Well what can I add of any value to this discussion.. perhaps nothing as I do not currently own a Porsche and I am not entirely sure if I do get round to buying one it will be a 997, though given I have seen a rather nice looking 997 at circa £17k and that 3.2 911`s, 993`s even those with an expected 100k +miles seem to begin circa £35k and can be advertised for two, three times that and perhaps more, I can definately see the attraction towards 997 on a potential value for money sports car basis as opposed to the investment vehicle aspect of Porsche which so many owners find a measure of comfort within...? Been there done that so not being critical.
Living on a tight budget but being overly keen on buying the car of your dreams may work out if you are lucky and young enough to recover from a possible mistake that your finances do not face ruination, as a youngster I bought my then dream car... a Lotus Elan though it was a rather used example as was determined by my budget at the time... and truth be told it was definately a less than wise decision though boy did I give it my best shot, being reasonably capable at most things mechanical... in the end I sold it and bought an Austin Maxi... Jeez talk about chalk and cheese, but it was a reliable monstrosity. If you are reading this Swampy, at that time I lived in a city flat with street parking so nowhere to park it up until I could save up enough to restore it to anything like reliable, or indeed justify such costings to my then new wife who no doubt had far better ideas as to how we should spend such relatively large sums of money.. and that it was my only means of transport, other than my Norton Dominator, which did not fit the bill for my work requirements, so yeah young men`s dreams can turn out to be nightmares..
Porsche... well by the time I was dreaming about that marque MANY years later.. reliability in terms of engineering quality was without question, sure some folk ran them without reasonable maintenance till the timing chain noise would scare pedestrians.... and Porsche in time modified the design of chain tensioners, with a relatively simple kit of parts that used oil pressure to assist taking up chain slack... Porsche at that time seemed to me to be carved out of the solid when compared with other sports cars I and my friends had owned over the years, thus it came as a GREAT disappointment for me to hear/read of the potential for any Porsche engine to be capable of something approaching self destruction, or become so expensive to repair that it may be entirely uneconomical so to do relative to the worth of the vehicle... add to that possible bore scoring and my reaction was... WHAT !!! ...shudder.!!!
Yeah it does seem that perhaps only a very small percentage of engines may suffer either issue but I do wonder if the Porsche extended warranty scheme came into being as a measure created to calm the nerves of those like me who thought Porsche engineers had lost their marbles or what, given it seemed they had designed a flat six engine with self destruct capabilities, and management thus thought it best to provide some sort of comfort for it`s customer base by offering an
Insurance scheme against such seemingly ridiculous possibilities...? Whether Porsche were the first motor manufacturer to adopt this form of
Insurance or not, I have no idea, though I think Land Rover offer something similar for circa £800 annually on a three year old Evoque..? While I have no doubt that LR and the products of many other motor manufacturers are not without their possible issues, I suspect few engines have the potential to damage themselves to the degree they are beyond economical repair if properly treated and maintained.
I suspect much may depend upon just how much of a gambler one is when thinking of buying ANY second hand sports car, the clue is perhaps in the first word of the description of the machine..? Sure some old ladies may indeed buy a 911 to go shopping, I knew one lady perhaps in her sixties ( a young thing(-
the wife of a Church of Scotland minister who bought a 993 turbo when they were the current model... and did not hang around waiting for the police to catch up on the motorway.. (-: In general I tend to expect a sports car to be well..err..used as such at least by one of it`s many drivers/owners in it`s lifetime, even garage queens may have been driven somewhat inconsiderately prior to being fully warmed through on that rare Sunday morning bid for freedom from the pressures of weekday living...?
When I looked at 997 gen 1`s I thought it best to factor in circa £10k as an
Insurance sum should I have engine problems, then thought that by adding that 10K to the purchase price I could get into higher mileage Gen 2 territory, but then if I believe that which I type, I would expect there to be some chance of repair or replacement of something, so perhaps best to buy from a specialist Porsche dealer in the hope it would be checked out and a guarantee provided ... but then I would be paying more from the outset in the hope if any issue should show it`s self, whatever guarantee was provided might cover the issue, well at least to some extent... I guess there will ever be an element of a gamble and if that is difficult to accept, then perhaps a re-evaluation in necessary..?