Parts were $11000 for the engine, I believe.
They then did things like alignments etc. and the final total , with tax , was $24500 odd
I decided to do an early oil change ( today ) at my Indie at 2600 miles on the rebuild.
My technician said he found it interesting that I received a short block.
He said that when this issue first came up he was working at a dealership and they would be shipped a complete engine with headers and all, and would just bolt it in and reconnect - a very quick process.
They said it was to keep labor down.
I guess that's not done any more - they used all the old bits on mine and, $8512 of labor later, it was back in place.
Parts were $11000 for the engine, I believe.
They then did things like alignments etc. and the final total , with tax , was $24500 odd
#42
08-07-2021, 06:18 PM
I just noticed your comment on this thread. I'm current going thru bore scoring issues on my 997.1S
I was think of and spoke to the gues at Renegade about getting a Renegade LS-3 conversion... the problem is they won't pass county Emissions testing.
They are even the ones that told me this... unfortunate... as I heard a lot of good things about Renegade
I was think of and spoke to the gues at Renegade about getting a Renegade LS-3 conversion... the problem is they won't pass county Emissions testing.
They are even the ones that told me this... unfortunate... as I heard a lot of good things about Renegade
#43
08-07-2021, 06:19 PM
Sorry to hear about your trouble.
If something like that happened to me, I would seriously consider a Renegade LS-3 V8 conversion.
http://www.renegadehybrids.com
If something like that happened to me, I would seriously consider a Renegade LS-3 V8 conversion.
http://www.renegadehybrids.com
I was think of and spoke to the gues at Renegade about getting a Renegade LS-3 conversion... the problem is they won't pass county Emissions testing.
They are even the ones that told me this... unfortunate... as I heard a lot of good things about Renegade
#45
08-07-2021, 08:37 PM
When you add up the price of the LS motor and all of the things you have to change in order to get it to work, you're in the neighborhood of getting an FSI bulletproof performance engine.
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