Just Suppose

[mikefocke]

that there was someone in the Porsche world who understood the specific metallurgy of our M96 engines and would take a sample of your oil and analyze it and tell you, based on seeing hundreds/thousands of other samples from running engines and the oil characteristics of a certain number of failed M96 engines, if there was a increasing statistical probability of a certain kind of failure in your engine. IOW, the value of this characteristic in your oil sample or the slope of this change in your oil's characteristics between samples is typical of what we see in an engine about to have failure Q. (Sally's engine, which just had failure X, had exactly the same change in characteristic Y of her car's oil as yours is exhibiting.)

This isn't the typical oil analysis done from the oil's perspective without regard to what engine the oil came from but rather is an analysis of the way the trace content in the oil tells specific things about what is happening in a M96 engine. This trend data may be the only way that forecasts of potential problems can be identified and forecasted in advance of an actual issue. This would help ease the mind’s of owners knowing that the wear occurring within their engine is being traced and evaluated by specialists that also watch and create trend data for hopefully hundreds of other M96 engines that could become part of the same program.

Would you be interested in paying for an oil analysis and thus contributing to the data base assuming you got a written M96 oriented analysis? Would you be willing to do it repeatedly if the value of trendlining your engine and its oil was increased the more times the analysis of your oil would be done (IOW you'd get a better prediction from multiple samples versus just the one and the data base gets better at predicting)?

Assume for this discussion the cost was $30 per analysis. And assume the process of getting the oil sample done was no more complicated than it is using existing labs and is thoroughly documented so that the DIYer can obtain a clean sample.

[bmohr]

yes. When do we start? :)

[Beelzy]

I am all ears. :renntech:

[palmtree907]

We do this all the time on Aircraft engines, so it's not far fetched to assume wew could do it with our Boxster engines. We just need a company that knows the baseline metallurgy.

[pk2]

I’d be in with some more clarification as to the method & methodology. Not the money, just don’t care for false diagnosis.

PK

[cvhs18472]

Not to be a fool, but what good would it do to know that your engine is about to blow up. Do you stop driving your car, do you quick sell it so that some other owner gets hit with a five figure repair, or knowing the potential failings, would there be a way to extend the life of your engine to an exceptable time period? If no real benefit can be derived from this information, at this time, why add $30 to an already expensive oil change. For me this would be an extra $100/year. I'm all for putting the money away for a 3.4 transplant. Ed

[1schoir]

Not to be a fool, but what good would it do to know that your engine is about to blow up. Do you stop driving your car, do you quick sell it so that some other owner gets hit with a five figure repair, or knowing the potential failings, would there be a way to extend the life of your engine to an exceptable time period? If no real benefit can be derived from this information, at this time, why add $30 to an already expensive oil change. For me this would be an extra $100/year. I'm all for putting the money away for a 3.4 transplant. Ed

The sudden failure of an engine can, in certain situations, lead to an accident.

Rebuilding an engine before it has self-destructed is less costly (think mangled valves/pistons, etc.) than rebuilding one that is about to fail.

Regards, Maurice.