Jdubbya's '05 CTT mods and fixes
 

Well I figured I might as well collect all the odds and ends that I've been posting in other threads and at least put a short note about everything I've done to my '05 CTT.

So here goes nothing...

1) Replaced the trans valve body with a Revmax rebuilt unit... http://www.revmaxconverters.com/valv...lacements.html Was a very straightforward replacement that pretty much any decent home mechanic can tackle. I raised it up to "special terrain mode" then ran it up on four small Rhino ramps and was able to easily get under it and do the work. Messy job but not hard. ~$1,000 (after refund of $700 core) with fluid and filter kit from ECS and a Motive power fill to get the fluid up in there. http://www.ecstuning.com/Porsche-200...ain/ES2738993/

2) Replaced all four brake rotors, pads/sensors and fluid.. Again a pretty straightforward job but I had a very hard time getting the front caliper mount bolts loose. Finally was able to heat them and use a sledge to break them loose. After that it was all pretty simple, replace the rotors, install new pads/sensors and bleed the brakes. Mine has the iE81 option so had the big rotors which made this a spendy job but not hard. This was my set....http://www.ecstuning.com/Porsche-200...Kit/ES2602322/ Biggest pain of this job other than the front caliper mount bolts was jacking this monstrously heavy beast up far enough to get jack stands under it and wheels off!!

3) Softronic ECU tune. Thought this one was going to be simple but I ended up having to change things up a bit when I had to pull and mail in my ECU. Not a big deal, I just had to do some planning as this is my daily driver and my other "toy" car isn't fully functional right now. Once I had the plan down and coordinated with Scott at Softronic it was simple. The ECU is under the hood and simply unplugs and snaps out of clips. No unbolting at all. Shipped it off and Scott had it shipped back the same day he got it. The only pain was he's on the east coast and I'm on the west so I had to ship it on Saturday so he'd have it first thing Monday. I had it back and the car running again Tuesday night though. As for performance, what can I say. I noticed much better throttle response right off the bat. Shifts seem to be crisper and maybe even quicker too. Boost builds quicker and pegs the needle easily. Lot's of fun and one of the best improvements I've made so far!! Well worth the money and Scott is great to work with!! Got it on one of his sales for ~$1,000.

4) Sprint Booster throttle signal booster. I actually put this on before the Softronic tune and I noticed it seemed to help with the apparent lag of the drive by wire throttle of the Cayenne. There were a couple times turning left I thought I was gonna get hit because of the lag. This seemed to help a LOT. Simple to install and quick improvement at a reasonable price!! $300 http://www.sprintboostersales.com/de...nne&engine=Gas

5) ECS/Ziza LED interior lighting package upgrade. This one was pretty simple too although there are a couple where having three hands or being able to stand on your head might be helpful. Other than that very straightforward and they give you great instructions too. The LED lights are much brighter than the old bulbs too. Loved this change. http://www.ecstuning.com/Porsche-200...ior/ES2570154/ $160.

6) Magnaflow exhaust. I have all the parts for this, just need to make time to get to my local shop and have them install it all. If it all works, looks good, and sounds ok I'll come back and post part numbers. Honestly though, I found all the parts on Amazon believe it or not. ~$300 in parts and should be less than $200 to install. Hoping the whole thing comes in under $500 total. That includes two mufflers, X-pipe, and new tips. EDIT: Adding part numbers.... X Pipe-Magnalfow #10790, Mufflers-Magnaflow #11226, Tips-Yanaka YMET001.


7) LED tailights upgrade/swap. Started this one tonight but not sure it's gonna work properly . Will update later on this one too. These are the lights I bought....http://www.ebay.com/itm/271551607007...84.m1497.l2649 Looking at the pics on the ebay page maybe they actually did work like they were supposed to but I want to make sure they have all the functions before I leave them in. Simple swap by the way, pop the rear hatch, pull the two little plastic covers and remove two torx screws and the whole assembly pulls right out. EDIT: The seller informed me that I needed to swap in two bulbs from the stock lights and everything works just fine now. Brighter than stock!

8) Agency Power diverter valves. Just got them today but have read good things about them. Figured I'd be ahead of the curve once and get these done before the higher levels of boost from the Softronic tune blows out the factory ones. Will probably tackle this install next weekend as I have other plans this weekend. $300 http://www.agency-power.com/catalog/...2to83tb092scv6

Future projects include blacking out the trim and wheels, it needs a good paint correcting detail, possibly doing secondary cat delete pipes and God-only-knows-what-else I find to blow more money on. Oh, and am going to lower it a bit with the Durametric cable! Keep forgetting to get this done. Also have a new "auto" headlight switch on the way, should have it soon. :)

Seems like there is more but that's all that comes to mind right now. If anyone would like more details about anything just ask. I'd be happy to help or elaborate.

I knew I was forgetting something. I replaced the struts in for the rear hatch and window. Again a pretty easy job just took a little patience to get the struts snapped back on the clips. Pretty easy overall though. $175 http://www.ecstuning.com/Porsche-200...rut/ES2593719/

Thank you for the support ;) It's always appreciated. Keep us updated with the future modifications as them come along.

Excellent write-up. Costs add up fast in these things!

Thank you too. Great customer service, fast shipping, and great products! You make it (almost too) easy to spend money on these things. ;)

Yeah, I'm used to it with my other car but didn't think it would add up so quick with this one. But hopefully I'm about done for awhile and I'll be able to just drive it. Sure is fun to stomp on that gas pedal though.

I'm glad you are enjoying the beast :).


Best,
Scott

Thanks for working with me to get the tune done too! Did a few deserted-road take offs the other night. Holy cow!! :)

Do yourself a favor & start with the drivers side diverter valve...it is such a major pain in the butt due to access restrictions, that when you do the passenger side, you will feel a huge sense of relief! It is very much worth the effort though. Have fun!

I found a pretty good thread on how to get to them. Good advice though! I was always taught to start with the hard part that way the rest will seem like a breeze!! Doesn't mean I always do... ;)

Just wanted to update this thread even though I posted info about it in another place. Got the Magnaflow exhaust installed last night.

I am not totally thrilled with it but it's not bad. It is not much louder at startup or idle. Also not sure if it's just that I'm not used to turbos or what, but something sounds not-exactly-right at WOT. Not bad, just not what I expected or was hoping for. I know I've heard before that mufflers will "open up" a bit once they are used so I'll see how it goes.

As for fit, all the pieces went in fairly easily and the new tips look pretty good. The kid at the shop installing it was having to help with another car someone else was working on so it took him a LONG time to get it done, but honestly not that much of the time was spent on mine. Pretty straightforward install. I'll post the part #s in the first post when I get a chance.

Do you have the cat bypass pipes?

Nope not yet but will probably be getting some soon!

Might really help get the sound you are looking for. I think the guy who did the original magnaflo had the cat bypass pipes.

Just an update. Still haven't tackled the diverter valves but might get to that next weekend. I also ordered some secondary cat delete pipes that should be here by then so might try to get it all done while it's up in the air. (Will update on the pipes when I get a chance, some folks will be surprised where I bought them)

I let a friend drive it last night and she backed into someone else's car. Looks like the only damage is my upper rear bumper cover. So guess I'm looking for a new bumper now too. :(

Here are a couple pics of the fun I have coming up....

Still working out what to do about the rear bumper but I did do some work on the CTT yesterday. I bought and installed secondary bypass pipes. Not that bad a job once you get all the peripheral stuff out of the way.

It made a noticeable difference! And folks here will be surprised where I bought the pipes too. After the debacle with trying to buy an exhaust from Leistung I looked around and I didn't really find any better deal than Hank at Hanksville is doing on the pipes. I decided to give him a shot and he came through in a big way. I ordered the pipes last weekend and he shipped them out first thing Tuesday after the holiday. They were here by Friday and I put them in yesterday.

The ONLY issue I had, and it was pretty minor was that the pipes were labeled backwards and I ended up not figuring that out until after I had put them in. It didn't take very long the second time around to remove and swap them.

Hank provided excellent communication and superior customer service. I will totally eat my words about not doing business with him and will gladly do business with him again. He even offered to field calls on the weekend if I had any questions. And once I figured out the pipes were in backwards the hangers and everything lined up great! Very nice product!

I also purchased mine from Hanksville (via Ebay) about 2 weeks ago. I believe that they purchased the design from Leistung (if I remember correctly). I had the exact same experience as you. Everything fit perfectly after I figured out that everything was labeled for the wrong side. Both pipes were marked in both marker and with a white label, yet they were both marked incorrectly. The hangers were all marked with a white label, and they were also marked for the wrong side. Once I noticed the driver's side pipe was ramming up in to the floor, I tried it on the passenger side and it fit perfectly. I'm loving the sound (especally on cold starts) and the price at $465 (+ 15 shipping) was hard to beat.

Yep, I like the sound as well. I let Hank know about the wrong labeling and he is looking at fixing it. Yeah I couldn't figure out why one side was hitting the floor and the other hitting the cross member.

Finally got around to the job that I was dreading after reading other posts about it. Replaced the diverter valves today.

I don't see why everyone said this was so hard. It was a little tight on the driver's side but not that bad. With the remote clamp pliers it was just a matter of getting them at the correct angle.

I didn't take either wheel off and only took the passenger side wheel well liner loose. You can get to all the fasteners for it with the tire still on. Actually I almost had just as hard a time getting the passenger side top clamp off as the driver's. The shroud for the intercooler kept getting in the way.

But they are done and the whole project only took me a couple hours. Well, so far. I left the bottom trays off when I did the bypass pipes last week so that saved me a little time. And I still left them off until after I go for a test drive to make sure it all holds.

I posted in the thread about strange whirring noise that I was hearing something from the front also. I changed out the differential fluids yesterday and my noise went away.

Still having issues with losing boost somewhere. Will keep working to track it down.

Nice , how many miles on the car ?

Pushing 80,000.

So I have been looking at parts diagrams and I can't seem to figure out what the fitting on the bottom of the intake Y is? I'm wondering if I knocked something loose on it when I took the intake apart.

The top of the fitting seems to spin around but I can't see how it would come loose. I pushed on the tabs but it won't come apart. Any ideas??

It will come apart. Just have to get it just right and pull it off in a straight down direction. It is on page 9 of the ECT coolant pipe instructions.
http://bd8ba3c866c8cbc330ab-7b26c6f3...efresh_Kit.pdf

I'll play with it some more tonight. Thanks!!

It helps if you push the connector in while you squeeze the tabs, then pull it out.

If this doesn't work, you may want to gently use a pair of channel pliers and a standard screwdriver for leverage. Since this is plastic, this should be your last resort since there is a high risk of cracking the plastic.

Thanks Gents. I didn't get a chance to play with it last night.

Well I still haven't traced down my boost leak. But I did get some pipe caps and air fittings put together for a test rig. Now I just need to figure out where and how to hook it up to find the leak.

I took time last weekend to replace the coils and plugs. The plugs didn't look too bad but new ones were pretty cheap so I did them while I was doing the coils. Had a little bit of a rough idle and now it's nice and smooth. The only hard part of the job was getting the passenger side beauty cover back in. In fact I ended up breaking it and it went back in two pieces. Maybe I'll see if my new plastic welder can fix it someday. Too much other stuff to worry about right now.

I hooked my boost leak tester to the MAF housing tubes.

Figured I would update this as it's been awhile. Let's see what we have done since my last post.

Changed fluid in the diffs and transfer case. Pretty easy job especially if you have a pump to get the new fluid in.

Made and used a couple different version boost leak testers. Found I had at least a couple leaks and ordered new hoses, O rings, and seals. https://www.6speedonline.com/forums/...questions.html

Replaced the lower boost hoses. Replace the O rings at the intercooler inlets and outlets, the MAF sensor fitting, and the seals at the turbo outlets.

Put K&N filters in.

Installed the P3Cars VIDI gauge ... https://www.6speedonline.com/forums/...e-p3-vidi.html

Replaced the battery, not really by choice.

LED license plate lights from ECS. http://www.ecstuning.com/Porsche-200...ing/ES2593790/

Put on winter tires. Ended up with these... http://www.discounttire.com/dtcs/fin...860&vid=008540
They seem to be doing pretty well although, as luck would have it, we are having one of the warmest winters I can remember out here in the Northwest.

And probably a few more items I'm not remembering right now. I have a power steering pump and hoses on the way so will be tackling that project before long. Fun!?

Jesus H, what now. Since replacing the hoses and o-rings the car has been doing pretty well until yesterday. Now it won't go over about 5lbs of boost. I'm getting awful frustrated but I know I haven't gotten all the vacuum lines either.

If it ain't one thing it's another I guess.

Well I still have to find the rest of these leaks. Dyno'ed my CTT today and ended up at only 367awhp and 385tq. Disappointed as I'm sure I should be getting better numbers than that. DGreen ran his 957 with just about all the same mods as mine and he was about 100hp+ compared to mine.

I figured I would be around or just north of 400 somewhere. More work to do I guess.

Well my Cayenne fun-ride is probably over. A dude tried making a right turn..... from the left-hand lane....directly in front of me doing about 35mph. Basically T-boned him right between the front and back door. My front wheels no longer point in the same direction and most of the left front corner is crushed. I seriously doubt insurance is going to want to repair it with the suspension and possible drive-train damage. We'll see though as I work things out over the next however long it takes.

Well it looks like the insurance is gonna total out my Cayenne. Interesting part is they are offering to let me buy it back for a pretty reasonable price. Not sure I want to fix it, but I could pretty easily make a lot more than what they want for it by parting out some of the big ticket items and then selling the hulk for scrap. Not sure I want to take on the work though and hassle of listing and potentially shipping bigger items. I'll have to think about it. Unless somebody here wants it, contact me and maybe we can work out a quick deal.