Replacement Expansion tank - Page 1 - Boxster/Cayman - PistonHeads UK

Pre sale curse has struck! Within hours of agreeing sale I go outside to put roof back up and find pool of coolant under car and inside boot. Arghhhhhhhhhhhh! Have removed all carpets (found a golf ball under there, that's what was causing the mystery noise!) and dried it all out. How easy/difficult is it to do a DIY replacement? I have found a new replacement on Eurocarparts for £150

anonymous said: [redacted] Do you take the level sensor from the old tank? I did see the note on the ECP site that I may need the sensor to go with it

I did mine last month using the latest OEM part... First disconnect the oil filler tube from the engine side then remove the spring clip from where the short rubber tube connects to a metal tube within the engine compartment. You can let the (now loose) spring clip slip down that metal tube. It shouldn't go too far and assuming that you can find it, it can be slid back up the tube again when you are ready to re fit it. ;-) (click to enlarge pictures) This side by side shot shows the old and new tanks with the the short rubber tube still attached to the old one. With these two connections off, it's possible to pull the tank into the boot and disconnect the remaining three connections from the boot (using a spring clip removal tool of course). An end-on shot (showing the short rubber tube still connected to the old tank)... The one piece plastic manifold including the oil filler tube. A crazy piece of design? I was able to replace my sensor without too much trouble but as a precaution, I poured hot water on the old one and the new tank before removal/refitting to reduce the negligible force required... This is what you will see before you fit the new tank.. Working alone and pushing the new tank by the oil filler tube towards the engine, I couldn't get the manifold end of the oil filler tube to snap-to the engine bay end of the oil filler tube as it would simply flex out of the way... A second pair of hands might help here but my workaround was to disconnect the other end of the oil filler tube (closer to the engine see "B" below for reference) and then push the now loose section of the oil filler tube onto the manifold (before securing it with the old spring clip) at the manifold-end "A" prior to refitting the engine-end "B". (p.s. presumably you need these spring clips but I do wonder how much pressure is to be found within the oil filler tube!) When fitting the new tank, I found that simply by lining it up and pushing the new tank/manifold towards the engine, the metal tube in the engine bay was stiff enough to penetrate (ooh-er missus) the short rubber tube (that had been transferred to the new tank) first time, but I could have been lucky here.. Refitting the remaining connections on the engine bay side was a bit of a chore and I ended up using one Jubilee clip but didn't feel too bad about it as it does appear to be a Porsche approve fix. ;-) I wouldn't like to add up how much time on this project including the diagnosis but feel quite happy that I managed to do it myself in the end. I found that working in the dark with suitable lights (I have an el-cheapo IKEA GU10 triple ceiling light fitting running 5W LED bulbs!) was better than working in daylight. Job jobbed. Edited by MogulBoy on Monday 2nd June 21:13

MogulBoy said: I did mine last month using the latest OEM part... First disconnect the oil filler tube from the engine side then remove the spring clip from where the short rubber tube connects to a metal tube within the engine compartment. You can let the (now loose) spring clip slip down that metal tube. It shouldn't go too far and assuming that you can find it, it can be slid back up the tube again when you are ready to re fit it. ;-) (click to enlarge pictures) This side by side shot shows the old and new tanks with the the short rubber tube still attached to the old one. With these two connections off, it's possible to pull the tank into the boot and disconnect the remaining three connections from the boot (using a spring clip removal tool of course). An end-on shot (showing the short rubber tube still connected to the old tank)... The one piece plastic manifold including the oil filler tube. A crazy piece of design? I was able to replace my sensor without too much trouble but as a precaution, I poured hot water on the old one and the new tank before removal/refitting to reduce the negligible force required... This is what you will see before you fit the new tank.. Working alone and pushing the new tank by the oil filler tube towards the engine, I couldn't get the manifold end of the oil filler tube to snap-to the engine bay end of the oil filler tube as it would simply flex out of the way... A second pair of hands might help here but my workaround was to disconnect the other end of the oil filler tube (closer to the engine see "B" below for reference) and then push the now loose section of the oil filler tube onto the manifold (before securing it with the old spring clip) at the manifold-end "A" prior to refitting the engine-end "B". (p.s. presumably you need these spring clips but I do wonder how much pressure is to be found within the oil filler tube!) When fitting the new tank, I found that simply by lining it up and pushing the new tank/manifold towards the engine, the metal tube in the engine bay was stiff enough to penetrate (ooh-er missus) the short rubber tube (that had been transferred to the new tank) first time, but I could have been lucky here.. Refitting the remaining connections on the engine bay side was a bit of a chore and I ended up using one Jubilee clip but didn't feel too bad about it as it does appear to be a Porsche approve fix. ;-) I wouldn't like to add up how much time on this project including the diagnosis but feel quite happy that I managed to do it myself in the end. I found that working in the dark with suitable lights (I have an el-cheapo IKEA GU10 triple ceiling light fitting running 5W LED bulbs!) was better than working in daylight. Job jobbed. Edited by MogulBoy on Monday 2nd June 21:13 Many many thanks for that, lots of very helpful info there! I'm not looking forward to accessing the engine bay as I had a new replacement roof with a glass rear window which is great but does not fold back above the roll hoops to give full access like the old plastic one.

If you are really struggling with access because of your aftermarket glass window top, the obvious solution would be to remove the entire top and frame first... It's actually quite a straightforward job (easier than the coolant tank, certainly) with just three bolts on each side. The only risk is that when you re-fit your top/frame, you might need to spend some time fine tuning the alignment.. Search for Mike Focke / Maurice "Installing a '03-'04 Porsche glass top and frame on a '97-'02 car". https://sites.google.com/site/mikefocke2/installin... I did this a couple of years ago with and put an OEM '03 top and frame on my '02 and the extra bow in the top frame makes it possible to retain decent access to the engine compartment - although I would have to say that it was easier with the placcy window top and I have found that I need to use bungees to keep the top in the service position as I've really never got on with the OEM supplied strap that is sewn in.

MogulBoy said: If you are really struggling with access because of your aftermarket glass window top, the obvious solution would be to remove the entire top and frame first... It's actually quite a straightforward job (easier than the coolant tank, certainly) with just three bolts on each side. The only risk is that when you re-fit your top/frame, you might need to spend some time fine tuning the alignment.. Search for Mike Focke / Maurice "Installing a '03-'04 Porsche glass top and frame on a '97-'02 car". https://sites.google.com/site/mikefocke2/installin... I did this a couple of years ago with and put an OEM '03 top and frame on my '02 and the extra bow in the top frame makes it possible to retain decent access to the engine compartment - although I would have to say that it was easier with the placcy window top and I have found that I need to use bungees to keep the top in the service position as I've really never got on with the OEM supplied strap that is sewn in. Jeeeeeezus that has to be the most difficult job I have ever done on a car! Took about 4 hours and a hell of a lot of cursing. Restricted access because of the glass rear screen made it more difficult but getting that first bottom hose clip off was a real nightmare. Here are some photos of my battle scarred arms after wrestling that damn clip off

anonymous said: [redacted] I didn't have the hose clip tool but once I eventually got to the clips they came off easily with normal pliers. It was just getting at the damn things that was so difficult. I would never have been able to do this on my own as you def need a second pair of hands for this job.

I found the spring clip tool to be a great help but I didn't/wasn't able to use it on every clip.... The one tool that I wished that I had was a pair of 45 degree needle nose pliers as I found that once you have disconnected the first two connections as per my post above and have pulled the tank intowards the rear trunk as best you can, it is hard (practically impossible?) to use a cheap spring clip tool on the clips on the enging side as you just can't pull the whole manifold far enough into the rear trunk to make these clips truly accessible. With regular needle nose pliers, you can just about get to them but I think that 45 degree pliers would help a lot....

Have you seen this one? http://986forum.com/forums/diy-project-guides/5026... I have borrowed the below image from the above link and quickly highlighted the two clips that I undid prior to pulling the tank in towards the trunk... P.S. This image was apparently taken with the engine out (I cannot imagine how else it was taken) so you may never get a view this good (unless you have an endoscope). The wiring loom is also out so you can see the tank in the trunk. I would agree that you could start off with just disconnecting the clip circled in the bottom left hand corner of the below image (i.e. the one that connects via a short section of rubber tube that I removed along with the manifold) but if you were to start pulling the tank into the trunk after just having undone this one, you would put be pulling against the oil filler tube uncessarily. Hence I would be inclined to disconnect the other end of the oil filler tube first. Once you have pulled the tank in towards the trunk, you could disconnect the manifold end of the oil filler tube, but it really isn't that hard to disconnect the clip in situ with the srping clip tool, it's just the re-connection process that I found to be an issue working alone... All the best.

I hadn't seen that's one but it's clear from one of the photos that he did remove the manifold nuts at one point, presumably to get some movement going but I would imagine that it could have been quite a struggle to separate the tank from the oil filler cap end of the oil filler tube/ manifold as the threaded end, where the oil filler cap is screwed on, is quite 'deep' but the two pieces come apart easily when they are both out of the car. P.s. I found one other guide where the chap claimed to have had to cut the oil filler tube in the trunk section and then patched it up afterwards, presumably in frustration that he couldn't separate them in situ!

Sorry to read about your struggle. Not sure if you will have another go or not but if you are convinced that the short rubber tube has bonded to the metal pipe, a quick squirt of WD40 might not do any harm. Next step could be a stanley knife to cut it free (the hose should be inexpensive and may need replacing if it has perised to the point that it has bonded to the tube). As far as the oil filler tube is concerend, remember that you can undo the other (engine block) end and deal with the manifold end later. In terms of pulling the tank into the rear trunk, it should 2-3 inches, which is all that you need, but 45 degree pliers will help you deal with clips that may end up on the same plane as the rear bulkhead aperture. It was at this point that I almost gave up but I got there in the end (without 45 degree pliers).

Sounds good. There were plenty of times during the process that I would have happily thrown £70 at it!

Wish I'd have spent £70 to save all the pain and cursing!