987.2 clutch is undriveable. I hate this car

Hi guys, quick story about me and my new to me 987.2 CS. 76k miles bought it sight unseen from a dealer in KY. Got it and it needed a clutch. It chattered and would slip a little. It had a really hard pedal and I figured that's how these things were. My previous car was a 2015 BMW M4 6 speed for reference. I get a a new Sachs sport clutch and pressure plate. new luk DMF, oem throw out bearing, fork, pin, you name it. I did not replace the clutch master or slave or anything with the pedal itself. I'm super excited to get a car back that works nicely. But guess what, it sucks! the clutch still chatters but it holds nicely. I live in San Francisco and cannot drive any repetitive hills for more than 20 minutes without smoking the clutch. It's absolute trash and it makes me want to sell this damn thing. i broke in the clutch gently over about 500 miles. I stall the car often and look like a total newb. stop and go traffic is an absolute nightmare. if you introduce a slight incline, forget it.. Is it just me? is it the sachs clutch kit ? are these cars total crap in hilly areas for stop and go? someone help me?!! i don't want to sell this car but this one thing is the line in the sand for me.

I think you have to pull the trans out again to see whats wrong.Stick shift in SF would for me a no go

My 987.1 clutch is no better or worse than that of the many other stick shift cars I've driven over the last 50 years. I've not heard people complain about the issue you describe, so have to assume something is wrong.

My current 07 Cayman and previous Boxster shifted fine, no issues. I assume you have something going on there that is out of the ordinary.

I've been on these forum sites for over 10 years and your complaint is the only one I remember. So, either it is you or there is something wrong with your car. Good luck.

I don't like driving mine in traffic or hills(like any manual) but I do it fine and its not like its undriveable...I'd do one of two things 1) go drive another one and see if its radically different 2) Let someone drive it other than you to see what they think

I've been living here 15 years and have driven stick the entire time. Never had an issue until I bought this car. I just can't imagine what it might be. Installing a clutch is pretty straight forward, I don't think it's even possible to get the clutch disc installed backwards. I think I'll throw a clutch MC and slave at it next . and possibly go with a sachs oem instead of sport kit. anyone in SF wanna drive my car??????

Lightweight flywheel? A lot of people report poor performance when they install these.

THIS IS YOUR PROBLEM RIGHT HERE. The Sport clutch has a sprung hub made for use with a single-mass flywheel. Mating two damped surfaces together can cause chattering like you've described.

I don't think that is it. They said it works just like the oe clutch but handles extra power. the discs look identical with no spring hubs on it. you can see a pic of the new sachs kit and then the old disc below https://photos.app.goo.gl/zgephAw9Q3w9cHBRA https://photos.app.goo.gl/JKxKyh4YaFRCVDL16

go drive someone else's stock 987.2 cayman s and report back likely the issue is either the car or you or the clutch components in your car

Greetings to a Cayman . It has been said that our 987's are not the easiest 1st gear starters. I had a BN OEM clutch installed on my preowned '06 CS prior to accepting delivery (2nd gear felt similar to neutral on the test drive). Regardless, I knew I had to have the car after the first 500' of said test drive was completed, nothing like it for the money. Left my 3.0 V8 BMW MT behind in the deal. Well the Cayman was a bit more tricky to start off than the BM for sure. Reverse is close to first for one. Is there a 'hill holder' option on yours? Well some practice and experimenting with the clutch switch (easy surgery on the steering column) gained me some confidence. Never had trouble to the point of smell, chatter or smoking after the first 3-4 stalls were past me (remember to turn the darn key ALL the way left b4 restart!) I'm in upstate NY near the Adirondacks but still not as frequent hill starts as SF...but I do tend to agree that the clutch installation is afoul. Welcome and pls do keep us posted!

Have you checked the clutch peddle switch? Has it been bypassed by the PO? If so, you may try reconnecting it or if not, you may want to try bypassing it. Some like it bypassed others not. I tried it bypassed and had some similar drivability issues. It may have to due with all my mods, but I find it better to have it and haven’t noticed any degradation in performance as others mentioned. Just a thought. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

If I were to place a bet, I would put my money on the sport clutch being the problem. I would not choose a sport clutch for driving the SF hills.

I’ve thought for years that my ‘06 CS was one of the toughest clutches to start off smoothly with that I’ve owned. My Mustang GT might have been more grabby. Mine will chatter from time to time too, though not consistently. I’ve owned mine from 12K miles to 33K miles so it’s the original clutch. I’ve bled the clutch cylinder to make sure it’s in good shape. It’s just the nature of this transmission.

I have a 06 S 6spd, and I'm just over the Bay from you. Works great and would be OK in SF for a few hills, but more then once in awhile and it would suck. 1st is very very tall and ment for track and flat starts. I think it tops out at +40mph, for reference my e46 BMW only goes to 25mph in first. In a hairpin turn on a back road I can downshift to first, not normal for a street car. I need to slip the hell out of it on hills. In general, if I'm going to be on a hill I try and plan to not stop if possible and creep up for a green light or a slow roll through a stop. Maybe that is why my clutch is working so well after 86kmiles. This maybe one of those items that Porsche did to dumb down the Cayman over the 911 using a very tall final drive gear. Second goes all the way to 80mph, what the hell!

I have an 08 Boxster S with a TPC turbo conversion. Shortly after adding the turbo, my stock clutch began to slip. No surprise, so I went ahead and contacted Sachs directly to see what they had as options for my set up. They ultimately recommended their Sport clutch with a higher clamping force pressure plate, I will look for the part numbers and post them later. I had the clutch installed by my local indy shop which is excellent. Immediately after picking up the car, I noted chatter in reverse and chatter in first. My mechanic suggested breaking it in moderately to get rid of the chatter. Eventually, the first year chatter went away and then the reverse chatter went away. For a while, the clutch did seem to hold the power quite well. However, now 14,000 miles later, the clutch is slipping. I am not going to replace it with another Sachs clutch since I am sure the same thing will happen again. I plan to install a Spec Stage 3+ clutch set up next . -Franc

My clutch has always been a bit funky. Easy to stall out on take off. I found I can drive it smoothely by using my toes on the pedal. More control that way.

This is exactly what I did, I contact SACHS too but I requested the sport clutch. They shipped the stuff and I had it installed with a new LUK DMF. Chattering right out of the box. Based on the last few replies, sounds like these cars just kinda suck on 1st gear take off. I'm hating it so much that I may just do it all over again but use a stock clutch instead of the sport. What about the sport clutch disc with the oem pressure plate, anything there?

I was actually researching that bypass switch but stopped because i guess it gives you some sort of fault on the dash? i'd like to try that and see what it does though. FWIW, my car does have hill hold or hill-assist. which I also find intrusive compared to my BMW , but comparing the two just isn't fair.

My understanding is you can bypass the clutch switch on the 987.1 , but on the 987.2 it throws an error. Anyway, there are a ton of us driving these cars with no mods and no problems. Not sure what's wrong with OP's car, but his experience is not normal.

Clutch switch went out on my 987.2 right after I bought it. I jumpered it and it worked great. The car gave me a dash warning (about the clutch not being depressed) when trying to start the car with a bad switch, but no error or warning once the switch was jumpered. I fixed it with a new switch within a few days, however, as there is no good reason to have this safety feature of the car disabled. Frankly the switch is a moot point, as the switch only affects the ability to start the car and should have no bearing on driveability or the performance of the clutch. If someone puts in a wacky-jacky clutch and the car now drives all wacky-jacky, there's no need for Sherlock Holmes to solve this mystery.

update; I replaced the clutch disc, pressure plate and throwout bearing with a sachs oem clutch kit. the sachs performance clutch pressure plate had some burning in it, likely from me having to slip it more because it was so aggressive on the hills of San Francisco. The clutch disc looked okay. and the flywheel, which i decided to keep had minor hot spots, so we scuffed it up good. new components installed and went for a spin. heavy *** clutch pedal for sure, much more than most cars I would say. but the engagement felt like what i think a normal operation should feel like. the chattering i had when starting off in 1st is now gone and the car feels normal. now for a nice and gentle 500 mile break-in.

update; I replaced the clutch disc, pressure plate and throwout bearing with a sachs oem clutch kit. the sachs performance clutch pressure plate had some burning in it, likely from me having to slip it more because it was so aggressive on the hills of San Francisco. The clutch disc looked okay. and the flywheel, which i decided to keep had minor hot spots, so we scuffed it up good. new components installed and went for a spin. heavy *** clutch pedal for sure, much more than most cars I would say. but the engagement felt like what i think a normal operation should feel like. the chattering i had when starting off in 1st is now gone and the car feels normal. now for a nice and gentle 500 mile break-in.

Good news! Just to clarify the clutch switch discussion...two switches on the clutch, one indicates clutch not depressed and wont engage starter. Second one changes the ecu timing and perhaps fuel delivery on start-off. That is the one to investigate. Bypassed, I get a code with the OBDII but nothing appears on the dash of my '06 CS. Honestly, I left mine jumpered, I like to decide on my own how to take off but there wasn't a terrible difference between the two. But no SF hills for me, fairly average terrain in upstate NY, more long mountain climbs than stop n starts. Good luck, sounds like you got it licked, now enjoy!

UPDATE #2 While the clutch is better and more driveable, it is still not what I would consider "normal". It slips way too easily. I feel as if the clutch is not fully disengaging when I push the clutch pedal all the way in. If I drive aggressively and shift at high RPM quickly, the clutch will slip when engaging. If I want to launch from a stop, forget about it. I'll smell the clutch at the next stop. If I rev the engine with it in gear and the clutch fully depressed, I think it's still making contact and slipping. Note on that last bit, I don't normally do this, but this morning I was behind my coworker at a light on the way in to work, and I jokingly revved it a few times while in 1st gear with the clutch all the way in. When I tried to actually accelerate, normally mind you, when the light turned, the clutch shuddered as it would when it's been overheated. So while the clutch is not aggressive the way it was with the sachs sport clutch kit, it still sucks balls. So I've got a few questions on top of any suggestions y'all might have. 1, is there any difference between the actual porsche flywheel and the aftermarket equivalent? I used the LUK DMF155 2, I hear using oem spec parts coupled with a sport friction disc only is a great combo, anyone have experience with this? 3, I wanted to replace the clutch slave and master but my tech said they weren't leaking and didn't recommend it. personally, i am convinced they are part of the problem any suggestions? i'm at the end of my rope with this car

Yeah, based on the parts you replaced the next place I’d look is the hydraulics. It definitely sounds like the clutch is not fully disengaging.

You did the install ? I would get another set of eyes on this install; an experienced tech, something is wrong, either not installed right or not miss matched parts.

Ok then the highly qualified MB tech should be the one figuring out what's wrong. Nothing against him but he is qualified to do and then figurer out why it isn't working right. He has hands and eyes on the car; not a bunch of Porsche guys posting on a forum.

you aren't wrong about that. he swears up and down it feels normal to him. i'm just going to take it to a Porsche independent or the dealer. i wasn't really wanting to spend $4k on a new clutch and hydraulics, lol