Why You Probably Shouldn't Buy an Air Cooled Porsche 

You buy a 40 yr old car and expect it to be perfect? Where’s the fun in that.,.

If you have the financial means its worth it. I’m 33 with no kids. My 1988 911 engine is dropped right now getting serviced. Told the mechanic anything questionable get it done while we’re in there. The love of the car simply out weighs the costs to me and i’m happy to keep it healthy. So young lads have fun, but keep the dinky wrapped, and get yourself an aircooled porsche.

"Straight messed up" is a technical term.

If I asked you if you wanted tea or a coffee, it would probably take you an hour to actually answer , actually.

I have a 993 which I have owned for a few years and never had any trouble with it at all

My biggest mistake was selling the near mint 3.2 Carrera which I owned. I am a broken man.

I bought an E46 for $2200. Knew it wasn't particularly well cared for, did it anyway. I never would have guessed the cost of parts needed.

Video idea : *So u want a s550 mustang...*

air cooled porsches are king of porsches. they are old tho

Really well made arguments Alex, it would be hard to debate ur takes. I dont care i still want one

I don't like the title. But I love Magnus Walker so I stayed.

I've a 1996 iris blue 993 C2. 60,000 miles and runs like a Swiss watch. She's 25 years old, and has been mine for 15 of those.

You gotta be a mechanic 😂. I worked for an SCCA Porsche race shop. That's how to research your dream car. Work at the shop first

Had a Porsche with a built 2.7 rsr motor. Repairs are a nightmare.

Stumbled into a 964 while window shopping the new Dodge Challenger circa 2010 or so... ended up with the 964 without ever contemplating a p-car before.... what great driving experiences until the eng threw what turned out to be a rod bearing... doing all my own work as ever before and some modest experience in aviation maint gave me confidence to go on in.... after it sat for a while in my garage staring at me endlessly, I finally did the deed, mind you it's the second engine drop ( C4 car) as I blew out the original rubber center clutch within my first year... the crankshaft was refurbished and all other parts tended to, inspected and bearings replaced..etc.. it was not my only car, so your advise rings true, have another driver as you need, these cars do not get fixed 'quickly' unless your a race pro I suppose.. now some 7.5K miles later and a UOA(oil) that turned out great, I'm smiling again and hoping all the 1 million mile Mobil 1 oil commercials pertain to my car as well...hahahhah ;))

All 20 Nissan 240sx and Silvias I've built and I asked myself why did I buy another one 🤣

No alex. Im here watching to stop my self crying because my father died yesterday

My biggest regret when it comes to buying cars to build is not having the money for the build. I have had two 240sx's one I almost got to run, but was just working minimum wage job so money and time were tight. The second 240 I actually drove home. Had planned to do work to it including new floor pan. Started doing some work on it but ended up selling it. I mainly regret my timing on buying project cars, helping out "friends" I hadn't talked to in years and not pushing myself harder for a better job doing what I want.

I had a 914,944,912...zero issues...got my 75 911 no sunroof coupe & engine was in and out 3 times and in the process my mechanic passed away,but once that thing was sorted out i loved it! Had it well over a decade...

Had a 2001 f150 xl that got totalled when I was in high school. Used the insurance money to buy a VW Passat because it looked nice and VW's are (usually) halfway decent cars. It was a 2003 Passat W8. It hasn't died yet(the transmission is getting close), but I refuse to ever look at the amount of money it's cost to keep running.

I didn't realize the older 911's were so hard to work on. I feel lucky to have a 964. I do wish the prices would stop rising. It wasn't to long ago that no one wanted 964's and the average person could afford them. They made great track cars because of their low cost. Now just breaking a tail light sets you back $500.

Do a "so you want a ___" video on my car i just bought so i can justify my bad financial decisions to myself please.

I had an air cooled Vw beetle once, bought it was a seized engine and though how hard can it be? Watched some videos read a couple books, managed to get it running, until one day driving it to work. I lose power in 3rd, ok downshift to 2nd, floor it and I’m still losing speed, somethings wrong so I pull over and as I’m looking in my rear view mirror to check for other cars in the lane beside me I see huge flames burst out of the engine bay. Needless to say I was late to work that day and only mildly surprised this happened

the TSW behind Alex's head looks like one of those halos from a renaissance painting when he's centered in front of it

I bought a 1980 BMW 320i with the m10. So far literally everything and it's third cousin on this car has fu$^3d itself sideways and I've genuinely considered trailering it to a large field buying a tank of gasoline and lighting a match and watch that orange pain in the a55 go up in a beautiful explosive ball of fire. Also the guy that was supposed to be a friend that sold it to me, had not done any form of maintenance whatsoever. For some reason however I always find myself outside picking through the issues one by one and still loving the car lol. Car guys are the perfect example of self deprecation. 😅😅

My dad has a 1983 911 SC Targa with 115k miles that he bought back before I was even born, which is over 21 years, and the car has always been great. sure there have been things here and there that hes had to fix or replace which is pretty standard for an old car but overall it still runs and drives like butter. Now maybe it's because my dad has owned multiple Porsches and multiple 911s so he knows the do's and don'ts but he has always said that the SC is super reliable for an old sports car.

You are not the only one! I thought I had a sorted 911sc. Tons of records that were just beautiful to look at when in a stack making me feel as if I had no problems in world. Ended going 17K in on the car to make it solid. It is a car that you should expect to spend 10K on top of the price you bought it for. other than that great car and I love it.

Brilliant ! The vlog I was expecting, to make their prices start to go down, so that I can get one 😁👍

always, always, always lower your expectations to the lowest you can. then lower it again and you'll never be disappointed. trust me.

I'd recommend buying private sale, reason being you can gauge the owner, AND save money. Find a 2nd 3rd or 4th owner car, meet the owner and ask them to take you for a drive. Hasn't failed me on many purchases, old and new. No porsches yet but the point stands

“you know, I know what we all about to talk about wheels, tires and suspension @ Fitment Industries”🤣💀

84 911 33k 71k on the clock, one head stud broken on cylinder 6, leaks a bit but still drive it 8k/yr How much was the SC? Head studs are more prevelant on pre SC when they had the magnesium case, '74-'77

Thought this was going to be a scotty kilmer vid

Because if you’re stuck in traffic you’re screwed

Hey Fitment Industries, will you guys ever have another shirt with a 370z? The Klutch shirt is out of stock 😔

Change it from CIS to PMOs and that fixes most of the issues the 3.0L have.

Buy a simple 993 Carrera and you’ll be more than happy!

I bought a 1992 Nissan 240SX LE for $50 USD back in October 2016. It's May 2019 and still has nothing done to it unfortunately lol. I get a lot of flak about owning an S-Chassis, but I love them...I'm saying that now because I've read a lot about oil leaks and all kinds of fun stuff.

Lost me after the first 8 seconds...……………..tried really hard but could not make it through this video.

Wow bro I’m glad you got that off your chest!👍🏾😊😎😂

Sorry about your car--that's a brutal failure on your car and I would be pissed too. That said, I don't follow this argument because water cooled 911s have their own insanely expensive engine failures (until the 997.2 at least). Both the 996 and 997.1 famously have the IMS & RMS issues in the M96 engine, which could easily turn a car into a valueless rolling chassis without warning. But even worse, is the problem with bore scoring. Basically, if you buy any Porsche, you should buy it knowing it will require some engine-out maintenance that will be extremely expensive, but much less than on a Ferrari.

2004 BMW 545..internal engine coolant pipe failure and electrical nightmare

Interesting. Am a Porsche fan but I know the price of maintenance and parts is heavy.

Nice, you keeping others from buying these so I can buy one for myself

Bruh my dad built one it was his second build he actually started digging into it's what got me into cars

Alex just had a big ooff moment. It’s ok.

I love air-cooled 911 Porsches however I'm smart enough to know that they are expensive as hell and if you don't have the finances don't f*** with that car cuz it will break you I want one in the worst way but you really have to have your p's and q's in order and know that the car is going to need work you can get parts for 911 for any Porsche through pelicanparts.com which is a good source for parts but those air-cooled 911 's they're finicky and you have to drop the motor to do a lot of stuff to them so be prepared to spend money that being said they are the king of Porsches they are nothing short of Awesome especially if you have a turbo one and then really be prepared to spend money because the turbos go those Motors are getting old even if they've been sitting you're going to have to address some issues and if you can't do the work yourself that car can financially break you but they are the cream-of-the-crop for Porsche I've owned my share of Porsches and I've spent huge money and I don't regret any of it I would do it all over again cuz they are that great I've had a 79 928 had a 84, 928 85, 944, a 94 968 convertible and I currently own a Boxster S 2002 I probably spent over $20,000 on repairs but like I said I would do it all over again cuz I love the cars you got to love these cars or you're going to hate them it's just that simple

70% of all 911’s ever made are still driving on the road today. They’re the most reliable sports cars of all time aside from the m96 and m97 water cooled engines. A guy bought an ‘84 911 with 102,000 miles and a few days after buying it was contacted by the original owner. Turns out it was track raced and had 402,000 miles on it. So when hoonigan took it to BBI in LA, they found out it had never even had the motor or trans opened and it had just had a clutch replacement and oil changes. This guy bought a Porsche that wasn’t mechanically maintained. He’s not wrong about the head studs though. These motors are rated for 300,000 miles.

My mistake was my first car. Which is a 2009 Subaru Legacy. TLDR: Don't buy a Subaru with a blown head gasket as your first car when you have no time to work on it and have to rely on others to do it for you. It's not fun. Like Alex, I did not fully understand the gravity of what I was getting into. The car had the famous Subaru blown head gasket. My dad and I pulled out the engine and fixed it and whatnot. And it ran fine for a while. Nevermind the fact that it took us six months to fix it because I had a three hour commute in high school and had no time to spare. Then the power steering pump puked fluid all over the engine bay. That wasn't too bad though. Just messy. Then a CV boot (or whatever it's called) tore and so we had to fix that. Then the catalytic converter needed to be replaced. And now the car is severely down on power and will not rev past 4500 RPM and can't go over 65 MPH, and is throwing zero codes in the process. We think it's something to do with the exhaust but at this point I just want to sell it to a Lemons team for 500 dollars. Or burn it. But at the same time I hate myself just enough that I want to figure out why it's doing what it's doing more than any of those things. It's also not really that enjoyable to drive. It is the suck.

I bought a 03 wrx with 180k miles but full bolt ons that was installed 6k miles before then. Ended up buying it and all the upgrades including suspension and everything was new, but a couple months later and a compression test, I come to find the motors at the end of it’s life. Obviously I’m not just gonna throw it on Craigslist and be done with it. No, I bought a new long block and did a motor swap in my parent’s garage. And this is my DAILY DRIVER. She runs amazing now and shredded her first autocross event with the new engine.

once you go air cooled you don’t go back.

Yep things can get expensive. #porschetax I had a 97 C4S (993) for 2 years. Luckily nothing major went during my ownership. However on the way to do the transfer with the seller the transmission grenaded. Literally a hole in the side of it as big as a golf ball. The seller replaced it with a used unit and I took delivery a month later.

I really knew I shouldn't have bought my 92 Stealth Turbo. Now I'm looking at doing a timing belt and valve stem seals in the spring. I shouldn't have bought it, but I'm glad I did.

Couple of things: 1. there is nothing inherently wrong with the head studs in the SCs, it was the earlier 2.7s that had this problem - if you had a head stud problem with an SC, it's because you bought an underutilized and poorly-maintenanced car that was almost 40 years old; and 2. younger car dorks started getting hard-ons for older 911s because of all the trendy nonsense about "analog", "mechanical" and "no-nannies", without realizing that all of that also comes with no A/C, heat that can light your feet on fire but can't defrost for shit, no radio or other conveniences, and performance that was great 40 years ago but can barely keep up with a new subcompact. A well-used and properly-maintained SC is likely the most reliable and best all-around 911 ever made, and all of the maintenance is easy enough for even a novice DIYer - not to mention that parts are super easy to find and still very affordable. Personally, I'll be happy as shit when all this faddish nonsense about aircooled 911s dies out and people move on to other makes and models, it will make club and other events fun again.

It sounds like the problem is people think a classic Porsche or Datsun ownership will be like owning a Civic. Like they can just neglect it and it’ll last forever, or they can just throw a bunch of bolt on parts at it and double the horsepower.

What are the wheels on the top right?

I picked up a fantastic 997 and today with 120K have had very few issues outside of maint.

I bought a 67k mi 964 in 2000. Water came in somewhere from the top and oil came out of the engine. I happily sold it at a huge loss 18 months later. Eventually I replaced it with a brand new 2006 lancer evolution mr which was a wayyyyy better car in every way. I really wish I kept that one.

They sure suck in traffic and thats very dangerous.

whats that wheel on top right. looks a lot like an xt005r' but thats at btm left

Always thought about buying an air cooled Porsche. They are hero cars. But you know what they say about meeting your heroes.

You guys can talk about whatever you want

anyone got a link to the vid at 2:12? i want to see more of that porsche

Hey I had a porsche once 😂😂😂 3 actually, they were all beetles 😂😂😂 so that's my story on air cooled cars but here's a much more interesting story of how I drove out one day , traveled about 50 km in ,my 72 and when I stopped to refill for gas , damn thing just wouldn't start , anyways because it's a 72 manual, push it with ignition on ,pop the clutch and voila , parked it at home thought great my car needs a visit at the mechanics. So next day I try to tick it over , I mean heck why not , it ran it ran like there was no problem whatsoever, took it to the garage nevertheless, nothing was wrong with it 😂😂 All I am trying to say is they have soul , tricky little buggers when it comes to living with them , but they got soul.

Sometimes hot fast girls cost more than fat reliable ones

Great job Alex 💪🏾! Hay you guys should think about doing so you want a TSX 🤷🏿‍♂️ ijs. Keep up the dope content 👌🏿🔥

this sign can’t stop me because i can’t read!

This is a wealthy man's or master diy's game. I have a '81 911sc and it's an absolute joy. It leaks oil, smells like gas, has no a/c, but on a beautiful day with the targa top off there's nothing better. Luckily it's car #5 for me so I don't have to rely on it in a pinch.

I mean I have a lead on 2 air cooled 911s and a 356, though technically the one 911 is a 901

You guys should do "so you want to own a 1st gen Camaro"

A 97 Mercedes C230 for $1000. Needs no more explanation

A video on why old cars are not the best to buy in general and a video on why you should do your own car work.

Well this is 2021 and anything with an engine and wheels is making good money. I’m picking up my 87 911 carrera 3.2 next weekend. I’m running out of Aircooled Porsche videos to watch. Got it at a good price. Could park it in a garage and cover it with boxes and still be able to sell it for a great profit

I'm doing a 3.2 now because of 3 broken head studs. The previous owner was a friend of the family and had fallen ill and wanted the car to stay close and have it done by an enthusiast (me). So because of that I got it at half market value at the time essentially subsidizing the engine rebuild. For me the parts are a fortune since I've been working on Corvettes in my stable. But the quality is still A grade OEM stuff from Germany. I think I spend $10K alone last month on parts and maybe another $5k will be spent on machine work and the other stuff you do while the clutch it out. If you just have enough money for the car and nothing left in the tank for maintenance, you are screwed. You will need a small fortune to do DIY and an absolutely obscene amount over and above that to have someone do the work. But if you take a year off with the car to sort it out, it should go another 100k miles. But when you're done with the new parts, you can easily eliminate the weak points of the engine like the divilar studs and connecting rod bolts on the 3.2. Then if you DIY, the flood of enhancements can be bought for the cost you're saving in labor at a shop.

Too bad about your experience... have had my ‘86 (3.2 Carrera) for 8 years, it started out as my one and only car, daily driver - have put over 60,000 miles (on top of the 115k it already had when I bought it) including ~30 track days and it’s never missed a beat. Store it every winter, fires up every spring. Most reliable car I’ve ever owned. Most fun car I’ve ever owned. There’s a reason values have gone up so much... worth every penny.

I know how it is blowing a straight oil stench into your car. Don't leave your oil filler cap on the manifold heat shield. Please.

Can anyone tell me what that wheel is up top right side bbs rs type looking gold one is?? Please

Can you do one for a 9th gen 2017 Honda Accord v6 manual trans.... prolly getting one twmr

You got the right water pumper though. Mezger FTW

Still the best car to every exist

I had opportunities to buy an air cooled 911. The window of opportunity closed.

I just purchased a 1987 911 Coupe black on black for 31k with rebuilt engine 10k miles ago. Has a few electrical issues like passenger window, radio but other than that seems to bit sorted. With people losing there jobs during this pandemic unfortunately or fortunately deals are to be had!

He is 100% right. I had two of them and it was not worth it. Glad I got rid of them,.

yah - word on the street is that you have to maintain those porsche's like a fighter jet to keep them from breaking down.

THANK YOU FOR SO YOU WANT A HONDA CIVIC TYPE R I LOVE YOU

The air cooled 911 train left *years* ago. Fuck it off, buy a cayman if you want a Porsche. They’re old enough that they’ve gotten cheap *but* they’re young enough you could just drive it and look after it for a long time. You won’t be looking at 15k top end rebuilds within a year of buying it. Cars should be driven, not garaged and restored as soon as a gasket leaks

So around 5:00 he said "and they're worth it" which means to me that is indeed worth it.

I solved your problem by buying our 87 911 30 years ago, been fine ever since… 🤣

I don't even like orange. But those wheels there boy. Wooo!

Lol - best air cooled - keeping it real - Porsche reviews ever

The beautiful thing about aircooled Porsche is like buying a Harley, you buy it because you love getting your hands dirty with it

I just drove a 993 C2 and man did it feel slow and clunky

As this is my dream car I do be grinding to get it one day anyway

I’d watch Alex get that tattoo.

top right (brown ish) wheel?

What gold wheels are those by your head?

They do look slow but there almost identical to the Volkswagen Beetle which is *Nostalgic*

If you don't have any mechanical ability dont buy one unless you can afford it ,working on them is part of it to me long trips require preparation and watching the weather forecast for carb tunning at your destination and in the end some kid in a turbo honda will blow your doors off with the ac on and he just does oil changes .

What are the red wheels on the left?

6:18.. Nah I'm rolling. I'm listening tho.