OPC V Indy servicing - Spark plugs

I used to favour OPC for servicing and what I thought to be the "hi-tech" end of maintenance believing that OPCs would be trained up on newer cars and perhaps an indie wouldn't, plus I wanted to be sure only genuine Porsche parts were used and I did have a Porsche warranty for some of this time.

They didn't do anything massively wrong, but they did once report that I needed a new headlight washer motor when it was a fuse and there was a time when they said nothing was wrong with my steering rack (contradicting my indie), a few months later it failed. They certainly didn't work with me to help me run my car, they clearly wanted spend and barely hid it.

Over the years of 911 ownership in various guises, I've got to know the indie where I go and spend time there seeing how they work and what they think about their customers. I would only go to an OPC now if I were to be in a warranty situation. My indie's experience, knowledge, care and attention rings true with Demort's post for me.

wasz said:

Demort said:

To be Honest i dont have a problem with OPC guys (probably a bit too negative on my first post ) , i was very happy at one for over 10 years and if you dont mind paying a bit more then a Porsche loan car .. good coffee etc may well be worth it.

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I don't think there is any question about the standard of work, the guys that do it or the quality of parts used.

What is annoying is the markup added on for "perceived value" of a "premium service" that consists only of a shiny showroom and mediocre coffee. Lots will pay it and thats fair enough.

Maybe if money came more easily to me I would spend freely, but every penny is hard won and so has to be put to work.

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Hi Wasz,

I think you will find the budget for shiny showrooms is the sales budget and the Illy coffee I get at my OPC is really good! After all, if you are buying a £150k car, you don't want a 'Bargain Madness' buying experience, so it is good the second hand Porsche buyer can share in this experience. As owners it is the perceived or real value we all buy into or believe in through our ownership.

Your average joe 996 owner is not the target customer for their showrooms, but to Porsches credit, they do compete for our custom through their Classic service deals which are often competitive and I understand doesn't make a great deal of money for Porsche.

The point is, and I think it is made by the OP, if you are choosy about which service your car requires, (i.e. minor without the plugs), they are competitive and you get a new 911 or Boxster for they day or two! Not a bad deal!

Demort said:

Porsche dont actually make spark plugs .. they comission a company to make them to their specs .

So .. lets say Bosch makes the plugs and charges Porsche £3.00 per plug .. Porsche puts their markup on them and sells them to the OPC so OPC pay £10 for the plugs which they put their markup on and sell for £17 each .

Bosch also make the same plugs but without Porsche on the box ( other cars may well use them ) .

Bosch sells them to lets say EPC for £3.00 who know what Porsche charge so mark them at £15 retail .. special offers etc and they discount .

Garages are the main buyers from EPC so get good discounts .. lets say indy pays £5.00 per plug , marks it up at £7.00 .. big saveing for the customer for the same plugs .

Ok you say the prices are similar ..

Porsche to service and replace the plugs want £645.
Indy to service and change the plugs want £370 .

Dont seem that close in price to me .

Ok from my point of veiw ..

I worked at an OPC for many years and now at an Indy ..

On a major service i will remove all the wheels for a brake bleed and do both nipples .

I will remove all the under trays and inspect the pipes for corrosion.

I will waxoil the pipes and anything i think needs it .

I will remove the rear discs and check / clean the handbrake shoes .

I will sand and paint the wheel bolts and the brake disc hubs .

I did none of the above at an OPC .. in fact i was on bonus and so tryed to do the job as fast as possible to get paid more .

Im not on bonus at my Indy .

Im the same person doing the same job !

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Hi Dermot, I like this post and thanks for posting it.

To clarify a point though, when you say a plug manufacturer is commissioned to make a plug to Porsche's spec, does this make it a unique plug suited to Porsche engines? It would seem to me that the use of that specific plug is important for optimum performance than a general plug from other manufacturers?

I realise you say that other cars could use the same plug as the Porsche specific one, but if it is made in limited numbers, could this account for the relatively high cost?

Thanks for the insight and keep posting your valuable information. :thumb:

I'm new to the 996 world but having bought a C4S recently which is low mileage and has a full OPC history with 13 stamps, I decided to keep with the OPC network and so just paid for a major service plus plugs, brake fluid and drive belt. Probably cost me £250 more than at an Indy, and who knows if it'll make any difference at all to the residual value, but it was geographically convenient and I got the use of a Macan for the day so no complaints here.


I am sure I'll use an Indy for any non stamped service or maintenance work.

Keeping a full book a OPC stamps going and convenience counts for a lot :thumb:

@ 911munKy

Indeed i am sir !

Suzuki GSX1250FA with a full panier set .. makes filtering tricky but hopefully people will see me coming this time !!!

I have the pleasure of a 45 mile round trip per day , dual carrageway and country roads .

Winter gear is all out , heated grips on so im all set for the cold monthes



@ Bluebird911

Im not totally sure its an off the shelve part or bespoke but from memory i think VW use them as well ..

Porsche would have worked with Bosch dureing the develpoment stage on this and other parts .. a bespoke item would cost Porsche more to buy so if an available part was obtainable then they would have taken it .

There are only so many variations of spark plugs and its mainly heat range , size and center core material .

Bosch make the 996 plug and it has a code number on it , what ever packageing it comes in its still the same plug from the same manufactuor.

NGK also make a plug to fit but that would be a non OEM plug .

I see many parts that are the same but without the Porsche part number on them .. pollen filters spring to mind .

However Porsche sometimes do jump on Manufactuors making the parts for retail instead of just for Porsche and stop them .. coffin arms spring to mind there !

Any manufactuor will make parts if they will sell and therefore make a profit , the OEM companys as well , and thats a good thing as it keeps prices down and keeps a supply of parts for older cars .

The law is or at least used to be that a car company had to continue supplying parts for any car out of production for 10 years .. after that its upto them .. to be fair to Porsche they supply parts for 30+ year old cars .

The oldest part .. yes they aint all new ..that i have fitted recently was some Targa roof cables , may have looked brand new but the date on them was 7 years old.

When the stock of these runs out then its upto Porsche if they get another batch made .. i know that unfortunatly they have no roof motors for this job and no date as to when or if they will commision a company to make more .. 2.5 monthes we have had this car and no end in sight

Im kinda digressing here though .. hopefully my poor explaination has given you an insight .

Oh .. as always .. IMHO

When I started out riding motorcycles (1965) mark up from manufacturers costs in Japan to retail were 500% and the Insurance industry wanted to reduce it to 40% for frequent claimed parts like petrol tanks and front forks ( don't know what it is like now but probably similar because a part manufactured for say £20 has to be sold by the manufacturer for a profit (say 50% mark up = £30) transported to the wholesaler and sold by him (say + 100% *£60), then sent to the retailer and stocked + say 60% (as he has to allow to discount it to his trade customers as well so needs a bigger retail mark up) = £96.00 (almost 500%). Each time the mark-up is on a growing total and there are often more than one or two middle men!

It is always worth checking what you get when you are being quoted "fixed pricing".

We used to include everything but lost out to others quoting a fixed price who then added in all sorts of extra charges.

Don't want to get into details as it could lead to all sorts of posts - the relevance is - as Demort says - check what you are getting for your money.

And then there is the way the job is done - checking and measuring, inspecting, visual checks, road tests and many other services that independents often do very well and that may not be included elsewhere.

When we first recruited from the established auto servicing market (decades ago) - we were amazed at the tricks they got up to - to make bonus.

We have never had a bonus system on jobs and no times against any of them, just do the job right - whatever it takes.

There are however better and worse businesses both in the independent and main agent market and we get to know who is who and what is what (as I am sure Demort does as he seems like our type of guy) so find cars that have recently been at a particular centre will always be better than those from another - and so on.

It must be very hard for owners to know where to go and who to trust - I suppose reputation is a good guide but we in the trade already know who is reliable and fair and who is not - but I am not going down that road!

Baz

Scully said:

Hi All,

I recently had my coolant changed by my local main dealer and following the job, I got the usual request to fill in an on-line survey about the service I received. It was actually quite a detailed survey with a lot of relevant questions, including one about whether I'd use the dealer again for my servicing. I told them that I would, except that the local indy was cheaper.

Surprisingly (in a good way), I had a quick email response from the service manager asking if I could spare the time to chat about the relative costs.

To cut a long story short, my local indy charges £370 incl vat for a major compared to £395 from the main dealer. The main difference is that the indy includes a spark plug change in the major price and the dealer wants £250 for the job.

Discussing this with the service manager, he asked - does the indy use genuine Porsche spark plugs? Well, I don't know, but I doubt it I said. Assuming it's the correct rating I'm sure many spark plugs are available that work just fine.

He told me that genuine plugs (branded Porsche) cost £17 and oddsies plus VAT EACH! No wonder the plug change is expensive!!

Is that normal for a main dealer? Why are the plugs so expensive when I think I saw on one of the independent parts sellers good quality plugs for £5.99 each?

I'm tempted to use the main dealer for my next major as the difference in price isn't that great but I'd really not want to pay an extra £250 for the plug change.

Any thoughts?

Cheers

Dave

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n

Now I'm no Carol Vorderman super whizz mathematician, but if there is a difference in product, wouldn't it be astute to buy Porsche labelled spark plugs. Tell the indy you'll supply them, knock off their cost and you're quids in and have Porsche spark plugs fitted.....

....just saying...

I posted on another thread just last week about the servicing of my VW Touareg. Long story short I went in for a warranty claim and was presented with a health check, these are the new scare tactic for getting work, that said I needed pads, possibly a set of discs and a set of tyres.
Total cost for all this was a kick in the pants off £2200!
Bit of research and I found out who makes the pads for VW, bought a full set for £90.00 (Autodoc far cheaper than ECP), checked the discs and yes they are worn, duh that's what happens to discs, but only by just under 1mm so they'll do another 20k miles.
All this mumbo jumbo about 'Approved' parts is just nonsense, I think there are very few manufacturers who actually make any of their own parts. So Radiators, Tyres, Plugs, Oil, Belts, Coil Packs, Pads, Discs, Wipers etc are all available from source for a fraction of what the Main Stealer will charge.
Best advice haggle, tell them what you want to pay then walk out, guaranteed you'll get a call back.

easternjets said:

I posted on another thread just last week about the servicing of my VW Touareg. Long story short I went in for a warranty claim and was presented with a health check, these are the new scare tactic for getting work, that said I needed pads, possibly a set of discs and a set of tyres.
Total cost for all this was a kick in the pants off £2200!
Bit of research and I found out who makes the pads for VW, bought a full set for £90.00 (Autodoc far cheaper than ECP), checked the discs and yes they are worn, duh that's what happens to discs, but only by just under 1mm so they'll do another 20k miles.
All this mumbo jumbo about 'Approved' parts is just nonsense, I think there are very few manufacturers who actually make any of their own parts. So Radiators, Tyres, Plugs, Oil, Belts, Coil Packs, Pads, Discs, Wipers etc are all available from source for a fraction of what the Main Stealer will charge.
Best advice haggle, tell them what you want to pay then walk out, guaranteed you'll get a call back.

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I would agree with you there about pricing, I do it all the time with OPC. They give me a price, I say 'be sensible with me', I give them a price I'm happy to pay and call me back once you've worked out if you want the business. Never had a time when they've not called back. Business is business, money in their pocket means no money in their competitors pocket. :grin: