PDK failure - Page 2 - Boxster/Cayman - PistonHeads UK

I imagine they’ll sell a good few warranties on the back of this! https://www.telegraph.co.uk/cars/advice/honest-joh...

Lexington59 said: I imagine they’ll sell a good few warranties on the back of this! https://www.telegraph.co.uk/cars/advice/honest-joh... No warranty, Porsche paying 80% of the bill and he’s still unhappy?!

I love the PDK and would buy again, but this is the main bill that I dread receiving out of warranty. Just good to remember that this is rarer than rare internet scare stories like M96/M97 issues. But yep it serves no consolation to those affected, can't argue against those warranties.

Grr_Boris said: No warranty, Porsche paying 80% of the bill and he’s still unhappy?! Objectively you are completely right. But if he has had it fully serviced by Porsche with that mileage, it really should not have failed in less than five years. I can see why he feels very dismayed. I know I would be.

What an an absolute pile of snowflake piffle. Which bit of £2,000 is an unreasonably expensive repair on a 5-year old car?

Richard718 said: Objectively you are completely right. But if he has had it fully serviced by Porsche with that mileage, it really should not have failed in less than five years. I can see why he feels very dismayed. I know I would be. Because he’s had it fully serviced by Porsche, that’s why he received a goodwill gesture of 80% of the cost. Large bills like this are exactly why the warranty exists, to cover you in the event of unforeseen failure. If you don’t want to take that risk, buy a warranty!

Lexington59 said: I imagine they’ll sell a good few warranties on the back of this! https://www.telegraph.co.uk/cars/advice/honest-joh... I think the PDK gearbox is the best dual clutch in the market but I'd never run one outside of a warranty. Porcshe do have a bit of an occasional Achilles heel with their drivetrains (not all) which has been present for 20 odd years.

Chances are that the mechanicals of PDK box are fine and that it was a software issue. The trouble is that you have no way of really knowing and are dependent on Porsche.

rockin said: What an an absolute pile of snowflake piffle. Which bit of £2,000 is an unreasonably expensive repair on a 5-year old car? Aye, absolutely. I mean which part of a gearbox failing on a 5 year old, 15,000 mile car with full dealer service history is unreasonable? Other than all of it. A gearbox like that should last most of, if not all of, the servicable life of the car. 15k miles is not acceptable. A £2k bill for consumable parts or parts which fail with age is fine on a car that age and mileage, but if Porsche think it's OK for a box to let go at those miles and 5 years old, that's a worry. Although them offering 80% shows they know it's not OK. Warranty or not, I would be pushing for the whole job to be paid for. Maybe that makes me a snowflake then.

If no warranty, surely would still be covered under the CRA as not of reasonable quality? 100% please...

Sorry, the warranty exists for a reason. From time to time, components will fail, sometimes they will be cheap, sometimes expensive. The car comes with a 3-year warranty from new. Outside of that, if you can’t afford to pay for this type of failure, then you buy a warranty. I think Porsche’s offer of 80% is perfectly reasonable in the circumstances. It seems that some people are happy to ‘self-insure’ to save money on the warranty, but still expect Porsche to pick up the tab, when things go wrong!

Ok im puzzled i bought my car it came with a 3 year warranty this was made clear to me , when the 3 years was up i decided to extend it certainly in part because of PDK gearbox , if I hadn't and it exploded how is that down to Porsche and for the record my car is just coming upto 10k miles

Is this the same issue as the Ferrari ones

So by that logic, as long as Porsche make a car that survives the initial warranty period (which not so long ago was only 1 year by default) then failures after that are entirely the owners problem as they had the option to take out an insurance policy against failures. If that's your view then fair enough, however personally I think that regardless of what the cars original warranty was, it is reasonable to expect certain components to last a more reasonable time. What is reasonable for a PDK box can be argued, but if Porsche offered 80% contribution at 15k miles, it would appear that they accept the box should last at least 75k miles. That seems low to me, but it does show that Porsche seem to agree with my assertion that 15k is not acceptable. A reasonable life for one component will be different to another - I'd expect no contribution on a spring or shock failure, for example - but a sealed component that is a critical part of the drive train and which has electronics that protect it from being able to downshift when revs are too high etc, should not be needing replaced after 15k in any car no matter what the original warranty period was.

PaulD86 said: So by that logic, as long as Porsche make a car that survives the initial warranty period (which not so long ago was only 1 year by default) then failures after that are entirely the owners problem as they had the option to take out an insurance policy against failures. If that's your view then fair enough, however personally I think that regardless of what the cars original warranty was, it is reasonable to expect certain components to last a more reasonable time. What is reasonable for a PDK box can be argued, but if Porsche offered 80% contribution at 15k miles, it would appear that they accept the box should last at least 75k miles . That seems low to me, but it does show that Porsche seem to agree with my assertion that 15k is not acceptable. That logic certainly does not follow. Of course 15k miles for the gearbox is unacceptable, which is why Porsche are picking up the majority of the cost - given the car had a full service history. However, the warranty exists for a reason. PaulD86 said: A reasonable life for one component will be different to another - I'd expect no contribution on a spring or shock failure, for example - but a sealed component that is a critical part of the drive train and which has electronics that protect it from being able to downshift when revs are too high etc, should not be needing replaced after 15k in any car no matter what the original warranty period was. Hence Porsche are paying 80%. The warranty is there to protect against high value failures for a relatively small outlay. If you choose not to buy this insurance then you are happy to take on the consequences.

I don't think it would be unreasonable for Porsche to cough up the lot in this particular instance and in truth they probably should, however, why would any other owners be inclined to buy warranties in the future? The "why should I, I can probably get them to pay for it anyway if anything big goes bang" logic will start to kick in.

I think most are missing the most important aspect of this..... If you run a car out of warranty then people generally accept that they take the risk on parts breaking, however this issue here is that Porsche do not provide any spare parts for the PDK, publish little technical detail and in fact go out of their way to make it as bloody difficult as possible to perform any repairs. I’m honestly surprised that Porsche can get away with this stance, especially in the USA where they seem to have ‘right to repair’ laws. In my view Porsche taking this stance should oblige them to pay at least 80% for any PDK replacement cost. Paying for repairs is one thing, paying £11k+ for a faulty sensor/stuck solenoid/ seeping seal etc is IMO completely unacceptable.

Tl;dr - each to their own based on their own risk assessment on their own circumstances Green1man said: I think most are missing the most important aspect of this..... If you run a car out of warranty then people generally accept that they take the risk on parts breaking, however this issue here is that Porsche do not provide any spare parts for the PDK, publish little technical detail and in fact go out of their way to make it as bloody difficult as possible to perform any repairs. I’m honestly surprised that Porsche can get away with this stance, especially in the USA where they seem to have ‘right to repair’ laws. In my view Porsche taking this stance should oblige them to pay at least 80% for any PDK replacement cost. Paying for repairs is one thing, paying £11k+ for a faulty sensor/stuck solenoid/ seeping seal etc is IMO completely unacceptable. Nissan just replace DSG 'boxes in the GT-R and I suspect that Ferrari, Lambo, Audi, VW, Merc, BMW etc. will all do the same. I think that it's common practice as these are very complicated parts that are hard to assess in sub-optimal conditions (especially without specialised technicians) and are manufactured by a third-party. This needs to be understood when assessing whether or not to extend a warranty. With the GT-R, though, there are plenty of places which can now work on these 'boxes (AC Speedtech and Litchfield, being two of the best known and most competent). I would imagine that there are companies which can do similar for the PDK but then you have to take the risk of 1) no warranty on the car or 2) voiding any warranty or Porsche goodwill if you go down this route. The pro, of course, is that the repair may be much, much cheaper (almost always the case compared to a new GT-R DSG 'box at "20k!). Either way (warranty or not), you're just rolling a dice and you can either be lucky or not, be quids in or not ... Each person should make their own risk assessment (is a known cost - warranty - which may not be required, a better option than an unexpected cost in the future, which may not ever be realised). It's up to them and nobody else should judge them on it as it's personal to them and their circumstances / psychology.

Charlie_1 said: Ok im puzzled i bought my car it came with a 3 year warranty this was made clear to me , when the 3 years was up i decided to extend it certainly in part because of PDK gearbox , if I hadn't and it exploded how is that down to Porsche and for the record my car is just coming upto 10k miles Because it's not fit for purpose, not difficult to understand, surely?

anonymous said: [redacted] I think what would be more relevant is the number of gear changes and type of abuse the failed PDK may have been subjected to, rather than the mileage. Car A, normal mixed spirited sports car road driving, driven by someone with some mechanical sympathy. Car B, weekend car, ragged to death for every mile on the speedo by someone with no mechanical sympathy and the chrome worn off the paddles. Given that today the dealer can tell exactly what use the car has been subjected to very easily I can see how they may entertain some claims more generously than others. Not making any excuses for Porsche but there are always two sides to any story.

homerdog said: Because it's not fit for purpose, not difficult to understand, surely? Please can you confirm the usage (mileage or duration) for each component, so that I can determine whether to buy a warranty or not? Thanks

anonymous said: [redacted] Some of the failures? can you point to a wedge of failures at low mileage which suggest that its more than an isolated issue.

anonymous said: [redacted] I thought we were talking about PDK gearboxes here. Your post seems to suggest that failure of the PDK gearboxes at low mileage is not rare

anonymous said: [redacted] Out of how many cars?

Grr_Boris said: homerdog said: Because it's not fit for purpose, not difficult to understand, surely? Please can you confirm the usage (mileage or duration) for each component, so that I can determine whether to buy a warranty or not? Thanks im going to guess that you 2 are comedian's .. oh hang on having read posts again probably not. not fit for purpose , who says ? and before someone says 15k , if the car has been mistreated ie taken right around rev counter from key turn and every set off traffic lights is treated as an F1 start what is reasonable/fit for purpose ? , the point i was trying to make was people don't seem to be interested in any form of self responsibility , when I bought my car i did research and concluded it had the possibility to bite me on the arse badly so a warranty was a good idea but the tone of some of the posts on here read like im not spending on a warranty because i will just stamp my foot and scream and Porsche will have to fix it.

ALWAYS KEEP THE PORSCHE WARRANTY GOING NO MATTER WHAT. Simple

"The engine could have been over-revved on a downshift, when it is not protected by the rev-limiter." I didn't think it was possible to over rev with a PDK ?

Lexington59 said: "The engine could have been over-revved on a downshift, when it is not protected by the rev-limiter." I didn't think it was possible to over rev with a PDK ? it isnt

Charlie_1 said: im going to guess that you 2 are comedian's .. oh hang on having read posts again probably not. not fit for purpose , who says ? and before someone says 15k , if the car has been mistreated ie taken right around rev counter from key turn and every set off traffic lights is treated as an F1 start what is reasonable/fit for purpose ? , the point i was trying to make was people don't seem to be interested in any form of self responsibility , when I bought my car i did research and concluded it had the possibility to bite me on the arse badly so a warranty was a good idea but the tone of some of the posts on here read like im not spending on a warranty because i will just stamp my foot and scream and Porsche will have to fix it. You do realise we are taking the same side on this?

Grr_Boris said: You do realise we are taking the same side on this? Apologies one way or another i wasnt having a good day yesterday and vented without thinking

Charlie_1 said: Grr_Boris said: You do realise we are taking the same side on this? Apologies one way or another i wasnt having a good day yesterday and vented without thinking

anonymous said: [redacted] From that perspective I totally agree and yes if it hasnt been misused for want of a better phrase then at that mileage its understandable to want have a dialog with Porsche and yes I would do that but I still think there is point to making sure you are in good position.

I'd be very angry and unimpressed even if I had a warranty. The gearbox should not be failing on a 4-year-old car. The whole point of a new car like that is hassle-free motoring. Otherwise, he might as well have bought a 10 year Boxster from a dealer like me and keep topping up the extended warranty. I expect on my now 12-year-old Boxster that it may break down and need the RAC to recover it to the dealer and that it may also need running repairs. So I may be without a car. That's the hassle/faff of owning an old car...

Newer cars certainly aren’t without problems, you can end up in the bmw Porsche assist hire car for a few weeks even for fairly mundane failures on a new one, in my experience.

Yikes. Always worries me reading these types of posts. I'd say Porsche offering to pay 80% is a good result and no doubt the replacement item will then be OPC warranty covered. Who knows why it failed and what use it has had, but for sure the PDK is well protected by safety measures not to over rev up or down in any mode so most likely a faulty item rather than misuse..