Tool Pants

Not sure what a 'hood' is. Is the part in this pic of a Boxster? Jeff

On a Boxster we also have 2 water drain tubes under the top. Leaves and other stuff gets back there and plugs the drains and then the area under the top fills up with water, and migrates to the cockpit. Put your top in the service position as if you were going to remove the engine lid and check to see if the drains are clear. A misaligned a/c hose will also get the passenger side wet like Loren says. But you said it was wet after a rain. Check the rear drain tubes and report back. Jeff

I saw them a long time ago on ebay. They are used tanks if you could not tell from the picture. I would not buy such a used part or you will be doing the job a second time. Take lots of pictures if you can get your camera into the engine compartment. Our local San Jose Boxster group has filmed 8 hours of video of various projects which we are putting on 3 DVDs. This would be a good project as it is a common problem and the older cars are out of warranty. Bring your car to San Jose and we will fix it and video tape the tank replacement. I hate to ask, but you have seen a split in the plastic and have coolant in the trunk since you already tried to remove the tank from just the trunk side? I use Bob at Sunset for cost plus 15%. No suprise there are no tanks in the US since this is summer time. My parts list and price list is from 2002 so take this with a grain of salt. 2002 Pet has the tank as 996 106 147 06 and the 2002 full price as $79.50, and is called water reservoir in the price list. Ending in 07 is not in my old Pet, which means nothing as the 'new and improved part' will be one digit higher. But my old price list has the 07 part as an equalizing tank for $211.41. When a part number has been superseded, such as 06 to 07, then when you look up the old part on the price list it directs you to the new part number, but in this case it shows both as valid parts. Strange, unless there is a mistake in my old price list. But a porsche dealer is online and it takes you to the newest part number and price, so go with what they say. Almost a 300% price increase for a plastic tank. Good luck with getting those spring hose clamps off with no room to work or see. I like to use needle nose vise-grips. Then replace the clamps with worm-drive hose clamps. Jeff

Why not have the dealer replace it since you have a 2000 unless you are out of warranty. So what was the problem. Other than a broken cable the only time I have heard about not being able to open a trunk is if something (like clothing) is jamed in the latch. Watch out if you buy a used latch, more so on ebay, and I have seen used ones on ebay. The microswitch in the latch goes funky and the trunk will not go on or will stay on until the computer shuts it off. Perhaps Loren will give you the part number for the latch with the improved switch. Oh, this is how my friend helped me open my trunk after a truck backed up into me. Jeff

I agree the B&M instructions are ok EXCEPT they do not tell you to mark the location of the shift cables before you remove the cables from the holders. Of course the DVD is much better as we did the install on 2 Boxsters and 2 996's and tried to do each install a little bit different. My friend Henry is in charge of putting all 3 DVDs together of various projects as I do not even own a digital video camera, and I delayed thigs as originally it was just 2 Boxsters but I wanted to include at least 1 996 so we shot more video. He is in Italy now but gave me a copy of the 4 B&M installs and they came out ok. He will be back August 8th it you want to wait. Otherwise just follow the instructions. Jeff

I have never removed the tank but I have been holding my breath as I have a 1997. It will probably split on me tomorrow. I thought one of our local guys Mark had done it because when I last saw his trunk in the picture all the carpeting had been removed, but I think he was trying to fix an electrical problem. And for some reason I cannot find the tank removal in the shop manual under the cooling section. Porsche must have put it under a different section of the manual and I will look for it when I have time. I called Peter and he said it is a pain only because you have to remove hoses in the engine compartment and the clamps are hard to get to and they are those spring type clamps that are a pain to compress and slide back. You also have to deal with the oil filler tube and tube for the dipstick. So removing the plastic tank itself from the trunk is not hard, but getting everything disconnected from the backside of tank from the engine compartment takes some time. Give it a shot and take lots of pictures. There is a coolant drain plug near the oil drain plug if you need to drain the coolant. When you fill the system you need to bleed it and I can tell you how to do that. But if you have a tip you need the PST2, but not with a 5 speed. Jeff Here are 2 Boxster and a 996 tanks I saw on ebay.

Foreign Affairs Motorsports was selling the kit for $995. Jeff

'Updated' cables for 1997-1999. 986 561 717 01 for left. 986 561 717 01 for right. Jeff

For your year there is no radio code. We did the trip computer retrofit on two 2003 Boxsters which means you have to disconnect the battery. Then we hooked up the battery when we were done and the radio went on - no code. Jeff

I also have a January 1997 that has never leaked from the rear main seal. It seems to be a hit or miss. Some newer cars leak and replacement motors also leak. I think there is something wrong with the M96 design. One day your crank is concentric to the seal and months later after the replacement seal has been installed and it leaks, it is not. Something is moving and until PCNA or PAG lets a mechanic take a motor apart rather ship it back on a pallet.... Peter split the cases on a Boxster and I will try to get his pictures. The new seal installer tool sets the seal farther into the crankcase housing vs. the old tool that set it flush. Time will tell if that is the fix. When I asked Peter why some replacement motors were also leaking he gave a reason, you do not know when the replacement motor was put together. The new seal started production in Feb 2000 but the new tools came out around March 2003. To answer your question. If it has not leaked for 6 years then you are ok since it would have shown up by now. Any seal will eventually fail from normal wear however. Peter with his new toys.

This hack is only for litronics, 996 or 2003 Boxster 'clear' lights, which have clear triangles. If you have lights with the amber on the headlight cover then this hack is not for you as you cannot remove the amber. Only on the clear lights with an internal amber lense. Once the internal amber lense is removed then you must replace the clear turn signal bulb with an amber bulb, or one of those bulbs that look silver but flash amber. Henry's before and after picture of his lits.

For others, a weld point is porsche speak for 2 or more wires crimped together. A number of wires are compined by a metal crimp then covered with a plastic sleeve. Figure 1 in the TSB shows a weld point. These are 2 of those connections in the front trunk wiring harness that goes to the horns. Jeff

Is it out of reverse gear. We disconnected the alarm control unit from the floor pan to get access to all the wires. There are also wires under the carpet. Then we removed the tape in order to find the black wire with a blue stripe. There are many wires taped together. We found the wire under the tape. The wire was not going to anything, but had a plastic cap on the end. Dig under the carpet and see what wires are hiding there. The TSB says that there are several reverse gear signal wires but we found one that was not being used - but we did not see it until we looked under the tape. Jeff

The collars are staked in 4 places which keeps them from falling off the bolt. Some people get a pry tool b/w the shoulder of the bolt and the top or the collar and can lever it past the ridge on the shaft of the bolt. If it were me I would take a very small grinder to the ridge until the collar can slide past the ridge. A dentist should have a grinder like that. ;) Jeff

I had no clue when we installed the mirror in Henry's 2000 Boxster, but thank god Henry knows electrical stuff and told me where to plug in the 2 wires. You have to remove the relay/support tray. It is held in on one side with a 10mm nut. This is it on a Boxster. You can see all the relays. Raman has his finger on one of the bridge plugs This is the back of the relay tray. The gray things with wires going in are the bridges. You have to put the 2 terminals on the end of the wires into the correct slots per Loren's diagram. This is inserting a terminal into the slot. This turned out not to be the correct slot as we were looking at the Boxster TSB which, unlike the 996 TSB, did not tell us that there was a wiring change in 1999. Thank god we also had the 996 TSB or we would never had figured it out. I think I will tell Porsche to update the Boxster TSB to made note of the Boxster wiring changes. :P Jeff

They are glued together. I was not able to separate them without breaking them. Jeff

Remember that the reservoir holds fluid for the clutch and brakes. I wondered what would happen if the clutch line broke and you pumped all the fluid out of the reservoir - no brakes! I was told the reservoir has separate chambers for this reason. If you bled your clutch you would have been able to replace the fluid in that chamber. Jeff

I do not see why not, since the TSB says the function is disabled when in reverse so if the wire is not hooked up then it will work in reverse and you will back-up into all the stuff behind your car. :o You have to run wires to the relay support and hooking up the reverse may take another 20 minutes. A bit of trivia. The mirror in the first page of the TSB is upside down. I would also make sure there are no electrical changes to a GT3 vs. an 996. We put in the mirror in Henry's 2000 2.7 Boxster and hooked up the 2 wires to the bridge as stated in the Boxster TSB. It did not work and we could not figure out why since we followed the instructions. Then we looked at the 996 TSB and it said to hook up the wires to different slots then what was stated in the Boxster TSB. Both TSBs for Boxster and 996 were issued the same day, but only the 996 TSB mentioned wiring changes. Then Henry switched the wires on his Boxster to follow the 996 TSB and it worked. Jeff

The interior mirror? We did it on a Boxster and ran the wires without removing the vent. You have to remove the seat to get to the reverse gear signal wire. We did not disconnect the battery so we could test the mirror before we put everything back together. The wiring harness that goes to the bottom of the seat is very long, so we did not disconnect it and just laid the seat on it's side outside the car. Jeff

A reverse cupholderectomy. Some pictures from when we removed them. Cupholderectomy The 'hardest' part is routing the wiring harness from the a/c display to it's new location as the plastic connectors are large and the radio is in the way. Pull the radio out at least half way and then it will be easy. Jeff

It just pulls up. Look at your new parts and you can figure out how they are held in place. Jeff

Patrick is in charge of the electrical stuff from now on, ok Loren, he got it right. Peter said to run the resistor from pin 1 to pin 4 wire so the light will not go on. I do not understand most electrical stuff. The ohms changes I guess if the buckle is in or out. Kind of like the deactivation bar for the child seat. Jeff

It took over 3 weeks to show up and I never thought I would be able to get my hands on it. This is the Boxster 2003 tech intro booklet that is given to the mechanics at the traning center. It covers VarioCam, MOST, PCM, and other changes for MY03. It is a supplement to the original 1997 tech intro. Cost $20. Jeff

I was only able to speak to Peter for a few seconds. You jump two of the wires with a resistor. The resistor can be 100 or 400 ohms. If your air bag goes off then they can tell from the control unit if the belt was 'buckled.' If you use a 100 ohm resistor the control unit will think it was buckled, and with a 400 ohm resistor it will show unbuckled. Jeff

The one piece upside down "U" trim started in 2002 on the 996, and in 2003 on the Boxster which is shown in my picture. It will not work with the older cars and has nothing to do with PCM or non PCM - it just will not fit. Jeff