Bore scoring not just on our 996/997/Cayenne's

Bore scoring on my Macan! Little hard to accept that a 5 year old Porsche with 76k miles developed this condition. Porsche's initial reaction = out of warranty. New engine is about 22000.00 installed and running and being only 5 years old there are very few in scrap yards to find a used engine. Owning a '99 Carrera with 126k and a Cayenne with 161k miles (yes I drive my cars!), I have to say this is a huge disappointment to have the Macan self destruct like this. The Lokasil liners are such crap.

very sorry to hear this. are the pictures of the cylinder walls or the pistons?

On cylinder walls #4 and #6.

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Holy Crap! That's pretty bad. Sorry for the situation. At least Porsche has it figured out which cylinders to score. How did #5 look?

Just those 2 cylinders on bank 1.

just curious what prompted the scope to be done in the first place?

It was a progressively increasing ticking sound, much like in the "old days" when you had a bad lifter or loose rocker arm on north American engine.

I wonder how prevalent it is across the board. It seems ridiculous for a 5 year old car.

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I seem to recall that Jake built a V8 or two for a Cayenne - not surprised that any Lokasil lined cylinders are failing like this.

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Any thoughts about having Nickies done? Figure labor and parts would HAVE to run less than the $22k quoted and you'd have a better outcome?

Does Jake rebuild Macans? If so, I’d go with him.

Wow! Sorry for your misfortune That blows big time! I wonder if LN Engineering has developed Nickie's for that motor. Not that it helps now, but I would suspect/have a look at the injectors on those cylinders - I bet they're leaking. *** Just for posterity - I thought cylinders 4&6 are bank 2? I realize the Macan is a V-6 and the motor is in the front, but that shouldn't impact the bank #'s should it? Bank 1 = cylinders 1,2,3 Bank 2 = 4,5,6... ? Good luck whatever you decide to do.

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This isn�t new with the Macan.. Seen this since the year they were introduced. Nickies are an answer, but like the Cayenne, these cars are often not regarded enough by their owners to spend the required amount for a be all, end all fix. There�s little to gain for the development that has to go into it..

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No. I decided not to work with these. Too many people regard them as a throw away car if something significant happens, just like the Cayenne.

I just saw as case of this the other day on p-tech's channel perusing youtube. You Tube Seems like this is becoming more common on macans. I was considering a second hand macan or cayenne as a daily, but I think this is enough to deter me even if it was CPO. As Jake indicated people treat these as throwaway cars.

Sad to hear. Have you modified the car anything(air filter, ECU etc)? have you done oil/filter service before the 10,000miles every time? Do you have any clue/idea why your car have suffered from it?

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They are all throw away cars when this happens. Junk!

Junk! 🤣 Only in America...🙄 $50-$80k for a �throwaway� car... Wow! This just blows my mind. Do you think some people have more $ than brains (no knock on OP)... I just don�t get it...

Now I thought I heard here that possibly part of the reason this problem occurs besides that our cars being "Environmentally Friendly", the connecting rods are too short. Is that the case here? I just wonder that if both are so flawed, why would Porsche keep going with it now their reputation is built on quality. They can't be that dumbed.

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Other brands have the scoring issue too.

Yup, so is more likely just the material of the cylinders and not the shortness of the rods?

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Might just be the way the video was edited but the tech went right to the boroscope on the ticking and didn't even "think" valve train. Wonder why... Good lesson for those with ticking 996's that come here with hopes of lifter problems.

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I've seen this before. It's the same as Panamera and Cayenne. Any engine with Alusil bores can suffer the same fate. Long drain intervals, fuel dilution of the oil, injetors with poor spray patterns or leakage all can contribute to scoring like on the M96 engine. We've had people send us blocks blindly without contacting us and once we tell them how much it's going to cost, they just tell is to junk the block. I'm pretty sure most of them have gone home to employees to make coffee tables. I put out a newsletter and shared it on FB and the forums about this last year: https://conta.cc/342xq77 Long story short, use an oil with more moly in it and change it more often. There have been countless threads about LM Ceratec and there is some credence to that based on the available research. Adding Ceratec to an A40 oil will get you about 300 ppm Moly, so about the same as running Driven's DI40 or DT40.

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$25,000 plus to fix a 76,000 mile car that�s probably worth $26,000, and probably will need lots of maintenance, yes Junk

What does "Long Drain intervals mean? Draining the oil out during oil changes? Thanks Charles for the insight.

Bone stock, and I have never actually driven it hard. The wife uses it as her daily to go to work and back and does not like to speed as it scares her. So if anything the car has been gently driven since we took delivery of it. Usual maintenance work. As an aside, I was really surprised at around 60k miles that all the wheel bearings were shot and needed replacement. Not a great reliability experience with this car.

Ah, long time between oil draining intervals. Not how long I am draining the oil. Me get it now.

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The factory drain intervals have varied over the years, but I believe it's at 12,000 miles or one year. It really shouldn't be more than 5,000 miles or 6 months, but if the car is driven in the winter or short drives, probably should be done every 3 months or 3,000 miles tops.

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I prefer to use the word "disposable". It's an unfortunate sign of the times. My parents came out of the depression and appreciated everything they were able to purchase with their limited funds. Things like simple appliances were considered a luxury and were repaired instead of disposed and replaced. It seemed like a cultural thing to do back then; but today, most people in the U.S. throw away more than they keep. Personally, people won't value Porsche SUVs or Crossovers, like they do the 911. The 911 represents what's left of the original Porsche DNA. Therefore, people place value in that respect alone. They won't be putting the modern Cayenne or Macan in a cooled storage unit anytime soon. These cars represent the corporate executives answer for survival. In the past, Porsche looked for ways to add power or technical innovation in their sports cars offerings, but somewhere in the last 20 years, SUVs have been the answer to keep the boat afloat. Just look at Lamborghini. You think the Urus is going to be a highly collectable car? The Cayenne SUV or other family friendly vehicles in the Porsche lineup will suffer the same fate as others European sports car manufacturers when they past their factory warranties. And, unless they can figure out how to sell to the next generations of 911 drivers, they may lose their precious following that are willing to cough up 6 figures for these cars. The last time I looked at the analytics, the majority of 911 owners are in the range of 45 - 55.

Macan is more V/W than Porsche, same as with Panamera and Cayenne. Ever since V/w took over Porsche those cars are heavily V/W based. I retired from Porsche before I had gone to Macan training, but from previous training on Panamara and Cayenne, the Cayenne 6cyl was V/w as was the Panamera 3.0.... The Panamera 3.6 and V8 and Cayenne V8 were Porsche engines. But they all used Alusil cylinders. They all know nikasil is the best for cylinders, but is too expensive for high volume production therefore they all use Alusil. V/W sells 60 times more cars than Porsche. it's simple, high tech/high performance German engineering = high failure rate The 996/986 saved Porsche from bankruptcy, but the new found wealth from 986/996 also was responsible for the "nail in the coffin" for Porsche as an independent carmaker. The wealth from sales of 996/986 was leveraged for loans in a plan to buy control of V/W group (over 75%) in 2005. But by 2008 (midway of the 997 model)the plan failed just short of the 75% and Porsche collapsed into the arms of V/W Group, never to an independent carmaker again. So, everyone who has been speculating on whether the 996 will ever be collectable, I think it will definitely go down in History for being the last sports car model of the "independent Porsche Company".

Aw man... What rotten treatment to a Porsche lover. You deserve better @pszikla . I hope there are 100's of thousands of happy miles ahead of you.

I wonder if you could source the motor from the VW twin to the Macan (Toureg?) and install that?

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Man, that is heartbreaking! Sorry to hear! Just curious, did you stay up on your oil changes? Any noticable issues throughout your ownership, like oil looking/smelling unusual? It's mainly because of cheap money by the Fed and minimum payment options. Our society has moved towards a throwaway society since at least the 90's. Cars used to be an item we kept for a decade or more. That's why they designed the cars better and used metal more often. That changed in the 90's when more and more people started "living for now". When the Fed kept interest rates low, credit card companies started the minimum payment option, and leases was offered to the average consumer. In turn, manufacturers no longer needed to design them to last. Throwing away a Porsche, Mercedes, BMW now isn't that much different from throwing away a Hyundai. Both are made mostly of plastic.

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I'm with "d". A car with such an initial cost should not be subject to this kind of failure at 5 years/less than 80k miles nor should it be considered a throw away. The Japanese brands and even some American brands are running well up into the 100k-200k with proper maintenance. Heck the oldest kid has a Honda Civic that he bought used that is now over 300k! Seems a lot of European car manufacturers are out of the loop on this subject. I find this indefensible...

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Right, my oldest son has a 2012 Ram 1500 Quad Cab with 400hp Hemi engine, iron block, aluminum heads, 2 valve per cyl, old school. at 120k just put the first set of new spark plugs in it, never put any other wrench on it, just oil changes.

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Oh, it's definitely defensible. The Euro cars you speak of are the ones they sell the most of. And people keep buying them. The original owner usually won't own the car when it dies since most are leased. No reason to change the business model. The only time it will change is if they sell less cars. Until then, junk those $80k plastic disposable cars!

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Thanks for this info, Charles. Can you shed any light on the difference between MoS2 as used in products like Liquimoly oils and additives vs MoDTM as used in Driven DT-40?

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I am afraid you are correct! Those manufacturers are all about "Show Me The Money". While I don't fault them for that as they have to make money, apparently, they have no concerns except for the first lessee. I hate designed obsolescence.

That is too bad. I wonder if that build had bad or missing piston skirts. These are not lokasil liners right? I thought they were alusil. Just bought a 2014 Cayenne Diesel and scares me to see this after I just rebuild last year on my 996 4S engine with nikasil plated liners due to the same issue.

It's stuff like this that will kill the ICE, Tesla is about to demo their new battery chemistry which is rumored to have a million miles of usable range before the pack is considered no good. Their model 3 and model Y motors already have demonstrated one million miles reliability. Meanwhile Porsche expects people to pay top dollar for this crap at 50-60k miles? Dunno what they are smoking over there in Germany

There will be production errors in ANY car, ever seen a Tesla on fire? Slightly harder to repair then swapping an engine..... I read that they built over 400 000 Macan, a few engines will die because of production error or user error.

When I bought my youngest son a vehicle, I had two criterion. The first was it had to be cheap since we have a long family history of drivers totaling their first car. The second was the engine. I ended up finding a well maintained, older BMW X5 with the old school non-turbo 3.0 straight six. He drove it through college (graduated with honors from Clemson as a chemical engineer day before yesterday). Now has over 200k with no engine issues at all. I was thinking about replacing my old reliable Mazda commuter car with a Macan. Not sure I want to do it now. It could create the same quandary as my 996. Do I spend the money to fix it, or get something else. The 996 is somewhat special, a Macan is not.

Too bad the electronics are sooo daunting.. A 2014+ GM 4.3 v6 would be a dandy replacement.. Great power, direct injection. about 285HP and 300+ ft lbs of torque stock.. And they cost about 3000 at a yard for a drop out. But the dash integration would suck ,,

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This is about Porsche being too greedy, they went away from tried and tested AL liners with nicasil coating just to save a few bucks. Everyone here knows how reliable flat six innovation motors are *because* they use these liners. I've never seen a Tesla on fire but I have driven past many burned out gas cars that caught fire over the years. ​​​​​​Stuff like this is why used residuals drop, for your average Joe who just wants a nice fun practical vehicle he will look at the depreciation and walk away from a brand that takes him for granted ​​​​​​

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It�s not just about cost savings. Nickel compounds are often toxic to workers and the environment. A lot of manufacturers just don�t want it in their factories.

Nikasil has it's own issues and is not a 'solve-all-problems' solution. Google(make a search which excludes Porsche) and you will find, here is one for you: https://buy.motorious.com/articles/f...jaguar-xk8-xkr . BMW presumably also moved away from Nikasil due reliability issues. The grass is always greener on the other side i guess...

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^^^ I totally agree with this. It's a cultural thing. Most people just want to get in and drive - or not drive, let the car do it for them (which from what I see on a regular basis, probably isn't a bad idea)... Forget about maintaining, fixing, or god forbid modifying - anything! (it's not just cars - have you taken a trip to the dump lately and see what people throw away? It's crazy!!!)

Just gasp. You would think porsche would help a little bit and not bend you over. I was thinking the stock pdk would be the weakest link for a macan to hit 150-200k miles but the motor maybe shotty too especially with these stupid recommended oil change intervals. my friend who worked at the porsche dealer strongly recommended against buying a macan s and turbos since they came out.....this was a few years ago and I was optimistic they may have sorted some of these issues. I�ve been following 4-5k oil changes for years in my 957 GTS <knock on wood> Hoping to hit 200k+ before it�s �junk,� 155k and counting now. What motor was in this?

Standard 3 liter

Unfortunately this crap can happen .... Am I worried no and I own 2 955 Cayenne's and a 997.1 and so far never had an issue........ Lokasil & Alusil - Nikasil I have had 4 decades of experience with these coating processes on cylinders. All my Japanese race bikes and dirt bikes since the late 70's had either one or the other and once in a while for no reason one would seize or wouldn't be running right and you would pull the head off and find scoring. This is a proven cost effective process which pretty much works for mass produced engines for decades by most mfg's but it does suck when one fails for no apparent reason. Unfortunately most cars regardless of brand are all pretty much disposable bick lighters and not worth going the extra mile to repair unless you have a cost savings angle on parts and labor. Here is what I've learned Lokasil & Alusil - Nikasil all pretty much the same crap regardless and would not deter me from owing another engine with one or the other .... Oil changes no later than 5k ....Good oil with a decent Moly content or additive ....Start let them warm up until the rpm drops then drive gingerly until engine reaches operating temp then go for broke and hopefully the engine God's are on your side.

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Holy **** !!!! Spot on !!!! Someone I agree with, my sons race Dirt Bikes and I have experience the same, from Millennium to US Chrome to Lancourt..,,Great coatings, but for some unknown reason, it can fail !! Sacrifice to the Porsche/engine gods is all that will overcome !!