Adding Porsche Sport Exhaust (PSE) to 987.2 Base

I decided to document my experience installing this as there's not a lot of info about adding the factory PSE and process. I have another post about Sport Mode and thought I'd go through the steps here since this was similarly sparsely discussed. I have a base Boxster and I always thought it would be cool to have one with all the options, kinda like if they ever made a 987.2 Boxster T . I looked at a lot of aftermarket options but always kept coming back to the PSE . At one point I checked the kit price and saw that it went up several hundred dollars from what I had seen before, and had a FOMO moment and placed my order. Ordering this kit is simple enough because it comes with everything. The part number is 987-044-200-12 and this comes with the polished tip tailpipe. There is a kit that does not come with the tailpipes (987-044-200-13), but was the same price as the one that does at the time I ordered. If you choose to carry over your existing tailpipe, you'll need to grind off the spot welds on the clamps. Next you'll need the proper switch in the console. Since I needed PSE and Sport, I ordered 997-613-551-01-A05. If you just want PSE only, the part number should be 987-613-551-00-A05. According to the install instructions, you'll need one of 2 wiring kits depending on if your car is a base or S. The base part number is 987-612-905-02 and the S wiring kit is 987-612-905-25. Now with all 3 of these parts, you're ready to roll. First up, watch YouTube videos on how to remove your exhaust , use EXTREME caution, and realize this is just my experience doing this, YMMV. I am not a professional. Go ahead and measure the placement of your existing tailpipe first so you'll know where to set the new one. You'll also want to start soaking the exhaust flange studs in PB Blaster or other penetrating fluid now (or yesterday), but it may be futile. Next you'll begin removing the nuts from the exhaust pipe to catalytic converter. This is where I hit a snag. These are press fit into the cat flange, and all 6 of them snapped like twigs. I started with the kitchen sink approach. Ultimately what worked best was I heated the studs with the MAPP gas a lot longer than I first thought was ok, then hit them squarely with the SKIL "auto hammer" I bought just for this. BTW these are marketed as auto nail hammers, but can work similarly to an air hammer with the right chisel bits. It actually worked well, and I finally got all 6 out. Victory! This is going to be a 2 part series, mainly because I noticed some slight damage to one of the valves while unboxing. Since the valve won't close as far as the undamaged one, I talked to the dealer and they graciously allowed me to return the left side muffler assembly to exchange for a new one. Looking at the instructions, the wiring seems a little intimidating, but it's hard to gauge when you're not looking at the actual parts and area. Due to shipping it might be a while before the next update. But I wanted to hold myself accountable by starting this now.

Thanks for sharing your adventure with this project. I too love the idea of a 987 T.

Thanks for starting this thread.. any hint on how much the complete package set you back? I'm going to subscribe..

This is EPIC.

Thanks @deilenberger Looking at $4k for the exhaust, $200 for the switch, $80 for wiring kit. BTW I was just at my local dealer today and I asked if Porsche parts were affected by the recent tariffs, and he said yes, they had a big price increase in November and expect more this year. Wonderful...

Round 2: Since I'm waiting on the replacement left side, I figured I could go ahead with some of the install. First up was to resolve the hardware situation. I found a kit at Home Depot that had various sizes of metric grade 8 nuts and bolts. I went with M8x25. I bought more than I need but a good kit to have around. Nothing tightened down here, just to hold things in place for running the hoses. The PSE kit came with new bolts and corrugated clamps for the muffler mounting. Next up is under the hood. Mounting the changeover valve and finding the connector. Porsche said it is here: I was worried for a bit, but I ended up finding it on the other side of the intake inlet, secured with velcro tape. Connector fits! The next step is to insert a Y distributor in-between a vacuum line on the front side of the engine. I was able to locate the line in A. Mine didn't look anything like what is shown in B. This is one of the 2 Y adapters and the Takalan hose you're provided. I tried looking this hose up to buy more but it's not readily available, especially in the 5mm x 1 size this is. Installing the Y adapter where the instructions specify is a really tight space. Here is the area in figure 13-A, the "Black Takalan Hose" the instructions refer to. It wouldn't be the vacuum hose closest to the PS pump reservoir, as those hoses wouldn't fit into the Y adapter. I cut the black Takalan line (scary) and installed the Y adapter inline with it. This makes me super nervous but that has to be the only line the instructions refer to. I then routed a cut of the clear Takalan hose under the intake to the Y adapter. Hard to see clearly but here is installed Y adapter: Another angle: Lighting is dark but this shows the changeover valve connected to the black Takalan hose in front. The white hose in the foreground will connect to the other port in the changeover valve. That tube comes from another Y adapter that connects the two muffler vacuum valves. Next on the list is to pull a harness out of the DME and add 2 wires, then run those up the driver side kick plate and up over to the mode button.

Round 3: I won't have the replacement muffler until early March, so I made progress on the wiring portion of the kit. This part is pretty straight forward and done according to the instructions. First (after disconnecting the battery ) you access the DME on the inside of the trunk liner, and carefully pull out the specified connector. Here are the 2 wires from the PSE wires in the connector. Pop this back in and then the fun part begins. I kept thinking I had to route the 3 wire harness from the DME through this wiring tunnel and under the drip tray in the next picture. I tried a bunch of different things to route the wire out of the trunk area such as the clear hose that comes with the kit, a clothes hanger, and fish tape. Nothing would work at all, and I got frustrated. Here is where I took a step back and it all made sense. The wiring needs to go around the insulator on the side of the firewall. The instructions were pointing me to running it through the wire tunnel, which is impossible. Now that I had this part figured out, I continued running the wires along the inner kick panel, behind the fuse box panel, and across the lower dash panel to behind the console area. I just removed the screws here and stuffed the wire between, being careful to not poke it with the screws going back in. One lesson learned was I should have wrapped the pin ends of the PSE harness to prevent damage. The pins have a lock tab on them and one broke off. It seems to be ok in the harness but isn't ideal. I only removed once side of the center stack area and was able to get the console switch out no problem. Here is the console switch connector. The red/grey wire taps into an existing red/gray wire that I connected with a posi-tap. The grey/green goes in the connector for the button light and the blue is the button signal. I had to undo some of the wrapping to get enough wire slack to do the tap. There's not a lot of excess to work with. The last steps were to reconnect the battery, get the barrage of warnings in the cluster, then connect my Foxwell to turn on the PSE in the gateway. Since I have no mufflers fully installed and an open vacuum line to the engine, I haven't started the car yet. The PSE button is continuously lit, and I think that's because there's no vacuum. The Sport mode button gives me a malfunction when I press it, but again I think it's due to the PSM errors you get when the battery is disconnected. A good drive should reset all that.

FINAL UPDATE: Last Monday I received the replacement left muffler with an unsmashed vacuum actuator. With the right side secure, I supported the left muffler with a floor jack and hand tightened the new bolts to the catalytic converter flange along with the new gasket. After sliding in the connector and the new chrome tailpipe finisher, I made sure it was lined up per my previous measurements and finally torqued everything down to spec. 17 ft. lbs. for the exhaust flange, mounting bolts, and connector, and 41 ft. lbs. for the exhaust tips. I was sick this week and was just feeling a bit better when I did this, so I didn't take as many pictures as I wanted to. You can see how I routed the vacuum hose coming from the engine with a clip to the transmission here. There's also a plastic holder that goes over the shift cable and holds up the vacuum line. Another difference from the instructions, they show the vacuum lines pointing downwards from the actuator, and you're supposed to clip them to the corrugated band bracket, then up the bar mount. Both actuators have the vacuum line exiting upwards so I didn't have enough vacuum line length to route it lower. I kinda wanted this to be done so I routed the lines above the mufflers and made sure they weren't hitting or rubbing on anything. I plugged the remaining line into the 3-way vacuum connector then tightened all the bolts to spec, then tightened up the exhaust tips. Before I put the rear wheels back on I started the car up. It sounded good, but after a couple minutes of running I freaked out a little bit as smoke was coming up through the engine bay. It ended up being the burn off of the myriad of sprays I used on the flanges to get the studs out. I could hear the actuators moving when the PSE was turned on, and did a visual check on both sides to make sure they were moving. Confident there were no exhaust leaks, I put the engine cover back on, assembled the rest of the interior, and took off for a long overdue ride. One of my biggest concerns was that the Sport mode wouldn't work anymore after changing out the button console. Once the PSM and cornering light errors cleared after I drove off, Sport mode worked again. The only thing I noticed off is that the PSE button light has a very faint glow at all times when PSE is off. I'm not sure why that is, maybe how it's installed as a tap into another wire, but it is at full glow when activated. And here we are with all the buttons lit up: Final thoughts - I like the PSE sound. When off it sounds exactly like it did before, and it has a nice deeper tone with PSE on. It sounds just like my friends 987.1 S that has PSE. I'm happy it turned out ok. Would I do this again? With the cost of the kit, (even more expensive now than when I bought it), the 4 week wait for the damaged muffler replacement, and the slightly louder than stock sound, I would go with the Carnewal upgrade. But hey, we don't know till we try, right?

@Reds89 - great writeup, and I meant to add the Technical Excellence Shield to your profile after your first thread about adding Sport Congrats! I hope we see more documented projects!

This is super cool. I have been trying to find a PSE for my 987.2 forever!!! The price folks want for them now is absolutely insane.