marksal

I have a porche cayman 2006 the car just lost of oil pressure and the engine died.

The replacement engine is more than the car is worth!!!

Can I repalce it easily witha different engine?? Out of a boxter??

Or is it time to scrap!

Any idea or help would be great

JCP911S

I hear you... here's the bad news that I have been living with... a full rebuild is easily $20K++... used engines are $20K+... and then you still have a used engine... it's easy to spend $2-4K on Mysweelas

Bottom line, you will probably put north of $25K into a car that is worth $30K on a good day... if you love the car, and want to keep it for years it may work, but financially, you are looking at some serious pipe.

My 2006 has about $20K worth of suspension work, and I'm selling it for $10K.... I'm just cutting losses... you are drawing into an inside straight..

Signed Dr Kavorkian
..

KrisA

Vertex does these engines for less than 20K USD:

https://www.vertexauto.com/product/6...lt-engine-34-l

Not sure how much $$$ to do the install, but surely it won't be cheap.

It sucks that replacement engines cost so much, as more of them fail I hope the costs will come down.

Julian_KCMO

Used engines are not $20k
Where are you located? I still have the 3.2 engine from my Boxster S available to buy. $3.5k

Cheers,
Julian

JCP911S

I hate to be a hater, but I got rebuild brake calipers from Vertex, and the seals blew out in two laps... IMHO they may, or may not cut corners, but...pay your money...and takes your chance...

Zirconocene

My experience with buying a new-to-me engine from a parts breaker was also less than $20k, but it was certainly not rebuilt, just a lower mile engine than the dead one that I bought the car with. Here are the places you can look for a used engine that seem reputable (I've done business with them in the past, but only one of them for an engine):

LA Dismantlers
dcAuto
Specialized German (I found these guys through eBay but they seem to have a pretty big operation)

If you want to branch out and take on a bit of a project, Audi 2.7 and 3.x V6 engines will bolt up to the transmission. These guys (https://www.renn27.com/home) are doing the swaps into the 996. That might or might not work exactly for the mechanicals of the 987, but I'll bet the control electronics solutions that they've come up with will.

I don't know what your level of comfort is with these kinds of things. It took me a little bit to find an Indy around me that was even willing to swap in a used Porsche engine so if you can't or don't want to invest some sweat equity, it may be a little tough to venture away from Porsche only solutions.

Good luck, no matter what.

Cheers

A432

Imho both the Vertex/cheaper rebuild and the used stock M97 3.4 engines aren't good options because
you run the risk of the same thing happening again. (don't believe Vertex sleeves the blocks on the basic build and the metallurgy is an issue)
Vertex does talk about displacement increases which should be sleeved but then you might be approaching the cost of one of the more reputable shops.

What you don't often read about is a little outside the box thinking like installing a '05 3.2 or the '05-'08 2.7 which have cast pistons (metallurgy improvement)
If you want to keep the 3.4 or + displacement and have some reliability, you pretty much have to sleeve the block and address the oil pressure issue.
Going to a 9A1 is a possibility but a moderate undertaking to get the wiring/sensors to work right. (2.9 easier due to port injection/Bosch DME)

If it were me, there would be 3 basic scenarios.

1. Just want reliable transportation/minimum cost and keep car
- consider good running/tested 2.7/3.2 with cast pistons (consider emissions/wiring and might require a flash to DME and DON'T tell smog tech lol)

2. Get max value out of selling
- compare value of selling as a roller to value parting out to value with 2.7/3.2 to value of installing used 3.4 (some track peeps/shops may want it in any of mentioned forms)

3. Keep car and improve power for long term ownership
- compare having 3.4 rebuilt by RND or Hartech or Porsche shop/self (sleeved) using their parts/tech (thread here about member recently doing the latter)

RJ80

Sorry to hear, it's sad to see another story like this. Here is my opinion:

What year is your car, how many miles, cosmetic condition, manual or automatic? Any desirable factory options?

If the car has lower miles, manual transmission and is in very good to excellent condition, maybe with some desirable options (uncommon color, full special leather interior), doing a quality rebuild at Flat 6, Hartech, etc may make sense. This car would likely be worth a bit more than a car on its original engine, due to modifications in the rebuild process to make it more reliable. Figure $35k for the engine with removal/installation, but you may well have a $40k car in the end.

Swapping with a used same-type engine (Boxster or Cayman 3.4) is possible for a little less money, but you really need to be comprehensive in making sure that engine is a good one. Swapping with a Boxster 3.2 will probably require a bit more work to get things like electronics working and will probably be less desirable in the market due to lesser power (though the post above mine does make a good point about improved reliability).

If you are not particularly tied to the car, I'd probably recommend cutting your losses and moving on. An average, higher-miles non-running roller might be worth $8k-$10k to a DIYer wanting a project or track car. With a swapped used engine, it's probably a $20k-$25k car, but it will cost you most of that to get there.

Again, just one person's opinion.

SlakkerRacingDev

With drop and install, we can take it to a 4.1L for you for around $28k. This includes the core replacement pieces because there’s a good the crank and possible the carrier are damaged, if not the case as well.


Or if you decide to have someone else drop and replace with a 3.2L, it takes 15 mins to reprogram the ecu so we can do it at no charge, if it helps out.

old man neri

LS Conversion?

JCP911S

A rebuild on a G-body 911 is about $20K-ish... but then you have a $70K car... a rebuild on an M97 engine can run $20K-ish... and you have a $30K car... I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but money is money, and as somebody who has dealt with this reality... facts are facts... it's not good

marksal

Thank you all for your valuable comments and help.

i think it is dead, time to go to the big scrapyard in the sky!

Mark

sasilverbullet

Part it out yourself...

harveyf

There are a couple of non-invasive things you could do to establish just how dead your engine is-
1. Put a wrench on the flywheel pulley nut and see if it can be rotated (in neutral). If it is locked up, then indeed it is very dead. If not-
2. Pull the fuel pump fuse. Try and crank it on the starter. Listen for bad noises. See if you get an oil pressure warning message on the dash.
3. If the oil pressure message comes up, there is a crude test- Drop the oil filter housing and filter. Crank the engine. No oil out of the open filter spigot is bad.
4. If you get oil gushing out of the filter spigot, install a new filter. Cut open the old filter and check for debris.
5. Put the fuel pump fuse back in and try and start the car. Similar to above, listen for bad noises and see if the oil pressure message comes up.
6. At this point, you'll have a general feel as to the value of your engine as a core. If you are selling the car, this might or might not get you a little more money. Or a miricle may occur and things are not as bad as they seem!

bredward

You're not getting more than $10k for a roller Cayman with a blown motor anyway, so a $20k rebuild to get a $30k isn't as foolish as it may seem. The car lost that much value the second the engine blew. Not fixing it doesn't magically get that value back.

And at the risk of committing blasphemy, I'd rather drive a rebuilt M97 than a rebuilt 2.7L with < 200 HP as on the G-body anyway...