Porsche IMS/RMS issues for BBC Watchdog

[solidstatelogic]

I have written to BBC's Watchdog over the IMS and RMS design issues with some Porsche cars which leads to the engine collapsing. More information can be found here:

http://www.renntech.org/forums/index.php?/topic/19...

http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wild-ass-rumor-of...

http://www.lnengineering.com/ims.html


If anyone else can also write in asking them to investigate it would prompt them into having a look. I am looking to get them to investigate the issue and find out how many owners are suffering this problem and if we can get Porsche to admit their fault and fix our cars at their cost because it is their inherrent design flaw which is causing so many engines to fail.

Email is [e-mail]

If you could please include the links and any other sources of information relating to this issue in your email to Watchdog would be helpful.

Cheers.

Edited by solidstatelogic on Saturday 8th May 10:47

[Conian]

snitch!

[Koln-RS]

Er, why ?

Has your car got a fault that hasn't been resolved

Is there any evidence that there is a widespread problem? I don't think so.(Warrany premium doesn't suggest it).

Thought RMS was largely resolved and often covered by Porsche, and IMS is unfortunate but fairly isolated, but covered under warranty or goodwill (see thread elsewhere).

[solidstatelogic]

My car hasn't got the fault yet, but it is obviously a widespread problem. Percentage-wise the failure rates are high enough to ask for a recall to get the problem sorted. Why should I be expected to pay out for extended warranties to cover an inherrent design flaw that leads to catastrophic failure?

Porsche should make their products fit for purpose and to last a reasonable length of time. I think a reasonable length of time for an engine is a damn sight longer than 20,000 miles. Some are failing at less than 1000 miles! WTF?! I just had to pay out a packet for a WarrantyWise warranty which will probably not even pay out for this problem.

Goodwill is nonsense.... They are treating customers unfairly for their defective products and it makes them look as if they're doing us a favour by contributing towards payment. They should cover the costs 100% as it is their fault. Asking us to take out their warranty means they are almost demanding money by menaces.

Edited by solidstatelogic on Friday 7th May 11:36

[Tino]

solidstatelogic said:

Percentage-wise the failure rates are high enough to ask for a recall to get the problem sorted.

Edited by solidstatelogic on Friday 7th May 11:36

Interested where you got these figures from.
This has been discussed several times on PH. People only start up these threads when something has gone wrong. There are thousands of watercooled cars still on the original engine at 100k plus!
Taking the issue out of all proportion, by someone who hasn't had a failure, just seems senseless, and if the media does give airtime to your allegations, how do you think that will affect the used car prices?
Having thought about it, your post count is low,a nd you havce just become a member, how do we know that you don't actually own a Porsche, and are trying to get the values to plummet so that you can get yourself one when they become valueless?

[bcnrml]

Tino said:

solidstatelogic said:

Percentage-wise the failure rates are high enough to ask for a recall to get the problem sorted.

Edited by solidstatelogic on Friday 7th May 11:36

Interested where you got these figures from.
This has been discussed several times on PH. People only start up these threads when something has gone wrong. There are thousands of watercooled cars still on the original engine at 100k plus!
Taking the issue out of all proportion, by someone who hasn't had a failure, just seems senseless, and if the media does give airtime to your allegations, how do you think that will affect the used car prices?
Having thought about it, your post count is low,a nd you havce just become a member, how do we know that you don't actually own a Porsche, and are trying to get the values to plummet so that you can get yourself one when they become valueless?

Funnily enough, I was going to tell the OP that his posts would be very unwelcome here, and now you've provided proof of that.

Do you not see the contradictions in your own arguments against his? Rhetorical question. No need to respond as I won't be drawn into a debate with you on what has already been substantially debated on this and other forums.

Edited by bcnrml on Friday 7th May 12:06

[clorenzen]

What a load of bks. I've had 3 Porsche's, none of them have developed a problem with the RMS and if they had it is an easy fix so I have no idea where you are comming from and suggest you get your statistics right before you spend time on this topic. Try owning a Discovery to see what poor customer satisfaction rates are as a reality check - or Toyota recently for that sake!

[matsmith]

[davek_964]

solidstatelogic said:

My car hasn't got the fault yet, but it is obviously a widespread problem. Percentage-wise the failure rates are high enough to ask for a recall to get the problem sorted. Why should I be expected to pay out for extended warranties to cover an inherrent design flaw that leads to catastrophic failure?

Porsche should make their products fit for purpose and to last a reasonable length of time. I think a reasonable length of time for an engine is a damn sight longer than 20,000 miles. Some are failing at less than 1000 miles! WTF?! I just had to pay out a packet for a WarrantyWise warranty which will probably not even pay out for this problem.

Goodwill is nonsense.... They are treating customers unfairly for their defective products and it makes them look as if they're doing us a favour by contributing towards payment. They should cover the costs 100% as it is their fault. Asking us to take out their warranty means they are almost demanding money by menaces.

Edited by solidstatelogic on Friday 7th May 11:36

I would be very grateful if you could post the actual percentage - which I assume you must have to make statements like this?

I wonder how many complaints Watchdog get like this one. It's a really serious problem which affects many owners - er, but not me......

[solidstatelogic]

I've got the figures from various places on the internet by people who have had the problem and those who have not.

If it wasn't a problem then why would Porsche change the design? I do own a Porsche and I am not happy about this potential problem ruining the whole ownership experience. I think Watchdog could at least look into it and do a proper investigation as to how many people have suffered the problem and if it is worth getting Porsche to comitt to helping customers out who may suffer the problem.

Whats the point in pretending to be blind to the issue just because you spent lots of money on something? It is ignorant and frankly idiotic to pretend something isn't the case when it is. Wouldn't you be happy knowing that you were protected IF your car had this problem? Its not a simple problem either - it renders the car useless, and then you're somehow pleased that Porsche contribute towards a problem they caused in the first place! Ludicrous!

It doesn't have to affect me before I inform others of the problem. What kind of person are you? So I guess until you get AIDS you won't take any precautions or warn others to protect themselves?!

Would be lovely if something like this was came true:
http://www.topspeed.com/cars/car-news/porsche-s-im...

Edited by solidstatelogic on Friday 7th May 12:25

[davek_964]

solidstatelogic said:

I've got the figures from various places on the internet by people who have had the problem and those who have not.

If it wasn't a problem then why would Porsche change the design? I do own a Porsche and I am not happy about this potential problem ruining the whole ownership experience. I think Watchdog could at least look into it and do a proper investigation as to how many people have suffered the problem and if it is worth getting Porsche to comitt to helping customers out who may suffer the problem.

Whats the point in pretending to be blind to the issue just because you spent lots of money on something? It is ignorant and frankly idiotic to pretend something isn't the case when it is. Wouldn't you be happy knowing that you were protected IF your car had this problem? Its not a simple problem either - it renders the car useless, and then you're somehow pleased that Porsche contribute towards a problem they caused in the first place! Ludicrous!

It doesn't have to affect me before I inform others of the problem. What kind of person are you? So I guess until you get AIDS you won't take any precautions or warn others to protect themselves?!

Would be lovely if something like this was came true:
http://www.topspeed.com/cars/car-news/porsche-s-im...

Edited by solidstatelogic on Friday 7th May 12:25

All of your statements are based on the fact that this is major problem affecting a large percentage of cars - which you absolutely do not have any evidence about. Some stories on internet forums are not enough - only Porsche know the percentage of failures.

ALL cars have problems and ALL cars have improved design of some components. That does not mean a high percentage fail. I have no idea what percentage of Porsche cars have this problem. The difference between you and me is : I admit that, and you pretend you do.

[Tino]

solidstatelogic said:

It doesn't have to affect me before I inform others of the problem. What kind of person are you? So I guess until you get AIDS you won't take any precautions or warn others to protect themselves?!

Would be lovely if something like this was came true:
http://www.topspeed.com/cars/car-news/porsche-s-im...

Edited by solidstatelogic on Friday 7th May 12:25

Entirely different issue, that I cannot even see the connection. We aren't talking about peoples health. The Aids problems were handled incorrectly, with media reports that zillions would die, assumptions reported that were proved to be incorrect, people afraid to touch aids sufferers, or use the toilet in case they could catch it. This is all from a very poor memory, I don't have access to show just what affect incorrect handling of information by the media had to people that had already caught it.
I'm not denying that the issue is there, its just that until we have concrete evidence, to calculate what the chances of failure are, and at what mileage/timescale etc, getting Watchdog, who lets face it, are hardly going to throw millions into proper research into the issue, will cause us more harm than good.
Yes, perhaps Porsche should issue a recall, but they won't do it for a 5 minute watchdog article, simply because of the huge cost to them, when they may feel that the failure rate(and lets face it, they will have far better figures that you could ever hope to drum up from a few hours of interent searching) is within acceptable figures.

Edited by Tino on Friday 7th May 12:42

[MikeO996]

Don't you dare get this on Watchdog till I've sold mine - if you do I might well sue you for damages




Only kidding - for what it's worth mine had the slightest RMS drip when I bought it - fixed with a new seal as part of a clutch replacement - but really no biggy - now 40 odd k miles later no problems.

[Soovy]

I'm sure Watchdog will be full of sympthy for Porsche drivers with busted engines.

You dick!

[M3RMS]

It sounds like your heart is the right place but the lack of tangible, quantifiable evidence is massively playing against you.

Not necessarily your fault - but the clear facts are lacking. Reading individual problems on internet forums is nowhere near enough to demonstrate a real issue. Generally people come on these forums to discuss problems & get advice - so they will by default have a higher proportion of posts highlighting issues.

If you can cleary, factually demonstrate an inherent problem that is impacting a high proportion of the cars then I'll support this. But if the best you can do is find a few self-perpetuating stories from the net then most people will see through this and get irritated by your stance.

So over to you. Let's see the data. I can be convincned - but at the moment you've not shown me anything to help your case.

Cheers
RS

Ps. Fact of life that new things do break even if they shouldn't - that's why warranty products exist. What you need to show is that the problem is sufficiently widespread!

[993AL]

You don’t stand a chance with Watchdog. Maybe if you are an ordinary Joe with a dodgy bonnet catch on a Corsa and many thousands of people are involved you might, getting half a dozen people on bleating about a design flaw in a Porsche engine doesn’t stand a chance because the masses don’t give a st.

Are there design issues? Yes, there probably are a few according to the learned guys on here who fix Porsche engines for a living. If you indeed have a Porsche then you should have done an extensive search on PH/Net before your purchase and you would have seen that there is a percentage of engine problems/failures. For this reason I factored in the cost of a Porsche warranty, should you have to do this? no you shouldn’t but if you want to own an expensive car and you want at least some protection against engine failure then you have to or it is possible that it will end in tears as it has for you.

[Tino]

bcnrml said:

Tino said:

solidstatelogic said:

Percentage-wise the failure rates are high enough to ask for a recall to get the problem sorted.

Edited by solidstatelogic on Friday 7th May 11:36

Interested where you got these figures from.
This has been discussed several times on PH. People only start up these threads when something has gone wrong. There are thousands of watercooled cars still on the original engine at 100k plus!
Taking the issue out of all proportion, by someone who hasn't had a failure, just seems senseless, and if the media does give airtime to your allegations, how do you think that will affect the used car prices?
Having thought about it, your post count is low,a nd you havce just become a member, how do we know that you don't actually own a Porsche, and are trying to get the values to plummet so that you can get yourself one when they become valueless?

Funnily enough, I was going to tell the OP that his posts would be very unwelcome here, and now you've provided proof of that.

Do you not see the contradictions in your own arguments against his? Rhetorical question. No need to respond as I won't be drawn into a debate with you on what has already been substantially debated on this and other forums.

Edited by bcnrml on Friday 7th May 12:06

I will reply.
How, exactly do you think a watchdog article will affect all of the aspects of this.
I mean:
Will Porsche fold, and carry out, what could be a bankrupting recall for a problem that we don't really know the actual statistics for.(not saying that the problem doesn't exist)
How will it affect the value of my car? and many others on here?

[Risotto]

Wishbones on the E46
Head gaskets on the K-Series
The Lotus Elise
Rotor tips on the RX-7

Just a few examples of well known design flaws - why is IMS any different? Cars are complex devices that are subject to all manner of driving styles/weather conditions/maintenance levels. Manufacturers aren't going to get everything right.

We're all aware of the above issues but (as others have said) that's largely because those owners who suffer from the issues tend to post about them on the inernet. Those who don't have a problem keep quiet. Consequently, your anecdotal 'evidence' is massively skewed.

Edited by Risotto on Friday 7th May 13:20

[blackburn]

Soovy said:

I'm sure Watchdog will be full of sympthy for Porsche drivers with busted engines.

You dick!

Sorry, but can you make it a bit clearer for the OP?

He he he...

[Koln-RS]

So far as I can tell, the OP has gone off on this tangent without actually having any problem with his own car Talk about shooting yourself in the foot.