Cayman 718 GPF Failure

[Cyclemotor1958]

Hi Guys & Girls

Without prejudice

Thanks Paul for your post, it really confirms what we have been saying for the last 2 years, the Gpf filter was never the problem, and this now finally shows no matter what parts you fit to these cars to get the oil ash % to behave, your wasting your time.

There has been a major miss diagnosis on this fault from the start, and the recent internal memo that came out on March detailing diagnostic checks to be carried out if the P242F oil ash load to high was present, definitely confirmed this.

Also the memo confirms that a new GPF had been modified to prevent this issue, and all vehicles with a production date later than December 2019 should already have the modified GPF fitted.

The one diagnostic check that would have stopped this situation from continuing, a GPF back pressure check was excluded on the memo, WHY.

The good news now is that the dealers can not blame the drivers of these cars, for putting in the wrong engine oil, or not driving them correctly, and the huge cost of replacing the GPF isn't necessary.

We have cars going back in for further checks now, after the new GPF filters have been fitted, and hopefully the dealers will be putting pressure on Porsche Technical to get this issue finally sorted.

Afterall its really embarrassing for them, now that the cats out of the bag.

The only thing left now is the software, which we have said many times is easy to adjust to correct this fault once and for all.

We now have 74K views on this subject, this amount of attention on a vehicle fault on our Porsche Club Forum is breaking records, never ever been seen before.

Fingers crossed, we are nearly there.

Sorry John, I hadn't seen your post, before I started mine, but might as well send it out.

Dave

 

[Paul-718gts]

Hi John,

Completely agree on both your root cause speculation and the method in which the Brand is managing this issue..

As you say it’s a numbers games and far cheaper to deal with the few than resolve the majority.

 

[dpoynton]

I have got punch drunk trying to get up to speed on this disturbing matter.

Could someone please post a resume of where things stand, eg, which 718 cars definitely DO NOT suffer from the GPF issue (all 18 reg and prior plus certain 68 dates?) and therefore which years we need to be careful about.
What have Porsche GB Reading publicly stated on the matter and what support will they give.
Any other salient points.

Thanks
David

 

[ianthow]

I have got punch drunk trying to get up to speed on this disturbing matter.

Could someone please post a resume of where things stand, eg, which 718 cars definitely DO NOT suffer from the GPF issue (all 18 reg and prior plus certain 68 dates?) and therefore which years we need to be careful about.
What have Porsche GB Reading publicly stated on the matter and what support will they give.
Any other salient points.

Thanks
David

Date of registration will not help due to variable time lapse between manufacture and registration. The model year (MY) is probably more relevant. This is coded in the 10th digit of the VIN. For MY 2019 cars, the code letter is K. Production for MY 2019 will have begun in the second half of 2018 so some 68 plate cars could be MY 2019. Assuming GPFs were first fitted for MY 2019, any car with an MY code earlier than K should be OK.

 

[Cyclemotor1958]

Hi Guys & Girls

Without prejudice

Well, what a day yesterday on our forum, just shows the interest on our forum when we put on some news.

Speaking of news, just had some this morning, we have a vehicle that's just had its original GPF filter reset to zero by a Dealer.

We asked for the oil ash % level to be rechecked after completing 300 miles, this was checked, and we now have 89%.

When you read the last paragraph of the internal Porsche memo regarding the OPF (GPF) procedure, it says in some cases the OPF can be recovered if a regeneration is carried out.

This regeneration is how they try to re set the OPF to zero. If this fails, the instruction is to replace the OPF and the vehicle retested.

It seems clear now that if a GPF % retest is carried out after a short mileage is covered, the software re calculates a new %.

This calculation is way off scale and doesn't represent the actual oil ash loading of the GPF, so it can not be believed.

On all of our cars that have had new modified filters fitted, all of them now have an oil ash % readings that make no sense at all.

What we also find is that there are no soot values recorded either, which we have seen on almost all of our faulty cars, which again is not right.

And the fact that we have no record of any driver of our 718 vehicle's reporting a ( Regenerate particle filter see Drivers Manual ) message on their dashboards, must confirm that something is not quite right with our software.

You would expect someone out there to have seen this message.

When this message appears on the dashboard, it leaves 2 trouble codes, P2463 Particulate filter soot load high, and 26740 Particulate filter Regeneration needed.

I am sure if Porsche Technical looked back at all the GPF replacement information they have, they would see this issue.

I wonder what was happening in 2019 when the Dealers were seeing our P242F oil ash load code coming on, and the need for Porsche to bring out a modified filter to prevent this from happening. And its odd that this issue should really show itself 6 years on.

Again, this was confirmed in the last paragraph on the internal memo.

We have a condition on these cars at the moment, that one minute we have a high oil ash% value that puts a light on, then the next minute its gone after a soot regeneration is carried out, and then the oil ash % comes back.

Thankfully, we all know now that these figures are not correct, and you can not regenerate ASH if it's real.

So all the hard work has now been carried out, eliminating the hardware, we just need to look at our software, bearing in mind that most of the figures you see on the GPF report are measured or calculated by an algorithm.

Dave

 

[JohnCRS]

To summarise, as requested by DPoynton above. This issue started with the first cars to be fitted with the GPF, model year 2019 cars. Most of the cases dealt with are from that period. We have seen later cars affected, and also different Porsche models, but so far these are exceptions and I do believe that these exceptions do not create a rule. We suspect there may be more cases coming through but do not have the numbers to support it (yet!)

So: Pre-2019, non GPF cars are fine
MY 2019, = higher risk
MY 2020, = lower risk
MY2021 and beyond = low risk (i.e. there is a higher chance of something else going wrong, rather than the GPF)

These cars consistently score well in reliability tests, so it is important to keep this in context. For every car that has had a GPF issue, there are tens, or even hundreds, of cars running fine. The reason this has become such a big issue is because some members faced a very large (£7-£9k) charge for something that was not covered under warranty. If Porsche had been able to fix it without charge, we would hardly know of it.

If I were in the market for a Cayman or Boxster 718 2.0 or 2.5 ltr car I would be wary of MY2019 model year. For all years I would ask for a VAL report and expect lower than, say, 60% ash load. I would then ask for the GPF to be included in the warranty. I would only buy through an OPC or Porsche specialist who is aware of the potential problem. On this basis, if I found the car I wanted, even a 2019 one, I would go ahead

It seems that 4.0 ltr cars do not suffer from this issue. (I know of one case that could be a GPF problem, but I know of two cases where engines have been replaced for other reasons.) I would be happy buying a 4.0 ltr.

I think the margins involved in the measurement of the ash load are incredibly small. Sensors and all otherparts of the drive train are manufactured to tolerances. It is possible that in some cases all the tolerances and measurements are such that they hit the predetermined level and trigger the error code. In most cases this does not happen but, very exceptionally, you get a situation like Paul's which becomes a lost cause.

Dave has done a fantastic amount of work on this issue and is happy to continue to assist members who are having GPF problems. Through his efforts we believe we know what we are dealing with and know how to help members avoid the big bills OPC's still try to charge. Thank yoou Dave. We will continue with this and, if Porsche technical would like to reach out to us, we really would like to know what 718 owners are facing.