Winter weekly engine starts.

[Jason Plato]

the cam looks knackered with wear on the carrier / cam thrust face not the lobe. I imagine your faces on the head/cam carrier were in poor state too.

 

"shells" must have been your crank and rod bearings.

 

either way £6500 for a refresh is decent money for bolting back together the cheese engine with new bits off the shelf, I imagine the engine builder is now taking the rest of the winter off in Barbados

 

here is my Duratec R .... C7 TOP

Taffia joint AO with Al

 

 

Edited by - Dave Jackson on 14 Nov 2009 16:32:09

[anthonym]

so. how to avoid this in future? or is 7 years, 24,500 miles good enough anyway?

 

(learning a new lexicon here)

 

see what I mean above about how it's not the cam lobes that were dry, but the cam carriers?

 

Whether the lobes are damaged or not is beyond my "eye", but the carriers are clearly blackened; that's why everyone is saying it's knackered and has been run dry without oil.

 

Unless it is during normal starting, then the dry running has been after Wintering for six months and then being started, when it takes an (relatively) age for the oil to re-enter the cam carrier / camshaft interface areas.

 

What's a thrust face?

 

Anthony

[anthonym]

NINE Years on it seems appropriate to give a follow up to this thread in the light now of years of experience.

I switch off in October, usually around 29th, and switch on again in May. Have done this since about 2003.

Engine is fine.

Same car... hard to remember she is now old.

My only caveat is that I live at altitude where it is VERY dry / not humid, whereas when I was in GB for one Winter, the damp/ humidity was terrible - so your mileage may vary.

Anthony 

[aerobod - near CYYC]

Now 5 winters of storing my R400D in winter with weight off the wheels and battery on a tender and a cheap cover over the top of the car. Off the road from early Nov to late April with no apparent issues other than tyres age hardening and having to be disposed of after about 4 years with half the tread used. I don’t typically lift the cover for 6 months.

The climate is also dry and cold here in the winter, I leave the handbrake on and have no corrosion or pad imprint on the brake discs when bringing the car out of storage.

[BenF]

This thread reminds me of my upcoming problem this winter, which is having a Porsche Cayman which will be stored in a single garage with no power from the end of November to beginning of March.

Not sure what to do to prevent the battery going flat.  I don't really want to disconnect it, I would rather keep it charged.  Does anyone know of a decent portable battery charging solution?  A quick look on the net just brings up lots of CTEK charger stuff, which only works with mains power.

[Jonathan Kay]

There's a long discussion of that somewhere: I'll have a look.

IIRC it boiled down to solar power or intermittent connection to a portable battery, and the latter would now probably best be one of those clever jump start packs containing a lithium battery.

Jonathan

[Golf Juliet Tango]

Surely that wouldn't recharge a battery, only jump start sn engine which is then recharged by the alternator?

Even if you have a nearly flat battery connected to a leisure battery, you would only partially recharge?

I will be taking the 21 off the road for winter; I'll remove the battery and institute a weekly recharging discipline (might be fortnightly).

[anthonym]

I've tried both over the years and these days disconnect the battery.

[Jonathan Kay]

Surely that wouldn't recharge a battery, only jump start sn engine which is then recharged by the alternator?
Even if you have a nearly flat battery connected to a leisure battery, you would only partially recharge?

The concept was to find one that could act as a smart "conditioning" charger to top up and prevent deep discharge of the car's battery. And carry the pack back to a mains point when necessary to recharge it.

Has anyone tried this?

Shirley

[Jonathan Kay]

Previous discussions, despite the search terms I think that the other options are in there somewhere.

Jonathan

[Golf Juliet Tango]

Thank you Shirley    - I have read those in the past and, despite my poor memory, I think the theoretical arguments do not work through to practice.

[Jonathan Kay]

The solar panels or the portable battery pack?

I haven't found the ideal integrated pack, but there are some that offer 0.85 A 240V AC, which is more than required by my CTEK charger (0.65 V). That's inelegant, but it might work for topping up and avoiding deep discharge... if the parasitic drain  and losses through inefficiency are less than the net power delivered by lugging the charged pack in one direction and the discharged pack in the other.

Jonathan

[BenF]

Thanks Jonathan, I don't think the solar-powered option is feasible, I don't particularly want to drill a hole in the garage roof, especially as it's not my garage.

The best option may be just to disconnect the battery for the winter, I just need to ask Porsche if there are any downsides to this (in terms of saved settings which will be lost).

If you leave a car on idle until it is properly hot, e.g. for 20mins, I still don't see the potential for damage, but that seems to be the consensus....

[Golf Juliet Tango]

Jonathan, the battery pack.

Like Ben, my (second) garage is not mine and is remote to my house, so I'm not going drill holes and am disinclined to put a solar panel on the roof (I certainly could not fix it down).

[Jonathan Kay]

If you leave a car on idle until it is properly hot, e.g. for 20mins, I still don't see the potential for damage, but that seems to be the consensus....

It was dogma when I was young that short run-ups were worse than nothing... wear on the cold engine and "acid from combustion". But I have no evidence that either was ever true, and you're proposing getting though the first phase anayway.

Jonathan

[Jonathan Kay]

Why wouldn't the battery pack work?

Thanks

Jonathan

[Jonathan Kay]

The best option may be just to disconnect the battery for the winter, I just need to ask Porsche if there are any downsides to this (in terms of saved settings which will be lost).

And ask that big Porsche forum?

Jonathan

[BenF]

Hi Jonathan,

Yes, you're right, I should ask on a Porsche forum, I instinctively ask on here first because I am already a member on here and also because I know people on here and therefore there is more of a trust in people's opinions!

Ben

[Jonathan Kay]

Only for very specifically Porsche questions, of course!

:-)

Jonathan

PS: Isn't it interesting whom we trust and why...

[Jonathan Kay]

PPS: Thoughts on the mobile battery solution?

Jonathan

[TomB]

Why not drive it once a month when its dry/ cold?  Its a modern Porsche, not a hand built relic from the 1960s with the corrosion resistance of a teabag.  If the battery isn't holding its charge over a month, you've got a problem anyway. Aside from the battery, it probably wont do it much good being stood in a garage for 5-6 months - think tyres getting flat spots, belts not moving position, brakes possibly rusting.  Problem solved.  

[anthonym]

I'm trying to figure out if cost is a constraint in this. I suspect not really. In which case disconnect the existing battery which if charged should have a "shelf life" of two years, so must be good for 6 months unconnected, and connect with croc clips a suitably large leisure battery - it can sit on the floor outside the car. 

The size is a parasitic drain calculation, but I suspect any deep discharge capable battery will do. 

I asked years ago how long they can keep them in the shops, was told two years - assuming acid within, if none then unlimited.

TomB, I agree those are risks, though I have never had tyre flat spots, maybe because a 7 is lighter? My brakes de-rust pretty quick when driven. Never noticed any belt issues. All that said, having stored many cars over many years, the worst thing one can do is not drive them. And the petrol goes off so they are a b to start. And humidity is a stored car killer. Maybe put it in a car coon and use a bigger leisure battery to drive that - swop out periodically for another. 

In fact on reflection, I think humidity is a far worse damage risk than a dead battery - based on storing cars in Britain. It gets into the electrics. I used a dehumidifier, which then froze and failed. Ruined the car (over much longer than six months), took me 80 days full time to rebuild it.

 

anthony

 

 

 

[BenF]

Tom, I can't drive it legally on the road here in Germany in Dec/Jan/Feb because it is on seasonal plates.

Even if it was on full time plates, there is the problem of lack of winter tyres.  Below 7degC you are not necessarily covered by your insurance here if you are on summer tyres.  The risk of something happening is slim of course, but it's a bit of a silly risk to take.

[TomB]

Ah, fair enough. Ignore me then