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YOUR RESEARCHStupidest engine question...EVER - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners
Leading reported evidence
Replace under warranty
Performed · outcome unconfirmed
No successful repair reported for this finding.
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Performed · outcome unconfirmed
I'm trying to get an answer out of Porsche North America because the engine in my 2004 Boxster S was replaced under warranty before I got it.
Stupidest engine question...EVER - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners
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Leading evidence: 'Replace under warranty' (no explicit attributable resolution; this is a reported action or suggestion). Across 1 matching discussions, the most frequently mentioned possible cause is 'larger one' (1 discussions; 0 report identifying it and 1 suggest it). The most frequently discussed action is 'Clean bill of health' (1 discussions). For that action, 0 discussions report a resolution and 0 report an unsuccessful attempt. No action has an explicit, attributable resolution report under the current rules. These are forum reports and suggestions, not a confirmed diagnosis.
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Explicit resolution reports before identified causes, performed actions and suggestions. Within each level, matching component labels precede direct query mentions and inherited thread context; successful versus unsuccessful discussion counts, owner confirmations and independent discussion support determine order. This is not a probability of success.
Discussions that suspect a cause
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Suspected cause
If you have an M97 engine, you'd know for sure it was the larger one.
Stupidest engine question...EVER - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners
Clean bill of health
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Suggestion
There is no way to know w/o removing the trans to inspect it before giving a clean bill of health.
Stupidest engine question...EVER - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners
Replace during production of the m96 motor
Suggestion or failed attempt
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Discussions that contain suggestions
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Suggestion
At least two factors are involved here: Porsche made running changes during production of the M96 motor that included various IMS bearing versions, and then introduced the M97, which has a "captured" IMS bearing.
Stupidest engine question...EVER - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners
Replace large bearing
Suggestion or failed attempt
No successful repair reported for this finding.
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Explicit resolution reports before identified causes, performed actions and suggestions. Within each level, matching component labels precede direct query mentions and inherited thread context; successful versus unsuccessful discussion counts, owner confirmations and independent discussion support determine order. This is not a probability of success.
Discussions that contain suggestions
1
0 original-poster resolution reports. Counts can overlap; they are not unique people or a success rate.
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Suggestion
The engine must be removed and stripped and the case must be split to replace the large bearing.
Stupidest engine question...EVER - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners
Replace during production of the m96 motor
No successful repair reported for this finding.
0
Reported fixes
0
Unsuccessful attempts
1
Discussions
Read evidence and context
Discussions that contain suggestions
1
0 original-poster resolution reports. Counts can overlap; they are not unique people or a success rate.
0 discussions have direct query context; 0 report a fix in that context. Other evidence may inherit the discussion’s subject.
Suggestion
At least two factors are involved here: Porsche made running changes during production of the M96 motor that included various IMS bearing versions, and then introduced the M97, which has a "captured" IMS bearing.
Stupidest engine question...EVER - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners
Replace without pulling the engine apart
No successful repair reported for this finding.
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0
Unsuccessful attempts
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Discussions that contain suggestions
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0 original-poster resolution reports. Counts can overlap; they are not unique people or a success rate.
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Suggestion
way to know which bearing is in this engine is to pull the trans and flywheel and look at the center bolt; if it is a 22 MM, it is the non serviceable IMS bearing which cannot be replaced without pulling the engine apart.
Stupidest engine question...EVER - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners
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Counts describe captured discussions, not unique people or a diagnosis. Author identities are not reliably stored. Exact duplicate evidence is counted once across matching discussions; one discussion counts at most once per action/state. Multiple repairs reported together remain a combination. Suggestions and failed attempts do not establish a fix. Matches cover whole discussions and can include related faults, model variants and incomplete threads.
15 eligible posts · 0 unverified posts · 1 discussions match the subject in their title or opening post.
986Forum: 1 discussions
0 evidence records excluded for query context · 0 excluded by outcome qualification · 0 adjusted by outcome qualification.
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Generation: 20261026T105141Z · outcome-qualification-6. Deterministic extraction; no AI model inference. How we use sources
Were the M97 engines ever used in the Boxster? I'm getting a 2006 S and see it has an M96 engine code. I guess I got confused and assumed an M96 meant "986" and M97 meant "987" type. At least someone told me that a while back but now I'm all confused.
To my knowledge m96 is all base 911s and base and S Cayman and boxster until they got DFI and the 9A1 engine.
The only car with the m97 to my knowledge is the carrera S from like 05 to 08 or whatever
Hello, Laminarman.
That's a difficult question, certainly not a stupid one. I'm trying to get an answer out of Porsche North America because the engine in my 2004 Boxster S was replaced under warranty before I got it. The Porsche dealer who did the work has purged their records from before 2010, so they can't help. After I bought the car a few weeks ago and went to get the IMS bearing replaced, among other things, the shop told me they couldn't do the job without splitting the cases. That indicates the motor is post-2005. But, maybe not.
At least two factors are involved here: Porsche made running changes during production of the M96 motor that included various IMS bearing versions, and then introduced the M97, which has a "captured" IMS bearing. Early M97s may also contain a weak version of the bearing. Documents in the successful class action lawsuit against Porsche based on IMS bearing failures contain some clues, but do not reveal everything Porsche knows for obvious reasons.
I'm determined to get to the bottom of this business and will start a new thread when I have the facts.
Cheers,
Dave
Thank you Dave. I had a PPI done and the dealer who did it said at 49,000 miles and the way it's been maintained it should not be a problem with the IMS. The date of engine build was July 2005 for model year 2006. Is it easy to just look under there and see if it's the replaceable bearing or do you need to take stuff off. Getting the car this weekend.
If the replacement engine was built in 2005, it could go either way. The
only
way to know which bearing is in this engine is to pull the trans and flywheel and look at the center bolt; if it is a 22 MM, it is the non serviceable IMS bearing which cannot be replaced without pulling the engine apart. Because 2005 was a transitional year, even Porsche could not tell you more without looking.
This is what I thought, which sounds like the stupidest most backwards asinine thing in the world. Still love the cars though. I miss my 911SC and 944S2 and need to be back in one.
That is strictly a guess on his part. There is no way to know w/o removing the trans to inspect it before giving a clean bill of health. Now if the previous owner did lots of oil changes and drove it 5K+ mi a yr, then there's a chance you won't have any problems. But it's a crapshoot and I wouldn't put too much stock in a guess.
Late in the M96 run, Porsche put the captive (larger IMS) in. So no way to know which IMS you might have. There's a chance with your car being a 2006, it might be late in the run and have the larger IMS. If you have an M97 engine, you'd know for sure it was the larger one.
Drive it for a while (a yr maybe?), save up some money and have the clutch replaced. Then you can see which version you have. If it's the smaller IMS, replace it.
