Porsche

Lynda bought me a set of new wheels for my 60th birthday.

After an exhaustive search (pandemic supply chain shortages), I ended up deciding to move the car to a 19" wheel from its default 20". This allows for more variety in options for tires. 

Here you can see them brand new with a set of Pirelli P Zero's on them. I hadn’t run any Pirelli’s before but they’ve seemed fine for daily driving and winter road conditions here in central California.

For the third time in two months, my 2013 Porsche Carerra S threw error messages at me. 

This time it was "Sport Mode Not Available" and "PASM Not Available". 

The previous error messages were a check engine light and when I ran the ODBII code there was also a Mass Air Flow error (P0068). After a little panic and a call to Bruce @ BR Performance, I settled down. I let the car sit for a while and then went for a drive. The errors cleared.

After living with a noise that seemed to come from the right front of the car, I finally dug in and did some research. This noise is described as "howling" you'd hear when you blow air across the top of a bottle. For me, this happens at speeds between 25-40 while running at a constant speed. In fact, one way to confirm is to see if the noise stops when accelerating (it does).

In Feb 2016 the alternator failed in my Porshce 2001 996. My mechanic was on vacation. I used Mobile German Auto Works here in Santa Cruz. They replaced the alternator and evidently replaced the coolant bypass coupler. The repair cost over double what it cost to replace it the second time.