2001 Porsche Boxster

Never thought we'd own a Porsche, but here we are. Of course, there is a backstory here.

A couple of years ago we started attending the local Porsche club's TSD rallies. Most of the Porsche club's events are for members only, but they open up the TSD rallies to any one with any type of car. After a couple of years of this, the Rally Chairperson asked Bob if he'd write/run a rally for the series. So of we did. As we got to know the folks in the club and looked at the activities the club does, we started to consider joining. Well to join, you need to own a Porsche. So the search started for the cheapest Porsche we could get just so we could join the club.

We looked at a couple and drove a couple and then we found one in Chico that seemed like it might be the right one. We went to look at it and it needed a bit of work, but unfortunatly, the dealer wasn't able to get it started so we couldn't drive it. We waited for about 4 weeks and the dealer was never able to get it started so scratch that one off the list.

Just as we resumed the search, Bob was lucky enough to get a kidney transplant! Great news, but the recovery means no events and no car searching for at least 2 months. During that time auction results were reviewed and Facebook Marketplace was checked daily as were a couple of the bigger used car search sites. We narrowed down what we wanted to a 986.2 (2001 - 2004), not silver or black, with a triptronic automatic transmission and less than 100K miles. This narrowed down the candidates to 3 in the surrounding area.

A 2001 blue Boxster S that was priced very high
A 2001 white Boxster
A 2002 blue Boxster

Based on recent auction results, the 2001 Boxster S was overpriced by about 5K but the dealer over paid for the car at auction and didn't want to lose money on it. Scratch #1.

#2, the white Boxster checked all the boxes on paper, but was about 80 miles away. We made the trip the dealer had detailed the car so the white paint shined and the interior looked almost like new. We drove the car and it had some small issues, but overall, it drove nice. We ended up making a deal for it and drove it home.

Decoding the VIN shows the car came with the following:

Exterior: Biarritz White
Interior: Metropol Blue Prtl Lthr Seats
BASE Porsche Base Model
391 17" Wheels - Boxster Design
446 Wheel Caps with Colored Crest
476 Porsche Stability Management
EF Metropol Blue Prtl Lthr Seats
M6F Metropol Blue Floor Mat
P09 Sport Package
V4 Metropol Blue Top

In addition, the original radio had been replaced with a Pioneer touch screen with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto support.

After we got it home, we had it inspected at our local independed german auto service center. They pointed out all the small things we had already found and a couple of other issues:

Front bump stops are crumbling
Inner CV boots are leaking a bit of grease
The MAF needs to be replaced
It needs a 4 wheel alignment

Nothing of real concern. However, the list of small things seems to grow at about the same rate as we fix them.

While we work on fixing all the small issues, we've been making some improvements/modifications:

Modification to enable fog lights as daytime running lights
Replace the halogen fog lights with LED
Replace the wiper relay with a VW part to have programmable intermitent wiper delays
Add a Rennline magnet cell phone mount
More to come...