Are these stock shift cables or aftermarket?

I bought my 2009 987.2 S a little over a week ago. It is remarkably tight - no squeaks or rattles (my BiL says it feels like the car is made out of a solid block of billet) - and the shifting is direct and not squishy. I mention that because I see a lot of complaints about vague shifting and cables snapping. Even before I bought my Cayman I figured on spending some money on Numeric stuff, but after driving it he and I think it's got great shift feeling. Fast forward to today, when I took off the engine cover for the first time to replace the A/O separator and saw these shift cables. I don't know if you can tell from the picture, but I wonder, are these stock?

To my knowledge they look like stock cables. The Numeric cables are black and non-insulated.

Yep, those are stock.. I actually really like the shift quality with the stock cables and shifter especially if the shifter bushings are in good condition. Cable snapping is due to routing of the cables and updated brackets address those. Before you go buy new cables, check that the previous owner hasn‘t already addressed that.

Those look like OEM cables but the rubber bushing where they go through the firewall has slices around both cables that indicate they aren't the original cables. So they may of been replaced, or a previous owner installed aftermarket ( Numeric or other) and reinstalled OEM before selling the car. It has been many years since I did my upgrade to Numeric but I recall there was black insulation on the OEM where they were routed over the engine. I actually slit the insulation lengthwise and used it on the Numeric then wrapped it with cloth tape to cover the gap left by the slit.

That's it. He told me he sold all his mod parts to a friend and in exchange, got his friends Cayman stock parts to put on his car. He told me his friends Cayman only had 40k miles, so it makes sense they feel decent. What he didn't tell me is some of the parts are from a 987.1. I guess I have some miles to go before I need to think about Numeric.

Just a warning that if they've got 40K on them you may not have as long as you think: the left cable seems to go at 40-50K, at least anecdotally. There's no warning wear or feel change, it just snaps. Or they could last another ten years, you never know. But if you're planning to keep the car you may want to just change them sooner rather than later for peace of mind. Good opportunity to take some of the rubber out of the transmission inputs and tighten things up as well: Cayman Shifter Linkage Mod Hello all, I'm excited to have joined the Planet-9 forum. It's been a great resource for my 2008 987 Cayman DE1. I figured I would make my first post a source rather than a request. I have seen many posts discussing shifter play and improvements. I noticed some room for improvement in the... www.planet-9.com https://www.planet-9.com/threads/cayman-shifter-linkage-mod.154537/page-2?post_id=2186081#post-2186081

Sometimes the cable snaps off the metal bracket at the transmission end leaving you stranded, and as a preventive measure, you can install a heavy-duty zip-tie to keep the cables attach into a bracket. This simple mod does not affect the operation in any way and if you want to disconnect the cables for any reason (clutch replacement) just cut off the zip-tie.

The more problematic failure mode is the left cable snapping in the sheath, about 6 inches from the transmission input. There's a bend in the cable there and the constant back-and-forth flexing eventually fatigues it. That'll leave you stuck. The revised Porsche cables have a different cable mounting point and transmission input piece to change the geometry there and hopefully avoid the issue. The Numeric cables are also available, and those are in theory a lot more durable (at least, I've never heard of any breaking).