Warning to Porsche buyers...warranty issue and PCNA

[rss996]

Just a warning to all with cars still under warranty.....

If you have an engine problem while under warranty PCNA will use your status of club events as evidence that you abuse the car.

Your records, auto x standings, and events attended will be brought to the hearing to prove you abuse the car along with DME readings etc....

Can't give the details....... but saw and heard it today with my own 2 eyes today at a hearing.....

Scary stuff!!!!!!!!!

Robert

[kary]

Not exactly what Porsche was like, but then the cars are not built the same way anymore either. Too bad they are not willing to stand behind their heritage...after all, that is what Porsche's have been used for...driving fast on race tracks!

[bryanearll]

Actually, I called PCNA about the same issue and they had no reports of anything like this happening. Futher, it was explained to me that PCNA and Porsche work together to sponsor events.

Regarding the DME data. I asked the VERY same question to the tech guys locally. Everyone assures me that ZONE 1 is OK it's ZONE 2 that is bad. After tomorrow I plan to take the car back to the dealer for another DME check, my intent is to see where Zone 1 starts. During the last event I never touched the rev. limiter but had Zone 1 recording (about 6-8 seconds or 6200 ignitions in Zone 1). This time I'm going to shift to 3 rather than keep it in 2nd and see if it stays off the charts.

Now I do think that we should get a DEFINITIVE letter from Porsche North America stating clearly their position. Zone 2 is a missed shift or the engine running backwards (both feet in when you spin please). Zone 1 is undefined. Certainly we should be able to get a definitive letter of support from the Porsche Club.

I believe that there is a LARGE amount of leeway with the Dealership to make the call for Porsche.

Let's have the Club send a letter to the dealers for an official reply as well.
Bryan

[rss996]

What do you think they were gonna say when you called them...Hello!

Is your car even under warranty still? If not don't worry about it.

You will never get a letter out of PCNA and if you do I will buy you a tank of gas!

The point is that they are like the big eye in the sky now watching our every move.....

Good luck to those who dare to get near this issue with a car under waranty!

[ajackson]

I can definitely understand a car manufacturer not wanting to warranty track cars. Stuff breaks a lot when you flog your car and maybe they shouldn't be responsible for it. On the other hand, people that do track their cars sometimes run into problems that are the manufacturers fault and should be covered. In either case, I am seeing more and more manufacturers implementing policies of voiding warranties of people that autox etc without a clear statement of their policy.

I am reminded of Comcast (I think it was them) a while back. They would cancel the policy of people that used an excessive amount of bandwidth on their cable modems. When questioned, no one could get a clear answer as to what was excessive.

I don't mind companies trying to protect themselves -- there are lots of consumers that will take advantage of warranties beyond their intended scope. On the other hand, policies of voiding warranties should be clearly spelled out to all parties in non subjective terms.

**Climbs off soap box **

[ben, lj]

I can definitely understand a car manufacturer not wanting to warranty track cars. Stuff breaks a lot when you flog your car and maybe they shouldn't be responsible for it. On the other hand, people that do track their cars sometimes run into problems that are the manufacturers fault and should be covered. In either case, I am seeing more and more manufacturers implementing policies of voiding warranties of people that autox etc without a clear statement of their policy.

Wonder how many of those other manufactures are charging a "racing heritage" premium as large as Porsche's? Much of their sales literature and videos (on their site) make referrence to on track use and racing developed technology. Porsche wants their cake and eat it to. Best thing though is to stay away from PCA events if you have a warranted Pcar. As you said, many parts break from abuse and many break from defective design (for example see the RMS issue from garage queen Boxsters and 911s from the beginning 986s and 996s to the present - cases of RMS are still being reported on the new 997). It's bad enough Porsche is selling out the brand on 6 cylinder SUVs, but this attitude toward playing around in a parking lot with some cones with the PCA is pathetic. I'd love to get the CGT out there, but there is no way I'm doing that knowing that should some very high dollar part fail due to defective design, I'm going to have to get a lawyer to have the warranty honored.

[MikeD]

Well, I can say from personal experience that I have had my car into the dealership on a few occasions for warranty work. And, in it's current livery it would be very difficult for Pioneer to NOT be able to determine what I do with my car. For those that know my car know what I mean, for those that don't take a look at my avatar a draw your own conclusion.

The most recent work was done two weeks ago. I unloaded the car off my trailer Sunday evening. They had the power steering and oil leak repaired by Friday (under warranty). Excellent job!

I have had nothing but great service from Pioneer Centers and PCNA when dealing with my car. If I do something stupid and break my car then I expect to pay for the repairs. If it is due to faulty manufacturing then I expect Porsche to take care of the problem. To date this has been exactly what has happened. In my book Porsche is living up to its well deserved reputation.

As for the rev stages. My engine has over 1300 hours on it. My last stage 1 ("approaching redline", which I am assuming is 7000 RPM as my redline is 7200) was at 900 and something hours. My last stage 2 (mechanical over-rev) was at 600 and something hours (over half the cars life ago). Still Pioneer and PCNA repaired the oil leak and power steering problems I experienced at SoW.

I suspect there is more to this story than simply that "the car was flogged".

[ben, lj]

Well, I can say from personal experience that I have had my car into the dealership on a few occasions for warranty work. And, in it's current livery it would be very difficult for Pioneer to NOT be able to determine what I do with my car. For those that know my car know what I mean, for those that don't take a look at my avatar a draw your own conclusion.

The most recent work was done two weeks ago. I unloaded the car off my trailer Sunday evening. They had the power steering and oil leak repaired by Friday (under warranty). Excellent job!

I have had nothing but great service from Pioneer Centers and PCNA when dealing with my car. If I do something stupid and break my car then I expect to pay for the repairs. If it is due to faulty manufacturing then I expect Porsche to take care of the problem. To date this has been exactly what has happened. In my book Porsche is living up to its well deserved reputation.

As for the rev stages. My engine has over 1300 hours on it. My last stage 1 ("approaching redline", which I am assuming is 7000 RPM as my redline is 7200) was at 900 and something hours. My last stage 2 (mechanical over-rev) was at 600 and something hours (over half the cars life ago). Still Pioneer and PCNA repaired the oil leak and power steering problems I experienced at SoW.

I suspect there is more to this story than simply that "the car was flogged".

A friend of mine was denied master cylinder warranty coverage at Pioneer because he had dot blue fluid and was therefore "tracking" the car! I've been leary after his experience given Pioneer's support of and employee attendance at the events. This story wherein PCNA tries to screw you even if your dealer is cool about doing the right thing is even more worrisome. Incidentally, I don't think Pioneer has near the latitude on a "white smoke pouring" out of a car situation (ie: probably needed an engine) as they do a simple oil leak and power steering problem. PCNA probably has to approve the former while not the later.

[rss996]

I can see them bringing DME reports to the table but for Porsche to Bring PCA San Diego region magazines and website printouts and records of all events driven in the club is pure B.S. They sponsor and encourage these events!

Don't sit there and try to prove a link to the fact that a driver is fast and #1 in his class so therefore he thrashed the car.....at Porsche sponsored events no less.

I am not sure if its the dealer, PCNA or both are trying to screw a customer for unknown reasons or just trying to scare the rest of the public from buying these cars and going to a track of anykind and breaking them.

These new Porsche's are not meant to be driven on a track.....I am starting to see the light!

[rss996]

I have no problem with Porsche protecting themselves from bogus claims. But to see them link the autocrosses and PCA events and bringing the Witness and web printouts is obsolutely scary!

If they say the computer shows abuse and we are not warranting it then thats their stand. To try and convince an arbitrator that because of these events the RMS leaked and the car blows smoke is hitting below the belt, especially since in another breath and on all marketing material they say how much fun these cars are on the track!

How come everyone elses cars don't blow tons of smoke after one lap at the autocross?

[ttweed]

These new Porsche's are not meant to be driven on a track.....I am starting to see the light!

I remember my father telling me a long time ago "Every car Porsche makes is a race car in disguise." That ended in 1999, as far as I can tell. It's a sad commentary on what a corporation must do to survive in the modern marketplace.

TT

[MikeD]

Ben: The information I provided was my most recent personal experience. I've had other work done on the car. I also know of at least 2 other Porsche owners who have had engines replaced AFTER their warranty has expired. The Porsche rss996 is describing is some sort of Jekll and Hyde afair, which I am not inclined believe given my experience with Pioneer and PCNA.

As I stated in my first post, I'm sure there is more to this story than is being disclosed here. I have a hard time believing PCNA has our names in hats and just pulled rss996's buddies name out when deciding who they should screw.

[rss996]

Mike, I believe you that Pioneer has been good to you and your friends. I am sure they will be good to me if my 997 goes kaput.........

PCNA has to know of his racing at club events from the dealer. I know it for a fact. I am sure that they would not come up with all this evidence if it were not for a number of conspiring minds working together.

I have heard of this before around the country and the same evidence has been brought to court etc by PCNA to show and claim abuse.

If you don't believe me then thats you own affair, but I sat there in the meeting and saw them do this to a customer with my own 2 eyes!

Tweed said it correctly, Porsche racing died in 1999......

Another thing, I think if you take PCNA to arbitration and or are a thorn in their side they will go to any length to push their weight around. If you bury your head in the sand and put up with RMS failure and white smoke then they will be more than happy to appease you as a customer.

[Jad]

I must personally second Mike's experience and have heard many other stories of Pioneer and PCA coming through vs none that I have any details on where they have failed. To hear them say it to a customer is far from having all the details. I know of several nice cars only driven on the weekend by women (like Denise's Boxster), the first statement is true, but the computer readouts would lead to the less than obvoius usage on those weekend drives . Does the friend AX his car, or does he enter enduro races? I feel AX's should be covered, assuming proper shifts and both feet in etc, but not enduro's, no engine (not even pre-1999 Porsches) can consistantly run 50K/4years of race miles without problems and Porsche should not have to warrant such use.

Has anyone been reading Panorama recently? Every issue has talk about 993 engines being good for ~30k miles safely between rebuilds (yes there are exceptions, but Pano said that is the best estimate) and to plan on rebuilding the engine if you buy a used one. The plus side they say, prices reflect these problems and the cars can be purchased relatively cheaply to help with the rebuild.

As far as RMS, Porsche's leaking oil is not exactly a new event, and while it should not be happening these days, it has been handled by the factory better than any other company probably would. As easy as it is to bash Porsche, I am open to alternatives that provide better built cars that are better able to deal with track time and have better factory backing. BMW? Ferrari? Lotus? I don't think so, but anyone else have other stories?

[sean996]

The big difference with "this" experience with Pioneer is they couldn't fix my car.

After trying to get an explanation for a year, the PNA rep explained how hard cornering and high RPM dumps too much oil in the heads which causes the smoking . . . there's an add on pump assembly that can fix it . . . voids the warranty though I think.

So you see this is a fundamental design flaw . . . Pioneer or any dealer couldn't fix the problem, so they started collecting data to use against me. I've had my POS F 308 for 10 years . . . I drive it identical to how I drive my 996. I would have welcomed somone from any dealer saying "look at this print out, you need to adjust your driving style". The PCNA rep also said the type 2 over rev's were 1000 rpm over red line . . . 8200 rpm . . . this might have been a flat out lie?

Here's the problem, though, I see if a dealer educates somone on the type 2 over rev . . . probably the second time the guy goes to the dealer after being made aware of the type 2, the guy has adjusted his/her driving style accordingly to not produce any type 2 overrevs yet the car still belches clouds of smoke on restart . . . then Porsche has nothing in their defense.

So basically, the PCNA rep explained that the somking is due to an indadequate lubrication system for hard cornering , and the type 2 overrev is their way of "not fixing it".

BTW, I was believing the smoke was normal until several of you guys yelled "your cars on fire"

Sean