How to Adjust Porsche 911 Litronic Headlights for Continental Driving

How to adjust Porsche headlights for driving abroad? What is the O & T Setting on Porsche Litronic Headlights

If you have a UK Porsche 911 (996 Model) Carrera that has litronic headlights then you can adjust the headlight beam to be able to drive on the right side of the road for using your Porsche in Continental Europe without needing to buy special headlamp stickers to cover parts of the light.

There is a switch within the Litronic headlight unit that switches from O (default, Own Country) to T (Tourist) setting and alters the headlight aim to avoid blinding oncoming drivers when using the Porsche 996 in Europe. However this setting within the Litronic headlight unit does reduce down the light output.

When I came to make this adjustment to my Porsche 996 Carrera I found that the Litronic units were already set to the T (Tourist) mode rather than the default for the UK. It would explain why I thought that the lights weren't that bright for night driving as the beam was being partially obscurred by the internal mechanism. Video of removing Porsche 996 litronic headlights and adjustment settings


Tool to remove Porsche 996 Litronic headlight units



How to Adjust Porsche 911 Litronic Headlights for Continental Driving



Access to remove Porsche Litronic headlight unit



Headlight removed showing spindle that turns to hold Litronic headlight in place

At some point a previous owner has presumably driven in Europe but forgotten to reset the lights to the O setting on their return so as soon as I get back switching the Litronic units from T to O will be the first thing on my To Do list!


Adjust Porsche 911 Litronic Headlights for Continental Driving



How to Adjust Porsche 911 Litronic Headlights for Continental Driving

Porsche 911 Carrera Long Term Ownership Costs

How much does it cost to run a 996 Porsche 911 Carrera? What is the long term cost of Ownership for a Porsche - Servicing and Maintenance?

Having bought our 2001 Porsche 911 Carrera 2 (996 model) that has full service history and all receipts for the last 10 years I thought it would be interesting to see how much it has cost to run over that time.



How much does it cost to own/run a Porsche 911 Carrera?

Depreciation over the last 10 years has been £35,000 - luckily that makes the Porsche 911 996 model quite a good buy at present in my opinion. Some are now around the £8000 mark (Aug 2013) but they are likely to have patchy service history or need some major maintenance.

The total servicing and maintenance costs over that time were £22,000. That brings a total cost of ownership for the 996 model Porsche 911 Carrera of £57,000 over a 10 year period. I'm hoping that the costs to run it over the next 10 years will be substantially less than that!!

The £5,700 annual cost of owning/running a Porsche 911 doesn't include fuel costs. The car has travelled 70,000 miles over that 10 year period which assuming a generous 25mpg fuel economy would equate to 2800 gallons of petrol, in litres 12740 litres. Assuming the current fuel price (obviously it was much cheaper back in 2003) this would cost £17,836.

Adding this to the maintenance and depreciation costs gives a total figure of £74,836. There are some estimates in this (fuel for example) but this is an approximate value that you could use to estimate the ownership costs of buying a new or nearly new Porsche 911.

Ownership costs for a used Porsche 911 will be much lower, not least because the depreciation element is dramatically reduced if not totally eliminated.

Porsche 911 (Model 996) Carrera 2 Coupe Purchase Inspection Costs

When buying my Porsche 996 Carrera 2 Coupe I took a friend who is a mechanic with me to inspect the various Porsche 911 models that I was looking at. I did consider a Pre-Purchase Inspection but having used a list of common issues & faults with the 996 model of the Porsche Carrera as part of our checks I decided not to do so. I will list the checks we carried out for the Porsche 911 (996 Carrera)  as part of another blog post.

Having bought the car I wanted to get an oil change carried out as the previous owner had only done very low mileage over the last 3 years but with 18 months since the previous service I decided that an oil change would be worthwhile.

I spoke to a number of Porsche specialists in the Kent and Sussex area but I was extremely impressed when speaking to Precision Porsche on the phone who are based near Uckfield in East Sussex. I booked the car for an oil change but also for them to check for any issues that they could see while the Carrera 2 Coupe was on the ramp. They were as helpful in person as on the phone and came for a road test in the car to check that all was driving as expected - fortunately it was!

They carried out a very comprehensive check of the car and provided a list of issues they identified, none of which were major and many would only be spotted by a Porsche dealer or Porsche specialist such as Coolant Cap being an old part number. Apparently he Porsche 996 Carrera Coolant cap has been superceded by an improved part that has better resistance to leaking but on this vehicle it had not been replaced.

The biggest expense of the service was the cost of the Mobil 1 (0W/40W) oil - unlike some other cars of similar engine capacity the Porsche 996 Carrera 2 takes nearly 9 litres of oil which with the dreaded VAT came to approx £100 for oil alone. On a related note Halfords had an offer on today with 30% off Mobil 1 oils so I picked up 5 litres for £34.99 to keep for top up.

We are now working through the list of items Precision Porsche identified and resolving them - some will require a visit back to Precision Porsche and others are things we will sort ourselves. While waiting to collect the Porsche 996 Carrera Coupe from them we spotted some very nice examples of older Porsche 911s waiting outside - this lovely 993 coupe and two 911 models from the 1980s.



Porsche 911 (Model 996) Carrera 2 Coupe Purchase Inspection Costs

Porsche 996 Shell VPower Petrol - Does it improve the driving?

After using standard unleaded in the Porsche 911 Carrera last week I managed to get to a Shell filling station and fill up with the new V-Power Nitro+ super unleaded. So far the results are very impressive. It isn't instant as the engine needs to get used to the higher grade of fuel but after 10-15 minutes or so the engine seems much smoother at tickover in traffic and does also feel more responsive on the throttle when accelerating from lower revs.

Porsche 911 First Drive - Initial Impressions of a 996 Carrera 2 Coupe

We bought the Porsche 911 (manual 996 model Carrera 2 registered in 2001) so I thought I would give some impressions of the drive after the first few trips in the car.

A lot of professional reviews remark that the Porsche 911 / 996 model has lost a lot of its character with the introduction of the water cooled engine compared to the previous air cooled 993 model. My experience is that the 996 Porsche still has bags of feel and a distinctive engine note that is unlike any other car I have owned. The 911 Carrera still has more than enough character for me!



Porsche 911 Carrera Coupe - interior photo

The seats are very supportive and comfortable with driving position adjustable for height and steering wheel also adjusting for rake not reach.


Porsche 911 First Drive - Initial Impressions of a 996 Carrera 2 Coupe

The instrument cluster is dominated by the rev counter with the analogue speed readout taking a secondary position to the left. There is a digital speed reading directly below the rev counter.

2001 Porsche 911 Carrera 2 Coupe in silver

Side shot of the 2001 Porsche 911 Carrera 2 Coupe in silver. This model has the manual gearbox rather than the more common Tiptronic auto box.

At startup you get the distinctive noise of the flat six engine and exhaust. Gear selection in the manual version can be stiff at startup but is much smoother once the engine has warmed up. The gearbox oil is due for a change very soon so it will be interesting to see how much difference that makes to the gear shift.

Once you are on the open road or motorway the performance from the 911's 3.4 litre engine is stunning. With 300 bhp on tap and a 0 to 60 speed of 5.2 seconds the car feels as quick as it appears on paper. The engine and exhaust sound add to the sense of speed even at lower speeds in town. The acceleration is effortless but you always know that the engine is there - unlike some other cars that are now so quiet that you barely can hear any noise from the engine even at motorway speeds.

The steering is very sharp and amazing how responsive it is - you only need a slight turn of the wheel on the motorway to be able to change lanes. The ride on the M030 sports suspension is hard but the Porsche 911 is a sports car so you expect that!

Overall the driving experience in the Porsche 911 has been everything I expected. The only item that has slightly surprised me is the difference in gear change between the car being cold and warmed up after a journey. I understand from friends with other sports cars that this is normal behaviour but it is noticeably different from driving my VW Golf!

Porsche 911 Unleaded Petrol Feedback - Difference Using Super 98 or Normal 95 Fuel in the Carrera 996 Model

The Owners Manual for the Porche 911 Carrera states that it should be run on Super Unleaded 98RON fuel but can also be run on normal unleaded 95RON.

I needed to fill up today and the petrol station had no super unleaded so I had to use 95 octane normal unleaded.

So what is the difference using normal or super unleaded petrol in a Porsche 911? I tend to use Shell V-Power petrol as there are so many reports of benefits from it as well as the research that Shell carry out.

In terms of performance there seems little difference between the two types of unleaded petrol although the Owner's manual seems to suggest that performance will be reduced with the 95 RON fuel. The biggest difference that I seemed to notice was that the engine was more noisy, less responsive and economy seemed lower than normal - the fuel guage was dropping much faster than the journey home from collecting the car.

Only time will tell how much variation there is between the two fuels but I do intend to use Shell V-Power where possible.

Porsche 996 Keyfob Not Working

If the key for your Porsche 911 (996 model) is no longer opening the car remotely the battery may well need replacement. The battery for the Porsche 996 keyfob is a 2032 code flat cell battery.

I found this blog that helpfully shows how to replace the battery in the keyfob of a Porsche 911 Carrera so that you can again open the car remotely.

http://lancej.blogspot.co.uk/2007/12/porsche-key-remote-battery-replacement.html