£20k 996 turbo ownership within 6 months?

[hygt2]

Rockster said:

Did about 60 miles per day in my Turbo when I drove it daily -- work commute -- and the front brakes lasted around 120K miles. The rears appear they'll last another 120K miles.

Rear tires last 20K miles but require a proper alignment. Incorrect toe (in or out) kills rear tires.

Front tires last double to 40K miles. So I replace a set of rear tires then when the 2nd set is due I replace all 4 tires.

That's really impressive on the brakes. Is your car on PCCB brakes? I live in central London and travel mostly in the South East and therefore brakes tend to be used heavier. Front pads last 30k miles, 45k miles on the rears. Discs on every 2nd sets of pads. My usage are 50% central London ( average 9 mph and 11 mpg ), 20% motorway ( average 45 mph and 29 mpg ) and 30% country roads drive ( average 30 mph and 18 mpg ). No track days.

My rear tyres last 15k miles and double that for the front, again with proper alignment.

[martyspain]

Just to add to the advice here on purchasing a Turbo, I'd look closely at the rads and condensers at the front of the car - leaves and general road muck can get in here and impair their functioning. Usual Porsche stuff, but worth a mention. Plus, check the tyres are N-rated and all the same make; sounds dumb, but on a 20k example corners may have been cut, and budget tyres is usually a good indicator of a previous owner not being able to afford to spend the sort of money that's required to keep these cars in good mechanical shape. Remember, these cars were £85k+ when new - running them isn't cheap!

Can't offer much more than has already been mentioned, really. I bought mine earlier this year and did a lot of homework beforehand - Google '996 Turbo Buying Guide' and you'll get plenty of useful info. I get 23mpg on mixed road driving, and 8mpg on track. You'll get very friendly with your local Shell garage! Insurance for me was around £540 for 5,000 miles per year, but that includes UK track day coverage. YMMV.

Edited by martyspain on Monday 3rd November 14:35

[Rockster]

hygt2 said:

That's really impressive on the brakes. Is your car on PCCB brakes? I live in central London and travel mostly in the South East and therefore brakes tend to be used heavier. Front pads last 30k miles, 45k miles on the rears. Discs on every 2nd sets of pads. My usage are 50% central London ( average 9 mph and 11 mpg ), 20% motorway ( average 45 mph and 29 mpg ) and 30% country roads drive ( average 30 mph and 18 mpg ). No track days.

My rear tyres last 15k miles and double that for the front, again with proper alignment.

Not PCCB brakes. Iron. Techs tell me if I had a car with PCCBs the brakes would last forever for me. (My next Porsche will have PCCB's on the short list of must have options.)

When braking I try to brake a bit later than "normal" but nothing too dramatic to avoid upsetting following vehicles. By braking later and harder this seems to help extend brake life.

Those long slow rolls to a stop with the brakes applied the whole time seems to wear out brakes quicker.

Also, with a manual transmission equipped car I use engine braking. I do not downshift to slow the car as this just trades brake wear for clutch wear. Clutch wear seems to be very low. At around 110K miles I had the RMS done and the clutch was exposed. Both the tech and I checked (measured) the friction disc thickness and found no measurable wear. I expect (hope) I'll get 250K miles maybe more from my Turbo's clutch. Don't laugh. My 02 Boxster with 286K miles is on its original clutch.

15K miles rear tire life is not too bad but as I think I have mentioned earlier in a post expect to get and most of the time do get 20K miles. (One set delivered 23K miles and still had 3mm of tread left which was enough that one tire with a nail was replaced free of charge covered by road hazard insurance.) Oh, No track days for my car either. And I'm judicious with the throttle going around corners.

[Nobby Diesel]

Rockster said:

Not PCCB brakes. Iron. Techs tell me if I had a car with PCCBs the brakes would last forever for me. (My next Porsche will have PCCB's on the short list of must have options.)

When braking I try to brake a bit later than "normal" but nothing too dramatic to avoid upsetting following vehicles. By braking later and harder this seems to help extend brake life.

Those long slow rolls to a stop with the brakes applied the whole time seems to wear out brakes quicker.

Also, with a manual transmission equipped car I use engine braking. I do not downshift to slow the car as this just trades brake wear for clutch wear. Clutch wear seems to be very low. At around 110K miles I had the RMS done and the clutch was exposed. Both the tech and I checked (measured) the friction disc thickness and found no measurable wear. I expect (hope) I'll get 250K miles maybe more from my Turbo's clutch. Don't laugh. My 02 Boxster with 286K miles is on its original clutch.

15K miles rear tire life is not too bad but as I think I have mentioned earlier in a post expect to get and most of the time do get 20K miles. (One set delivered 23K miles and still had 3mm of tread left which was enough that one tire with a nail was replaced free of charge covered by road hazard insurance.) Oh, No track days for my car either. And I'm judicious with the throttle going around corners.

Those are impressive achievements, in terms of brake/tyre/clutch longevity.
I can't get anywhere near the figures that you state. I have the geo set correctly and don't consider myself an aggressive driver, especially around town in the stop/go/stop environment.

20K from a set of rears is tremendous. I'm less than half of that. Fronts do last between 2 and 3 times the mileage of rears.

[Rockster]

Nobby Diesel said:

Those are impressive achievements, in terms of brake/tyre/clutch longevity.
I can't get anywhere near the figures that you state. I have the geo set correctly and don't consider myself an aggressive driver, especially around town in the stop/go/stop environment.

20K from a set of rears is tremendous. I'm less than half of that. Fronts do last between 2 and 3 times the mileage of rears.

Have to question the geo numbers/settings. There are differences of opinions on what constitutes a proper geo for these cars. This comes from I believe the factory allowed variations in the settings.

Some settings allow for more rear toe in and this increase in toe in eats rear tires on their inner edges.

My tech applies less aggressive toe in settings and the car feels quite good on the road, even at elevated speeds (165mph max.) and yet tire life is as I mentioned earlier quite good.

The one time my car received the more aggressive alignment settings -- unbeknownst to me -- the rear tires were gone in around 8K miles.

[hygt2]

Rockster said:

Some settings allow for more rear toe in and this increase in toe in eats rear tires on their inner edges

Do you mean negative camber? Toe in should wear the outside edge and toe out wears inner edge.

From memory, the 996 Turbo rear camber is c. -1.0 to -1.1 from factory and wears the inner edge if not corner hard.

Funny enough the front camber is only -0.5 to -0.6 against other 4WD cars, such as EVOs or Imprezas which has matching negative camber front and rear. I think the lesser negative camber at the front axis of the 996 Turbo contributed to its natural tendency to under-steer when driving near the limit, despite feeling RWD when under power.

I discussed with Wheels In Motion that at the next geo setup, we will keep the rear geo stock but increase the negative camber to -1.0 at the front - and live with wearing inner edge at the front.

[Rockster]

hygt2 said:

Do you mean negative camber? Toe in should wear the outside edge and toe out wears inner edge.

From memory, the 996 Turbo rear camber is c. -1.0 to -1.1 from factory and wears the inner edge if not corner hard.

Funny enough the front camber is only -0.5 to -0.6 against other 4WD cars, such as EVOs or Imprezas which has matching negative camber front and rear. I think the lesser negative camber at the front axis of the 996 Turbo contributed to its natural tendency to under-steer when driving near the limit, despite feeling RWD when under power.

I discussed with Wheels In Motion that at the next geo setup, we will keep the rear geo stock but increase the negative camber to -1.0 at the front - and live with wearing inner edge at the front.

Nope. I mean toe (either in or out). Too much toe in or out eats the inner edges. With too much positive toe (toe in) the tires scrub from the outside in and with negative toe (toe out) the tires scrub from the inside out.

In this case of too much toe in or toe out then camber plays a role in the wear as during some of the time the rear tire is lightly loaded but because of camber the inner edge is more heavily loaded than the outer edge and the inner edge of the tire will wear faster.

The idea is to select a toe setting (in or positive) that has the tires scrubbing the least when the car is underway. Remember alignment settings are static settings that in a dynamic environment - the car moving down the road undergoing acceleration, braking, cornering -- have the tires pointed in the ideal direction most of the time.

A recent alignment of my Turbo the tech adjusted the rear toe from 0 degs 05' to 0 degs 10'. IOWs he cranked the toe in a bit.

The factory manual gives this for the rear toe setting:

+10' +/- 5"

So my car left with +10' of toe in (positive toe). Based on my experience over a number of sets of tires, this setting delivers very good tire life.

My comments regarding camber still apply. Next time you are behind a Porsche that is underway note the rear tires will appear as if they have lost their camber. Underway is a lot different than the car sitting on the alignment rack.

With correct toe though you can run more camber, though this is not a carte blanche to go over board thinking that if some's good more's better. In one case a shop released my Boxster with as much rear camber as the factory spec allowed (before the setting when into red I guess). When I protested about this and voiced a concern about tire life the shop owner assured me tire life would be very good. I had my doubts but took the car and tire life was very good. As good as at any other time. Camber doesn't matter nearly as much as toe.

Too much camber at the front tires can make the car darty on the street. While on the track the car reacts quicker to steering wheel inputs this quicker reaction can make the car on the street a bit unpleasant to drive. Frankly with the very wide tires these cars are darty enough with the less aggressive camber setting.

[hygt2]

Rockster said:

Nope. I mean toe (either in or out). Too much toe in or out eats the inner edges. With too much positive toe (toe in) the tires scrub from the outside in and with negative toe (toe out) the tires scrub from the inside out.

In this case of too much toe in or toe out then camber plays a role in the wear as during some of the time the rear tire is lightly loaded but because of camber the inner edge is more heavily loaded than the outer edge and the inner edge of the tire will wear faster.

The idea is to select a toe setting (in or positive) that has the tires scrubbing the least when the car is underway. Remember alignment settings are static settings that in a dynamic environment - the car moving down the road undergoing acceleration, braking, cornering -- have the tires pointed in the ideal direction most of the time.

A recent alignment of my Turbo the tech adjusted the rear toe from 0 degs 05' to 0 degs 10'. IOWs he cranked the toe in a bit.

The factory manual gives this for the rear toe setting:

+10' +/- 5"

So my car left with +10' of toe in (positive toe). Based on my experience over a number of sets of tires, this setting delivers very good tire life.

My comments regarding camber still apply. Next time you are behind a Porsche that is underway note the rear tires will appear as if they have lost their camber. Underway is a lot different than the car sitting on the alignment rack.

With correct toe though you can run more camber, though this is not a carte blanche to go over board thinking that if some's good more's better. In one case a shop released my Boxster with as much rear camber as the factory spec allowed (before the setting when into red I guess). When I protested about this and voiced a concern about tire life the shop owner assured me tire life would be very good. I had my doubts but took the car and tire life was very good. As good as at any other time. Camber doesn't matter nearly as much as toe.

Got it, I understand.

Rockster said:

Too much camber at the front tires can make the car darty on the street. While on the track the car reacts quicker to steering wheel inputs this quicker reaction can make the car on the street a bit unpleasant to drive. Frankly with the very wide tires these cars are darty enough with the less aggressive camber setting.

Er ... shouldn't narrower tyres give more responsive/"dartier" handling? My understanding is that narrower tyres and/or lighter tyres should have less inertia when corning, resulting in the tyres quicker to settle into its slip angle from constant straight ahead to constant cornering. Hence I insist on having 225 section at the front instead of some people's "upgrading" to 235 section.

You can feel it through "hinting" at the steering wheel too. The steering gets heavier as you turn as slip angle are generated (i.e. momentarily the alloy and the tyre are not pointing in the same direction as the tyre wall is twisted). Once the steering input is completed, the tyre will take a short time to catch up (i.e. the tyre catches up to point in the same direction as the alloy) and the steering wheel becomes slightly lighter when the tyre and alloy are pointing in the same direction. An article I read put it simply as "the search for nothing" (i.e. from the build-up to the subsiding of steering feel as you dial in steering locks, noticeable on 996 but less so in 997) - when you feel nothing, you can then apply more power more safely.

Sorry I digressed from the subject of the thread - this is now more about limit handling on drivers training, tyre construction and suspension engineering

[Spaceman2001]

There's a black one on eBay @ £22k 75,000 miles and Tip. Seems decent value if service history checks out.
Look at this on eBay:

http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&alt=...

PORSCHE 911 TURBO 996 TURBO

[hygt2]

Spaceman2001 said:

There's a black one on eBay @ £22k 75,000 miles and Tip. Seems decent value if service history checks out.
Look at this on eBay:

http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&alt=...

PORSCHE 911 TURBO 996 TURBO

Gone already - did you buy it? Good price if everything checks out.

[hman]

well this thread has rather shattered a dream of 996 turbo ownership for me.

started looking at 996 carreras, realised that 997 carreras were also in budget - then realised I should be looking at turbos instead due to the carreras bore scoring problems - which arent present on the turbo engines

So the 996 turbo wont melt its engine but it is prone to a number of high cost faults, which when added up might be the same as the 996 bore scoring issue in £'s

so with my £20,000 budget I now wonder if porsches are going to be a lot of trouble?

[hygt2]

hman said:

So the 996 turbo wont melt its engine but it is prone to a number of high cost faults, which when added up might be the same as the 996 bore scoring issue in £'s

so with my £20,000 budget I now wonder if porsches are going to be a lot of trouble?

I would not say 996 Turbo is prone to a number of high cost faults but rather very high cost of individual component. I should highlight that these are not components breakdowns but rather normal components wear and tear which other cars also suffer.

As a comparison, I had the change a condenser on my 95 MR2 and the single Denso condenser cost the same as the pair of condensers on the 996. The (air spring) strut on my W220 S-Class is £1,500 + VAT part only per strut which is more expensive than a spring and damper on a 996 per corner !!! Even tyres, each of my S-Class tyres (c.£250 Michelin MO-rated) costs the same as the rears of the 996 Turbo but at least the front 996 Turbo tyre is half of the price to the rear!!!

Like for like, my W220 S-Class and my 996 Turbo both cost very similar at new price. Now the 12-year old 996 Turbo is cheaper to run than my 11-year old Merc on an annual basis.

£20,000 is going to get you a very, very nice 996 C4S or 996 C2/C4 with change or a still nice 997. The question you should be asking is if you can afford the servicing and maintenance costs.

They are old cars now and there will always be age related and under-use issues like rubber in bushes splitting and exposed metal corrosion like radiators, condensers and rear under-carriage (911 never had under-tray at the back so nuts and bolts and plates under the engine get corroded).

As a result, at each service, there will always be additional items needed doing. A couple of my friends who runs 996 C4 low mileage (c. 6-7,000 miles per year) who use specialist Paragon for 6-7 years in a row now always said each visit annual visit is always c.£2,000 - sometimes it was £1,500 and sometimes it was £2,500.

From speaking to people like 911 Virgin or Porscraft is that some people cannot afford or choose not to spend and after 3 year, the car ended up with £4,500 worth of repair backlog. Then the car becomes unsaleable or the owner hope to sell privately to an uneducated buyer who do not do a PPI.

I was discussing with Ken at 9E once where a guy bought what was a low mileage 996 a Turbo for £30k which he thought was well maintained and upon the first service needed c.£8k of servicing and maintenance work. The owner then had a dilemma whether to spend and do the work or trade it in but the down side would be that the car would only be worth £18k to those like 911V.

We can help guide you but the running costs is your decision.