I DID IT!!! But. . .
08-29-2004, 12:58 AM
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I DID IT!!! But. . .
Well, I got a 951!
That's the good news (pictures are forthcoming).
The bad news is it died literally 15 minutes after picking it up. I had the little "!" lamp illuminated while driving it and figured it was just because there was virtually no fuel in it (the thing was well into the red - on fumes). I pulled into a gas station about 5 blocks from my place, put go-go juice in, checked the oil (again, even though I did before I left the guy's place where I bought it just 'cause I'm obsessive like that) and went to start it up. . . click. Nothing. Again. Click. Nothing. DAMMIT!!!
Tried pop-starting. Engine turned, fired a couple of times, then died. Nothing. I had a guy help push to get a little more speed for the pop-start - same problem. I asked a kindly guy in a van for a jump-start, vroom! Started right up, but as soon as the jumper cable was removed, RPMs dropped and the engine died again. Soooooo, I went home, grabbed the (known good) battery out of the 944 that's up on stands right now and went down, transplanted it into the 951 - vrooom. It started right up, but the damn "!" light is still on and voltage is showing very high on the scale (up over 14 it looks like). This seems to be an alternator / charging system problem of some sort (bugs the crap out of me too, 'cause the car was PERFECT when I test drove it before). I'm guessing this might be an overvoltage relay problem that's tripping the alternator off-line (?) Where is this located? What are the first things to check? Voltage regulator? How do I check?
Thanks all you 951-ers! Yes, pictures will come. . . But it must live again first. .
That's the good news (pictures are forthcoming).
The bad news is it died literally 15 minutes after picking it up. I had the little "!" lamp illuminated while driving it and figured it was just because there was virtually no fuel in it (the thing was well into the red - on fumes). I pulled into a gas station about 5 blocks from my place, put go-go juice in, checked the oil (again, even though I did before I left the guy's place where I bought it just 'cause I'm obsessive like that) and went to start it up. . . click. Nothing. Again. Click. Nothing. DAMMIT!!!
Tried pop-starting. Engine turned, fired a couple of times, then died. Nothing. I had a guy help push to get a little more speed for the pop-start - same problem. I asked a kindly guy in a van for a jump-start, vroom! Started right up, but as soon as the jumper cable was removed, RPMs dropped and the engine died again. Soooooo, I went home, grabbed the (known good) battery out of the 944 that's up on stands right now and went down, transplanted it into the 951 - vrooom. It started right up, but the damn "!" light is still on and voltage is showing very high on the scale (up over 14 it looks like). This seems to be an alternator / charging system problem of some sort (bugs the crap out of me too, 'cause the car was PERFECT when I test drove it before). I'm guessing this might be an overvoltage relay problem that's tripping the alternator off-line (?) Where is this located? What are the first things to check? Voltage regulator? How do I check?
Thanks all you 951-ers! Yes, pictures will come. . . But it must live again first. .
Last edited by Porsche-O-Phile; 08-29-2004 at 07:01 AM.
08-29-2004, 02:42 AM
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Thanks all. Anyone know if I can transplant one out of my 944 until an appropriate purchase of a new one can be made? I think the alternators are the same (the 944 is a 85/1 and the 951 is a '86).
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08-29-2004, 03:05 AM
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Haha. Sorry 7th - I issued an apology to you. . . My generalization was an unfair "damn-I-remember-how-much-I-hated-living-in-Florida" rant.
It's white (sorry no guards red, would've been my choice too), a very nice white - looks a lot like Danno's car. Has full leather (no cracked seats, NO cracks in dash - !) Fuchs
, a recent Blaupunkt stereo (I think it's a Tokyo or something - I forget offhand), very good condition overall. All lights and everything work fine, sunroof works, has good maintenance history. . . Hmmm. . . what else. . . I'm pretty stoked about it - I'll be more so if I can get the darned thing working right! So you all think I should check and try swapping the voltage regulators first? Sounds like a good plan. I'll make a couple of phone calls to car parts places tomorrow just if perchance they happen to have one (unlikely, I know) but if not, I can try "borrowing" the one out of the 944 until Monday when I can order a new one from a dealership. Any idea what they cost? I'm thinking maybe $20 or so. . .
Hehe. My wife just gave me that "roll the eyes" look and shook her head. I actually live for that.
It's white (sorry no guards red, would've been my choice too), a very nice white - looks a lot like Danno's car. Has full leather (no cracked seats, NO cracks in dash - !) Fuchs
, a recent Blaupunkt stereo (I think it's a Tokyo or something - I forget offhand), very good condition overall. All lights and everything work fine, sunroof works, has good maintenance history. . . Hmmm. . . what else. . . I'm pretty stoked about it - I'll be more so if I can get the darned thing working right! So you all think I should check and try swapping the voltage regulators first? Sounds like a good plan. I'll make a couple of phone calls to car parts places tomorrow just if perchance they happen to have one (unlikely, I know) but if not, I can try "borrowing" the one out of the 944 until Monday when I can order a new one from a dealership. Any idea what they cost? I'm thinking maybe $20 or so. . .Hehe. My wife just gave me that "roll the eyes" look and shook her head. I actually live for that.
08-29-2004, 03:30 AM
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Congratulations! 
Can't wait to see the new car!
Correct me if I am wrong, but the alternator is one of the things that changed in the 85.5 model -- they went from the older 90 amp model to the newer 105 amp model. I also believe Iceshark is going on a long vacation soon -- so you'd better move it!
Check the easier things first (tension on belt, rusty grounds). If it turns out that you want to replace the alternator or just the regulator immediately like today -- give a hollar. I just got a rebuilt one in the mail intended for my car, but I need a new tranny first. You can have it for what I paid for.
BTW, does this mean you won't want the header panel, anymore? I'm sure I can easily find another happy home for it.
Can't wait to see the new car!Correct me if I am wrong, but the alternator is one of the things that changed in the 85.5 model -- they went from the older 90 amp model to the newer 105 amp model. I also believe Iceshark is going on a long vacation soon -- so you'd better move it!
Check the easier things first (tension on belt, rusty grounds). If it turns out that you want to replace the alternator or just the regulator immediately like today -- give a hollar. I just got a rebuilt one in the mail intended for my car, but I need a new tranny first. You can have it for what I paid for.
BTW, does this mean you won't want the header panel, anymore? I'm sure I can easily find another happy home for it.
08-29-2004, 04:17 AM
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dammit, now i have nothing on you. once you had aN NA, I had a turbo. Now you have a turbo, and a (soon to be) turbo'ed NA. Congrats... wanna help me with my car? I'll show you more roads!
~Eyal
~Eyal
08-29-2004, 06:44 AM
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Joe, no-no - I'll defintely still want the header panel; it's for the Callaway car anyway since I'm going to try and mount either the intercooler or an oil cooler up in the area behind the header there (plus it's great for looks). Now you understand why I'm a little short of money right now - I've been working on this one for a few weeks and it's going to take at least another couple to get back "on top" of things and what-not. I'm definitely still interested though; if waiting is a problem for you, please let me know (maybe I can do some creative financial rearranging). In the meantime, it looks like I might possibly need your alternator if that turns out to be the problem. It looks like I'm going to be ripping into this thing with the socket set a little sooner than expected, so if you have one and don't mind meeting somewhere. . .
Eyal - heck yea! I'd love to make it up there and work on it (and your car) with you (when we're not out doing crazy things that probably shouldn't be repeated here ;-) ). I'm dying to see what the status of your ride is! I'm a bit leery of driving mine that far right now though since if the alternator is off-line I'm running solely on what's stored in the battery for the primary electrical system and if the battery drains down then I'll be stranded in the middle of who-knows-where. This one's kind of a fun-buster.
Unfortunately it looks like I have to do this one locally - very locally. I only had to drive it back about 6-7 city blocks from the gas station to here on this battery with no real way of telling if there was any sort of charge going back into the battery or not. I dunno. I hope it's a regulator or a loose wire that popped off the alternator or a dirty connection or something else easy. If it IS the regulator, maybe I can get lucky and the local NAPA or someone will have one (I doubt It'd be that easy though). Either that or maybe Frank has one lying around (he's only about 20 minutes) or I can just get Joe's and transplant it (he's kind of far away though).
The manual gives the typical useless "if the alternator light comes on and stays on, see your dealer" sort of "advice". Grrrrrr. I'll have to look more closely today when the sun comes up, but I truly hope this is an easy / reasonably inexpensive fix.
Here are another couple of questions for all you 951 people out there:
(1) what are typical boost indications? I'm showing 0.4 or less at idle / RPMs up to about 1500-2000 or so and light throttle (makes sense I guess) and as high as 1 bar (maybe a little higher) with the throttle mashed and the RPMs higher in the band (3K-5K).
(2) There's a small "L" hose by the a/c receiver-drier that comes off of the pipe by the BOV. It looks like a hose of some sort should be connected to it, but there's nothing (just the metal "L"-shaped nipple). Anyone know what this is? I'll post a pic later on.
(3) Are the dash lights always that dim on the new style car dashes? I've heard people complain about this, but MAN!!! Driving home from the gas station last night I was wondering if I had the little rheostat all the way up or down - it didn't seem to make a whole lot of difference!
Eyal - heck yea! I'd love to make it up there and work on it (and your car) with you (when we're not out doing crazy things that probably shouldn't be repeated here ;-) ). I'm dying to see what the status of your ride is! I'm a bit leery of driving mine that far right now though since if the alternator is off-line I'm running solely on what's stored in the battery for the primary electrical system and if the battery drains down then I'll be stranded in the middle of who-knows-where. This one's kind of a fun-buster.
Unfortunately it looks like I have to do this one locally - very locally. I only had to drive it back about 6-7 city blocks from the gas station to here on this battery with no real way of telling if there was any sort of charge going back into the battery or not. I dunno. I hope it's a regulator or a loose wire that popped off the alternator or a dirty connection or something else easy. If it IS the regulator, maybe I can get lucky and the local NAPA or someone will have one (I doubt It'd be that easy though). Either that or maybe Frank has one lying around (he's only about 20 minutes) or I can just get Joe's and transplant it (he's kind of far away though).
The manual gives the typical useless "if the alternator light comes on and stays on, see your dealer" sort of "advice". Grrrrrr. I'll have to look more closely today when the sun comes up, but I truly hope this is an easy / reasonably inexpensive fix.
Here are another couple of questions for all you 951 people out there:
(1) what are typical boost indications? I'm showing 0.4 or less at idle / RPMs up to about 1500-2000 or so and light throttle (makes sense I guess) and as high as 1 bar (maybe a little higher) with the throttle mashed and the RPMs higher in the band (3K-5K).
(2) There's a small "L" hose by the a/c receiver-drier that comes off of the pipe by the BOV. It looks like a hose of some sort should be connected to it, but there's nothing (just the metal "L"-shaped nipple). Anyone know what this is? I'll post a pic later on.
(3) Are the dash lights always that dim on the new style car dashes? I've heard people complain about this, but MAN!!! Driving home from the gas station last night I was wondering if I had the little rheostat all the way up or down - it didn't seem to make a whole lot of difference!
08-29-2004, 07:23 AM
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Yes, does sound like an alternator problem.
To get to the alternator in a 951 you need to remove the air filter, some air intake hoses and quite a bit of coolant hoses. Hence you'll need to drain the coolant system at least partially. When I did the IceShark battery cable upgrade I made a writeup (over 20 pages). May be I can send you the part about the alternator. Email me.
Question 1: Those gauge readings sound about right
Question 2: Need a pic
Question 3: Lights are very dim. Do a search lots of info on upgrades. I got the FlamingEye kit a month ago. Have not had time to install it yet. Others have found it vey worthwhile.
Good luck!
To get to the alternator in a 951 you need to remove the air filter, some air intake hoses and quite a bit of coolant hoses. Hence you'll need to drain the coolant system at least partially. When I did the IceShark battery cable upgrade I made a writeup (over 20 pages). May be I can send you the part about the alternator. Email me.
Question 1: Those gauge readings sound about right
Question 2: Need a pic
Question 3: Lights are very dim. Do a search lots of info on upgrades. I got the FlamingEye kit a month ago. Have not had time to install it yet. Others have found it vey worthwhile.
Good luck!