Fixing our Cayman’s gearbox for thousands less than the dealer quote

Our Cayman had a bad transmission–fifth and sixth gear simply not home.

The dealer quote to fix? About $15,000.

Yes, three zeroes to the right of the comma.

This little issue torpedoed the selling price of the Cayman, allowing me to pick it up for $15,000, about half of what it should have fetched.

[$15,000 Porsche: Are we stupid, or …

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I feel like this needs a "dealers hate him, see how he beat them with this one simple trick" tagline, lol...

In reply to thewaitingthrophyman :

Last time we did that (as a joke), people got a little, um, salty. 

Beat the Porsche Dealer With this One Little Trick

Hack Your Way to Saving $15,000 at the Dealership

Porsche Dealers Don’t Want You to Read This

But, seriously, glad you enjoyed it. Killer fix, huh?

I love articles like this :)   Makes me want to buy a Boxter or Cayman just to do this....but I know better lol

Wow, awesome job.  Nothing like taking a look to see what is actually wrong, versus just quoting a crazy price for an entire new transmission.

Would Permatex's Gear Oil RTV perform better, worse, or the same in this situation compared to the MotoSeal?

It's way thicker, so I feared it would negatively influence the tolerances. 

Congratz on your "like new" Porsche Cayman and for having the balls to take it on. So many (if not all) of these manufacturers do not want us to be able to fix the machines they produce. We have to keep doing the "impossible" just to show that we will not be deterred. 

This feels like related content, albeit on a much grander scale:

https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/build-projects-and-project-cars/r63-amg-the-unicorn-of-my-destruction/110824/page9/

Great read, great job!  Re; the light weight flywheel.  When I pulled the gearbox on my 01 Boxster to do the intermediate bearing fix I also elected to replace the clutch and put in a light weight flywheel instead of the dual mass original.  As long as you use a spring center clutch plate instead of the solid one as original there is no extra vibration and you get a quicker spin up when double clutching to downshift.  If anything it seems smoother in operation and just a bit quicker in acceleration acording to my g-meter.  Thanks for the article.

In reply to Toyspyder :

While it's admirable that they rebuilt it, and sucks that P doesn't repair, IMHO, the worst part of all of this is that P made a car with this rather nasty flaw.  Just like the bearing problem on the recent flat 6.  Why is P able to get away with making cars that have some really, really expensive flaws?  Ford had to recall all of their cars with the flawed transmissions- but somehow Porsche can continue to get away with some rather nasty flaws?

Yep, for some reason no one cares Porsches have issues like this. Something about high end cachet and the performance you get has people not caring, is my guess.

I'm not going to proclaim to be an expert but I've been aorund these cars for 5+ years now and this is literally the first case of this particular failure I've heard of. The ims bearing was the subject of a lawsuit and not exactly a high point in porsche's history, and the gt3 engines were the subject of a multi cycle recall with an extended warranty. It's not exactly like nobody cares and nothing is being done. Pretty much every mainstream manufacturer has had at least one major recall in the last few years - or worse - something that should have been a recall but they refused to acknowledge it. This stuff happens, and it happens more as the technology involved gets more advanced and intricate. I don't love it but I can't think of a brand you could go to to truly get away from it. At least Porsche is *usually* pretty good about admitting and fixing their mistakes and honoring warranties. And when the cars are working they're pretty fantastic.

The IMS bearing problem in the "recent" flat 6s was fixed 15 years ago, so it's not that recent. Granted, they did use that design for 12 years...

Great job, Tom! You get lots of cred for this adventure.

Yeah, believe me, I've been looking for another Boxster or Cayman with the same failure to replicate my success (and fix/flip for some racing budget). I haven't seen another one with a broken transmission yet, but I'm still looking. After all, I've got 24 more dowel pins to use!

I am going to ask my friend that owns a Porsche shop and see if he has seen this before.  
 

Thanks for the write up on this!!!!  

In reply to j_tso :

Being a motorcycle guy I have used motoseal and threebond on multiple automotive repairs with good long term results. These type sealants are designed for close tolerance machined aluminum surfaces. They also are used on 2 stroke crankcases where the pressure changes are a big factor.

In reply to Oldfast1227 :

Not only that, but you don't even need to go aftermarket.  Porsche makes all the parts you need, including the lightweight flywheel.  When I need to replace the clutch in my 996 turbo, that's the way I'm going.

Why $15,000? Because Porsche!

This makes me want to search classifieds for a cheap "in-need-of-repair" Porsche, but I know I wouldnt get lucky with such an easy fix.

Here's a cheap one, just with a different issue......Marketplace - 2007 Porsche Cayman | Facebook......$5000

So... Is that "cutting edge" case sealing method designed to save the tenth of a cent that sealant would cost, or just to prevent people from trying to fix it themselves, and also finding out the doofy design choice Porsche made there? 

I didn't know about the motorcycle sealant, if I'd have assembled it and it leaked, I'd just wrap the seam in flextape, my new go-to for such things.