911 (996 Carrera)

Why Porsche built a 911 out of Boxster parts

By the mid-1990s Porsche was losing money on three separate car lines and its air-cooled flat-six could not meet the emissions and noise rules coming its way. August Achleitner, who ran vehicle concepts from 1989 to 2000, put it plainly in Porsche's 25th anniversary release: the company needed a cheaper car for volume, which led to the Boxster and the 996 sharing parts. The program was sized to sell at least 30,000 of the two cars a year with a good return. Under chief designer Harm Lagaay, Pinky Lai's 996 was built identically to the Boxster from the nose to the B-pillar, down to a headlight module that combined five functions in one cheap unit. The Boxster launched in 1996, the 996 was shown at Frankfurt in 1997, and Porsche sold more than 30,000 a year, roughly 175,000 in all.

1999-2001: the 3.4 and the cable throttle

The 996 Carrera arrived in the United States for the 1999 model year as a coupe and a Cabriolet, the first 911 with no air-cooled engine behind it. The M96 made 296 hp and 258 lb-ft, 24 hp and 15 lb-ft more than the 993, in a car PCA puts around 2,900 lb as an early manual coupe. Road & Track and Car and Driver both recorded 4.6 seconds to 60 mph. MotorWeek tested a 1999 Cabriolet at $75,225 and 5.0 seconds and noted the plastic rear window, replaced by heated glass for 2002. The 1999 car is the only 996 with a throttle cable; electronic throttle for 2000 brought 300 hp and the option of Porsche Stability Management. The narrow-body Carrera 4 followed about six months after the Cabriolet; its coupe ended after 2001. The press turned on the headlights within months, to the designers' surprise.

2001: the Turbo brings a different engine

The Turbo reached North America for the 2001 model year with the Carrera 4's viscous coupling moved into the front differential, which for the first time allowed a Tiptronic Turbo. Its engine was not an M96 but the Mezger flat-six from the Le Mans-winning 911 GT1, its intermediate shaft on pressure-fed plain bearings, rated at 415 hp and, by MotorWeek's figures, 415 lb-ft. MotorWeek ran it to 60 mph in 4.1 seconds and a 12.6-second quarter at 112 mph, at $111,000 base. From 2002 the X50 power kit with larger turbochargers and intercoolers gave 450 hp and 457 lb-ft. A Turbo Cabriolet came for 2004 and the Turbo S, with X50, carbon-ceramic brakes and a CD changer standard, for 2005.

2002: 3.6 liters, new lights, Targa and Carrera 4S

Displacement rose to 3,596 cc for 320 hp and 273 lb-ft, the body gained thicker-gauge metal in places, and the front end took the Turbo's Bi-Xenon headlights and a reshaped nose. MotorWeek's 2002 Carrera ran 5.0 seconds to 60 mph at $67,900 base. Two new bodies arrived: the Targa, with a sliding glass roof and a rear window that opened as a hatch, at $75,965 and about 150 lb over the coupe, and the Carrera 4S, the 3.6 and all-wheel drive in the Turbo's wide body with its brakes and 18-inch wheels, at $80,965. MotorWeek's C4S and Targa test prints 315 hp for both, five fewer than PCA gives the same engine, which no fetched source explains. A Carrera 4S Cabriolet followed for 2004.

2004: 1,963 silver cars and the end

For the 40th year of the 911 Porsche built 1,963 numbered Carrera coupes in GT Silver Metallic with gray leather, the Turbo front bumper, the X51 power kit at 345 hp by Stuttcars' figure (345 PS in Porsche's release), sport suspension, a limited-slip differential and a manual gearbox only, at $90,565. The 997 replaced the Carrera for 2005; a handful of Carrera 4S were sold as 2005 cars and the Turbo, Turbo S, GT2 and GT3 ran into 2005 and 2006. The GT3, which the US received only for the 2004 model year, and the GT2 are on the separate 911 GT3 (996) page.

The intermediate shaft bearing is the fault that defines the car. The M96 drives its camshafts through an intermediate shaft on a sealed ball bearing, revised three times: a dual row through 1999 and in some 2000 and 2001 engines, a smaller single row with significantly less load capacity from 2000 through 2005, and a larger non-serviceable bearing from 2006. Eisen class action documents cited by LN Engineering put the single-row failure rate at about 8 percent against under 1 percent for the dual row; LN's own projection is 10 percent by 90,000 miles. PCA's tech expert counters that nine of ten original bearings never fail, while conceding that the market prices them as if they will. A failure contaminates the whole engine. Prevention is a retrofit with the engine in the car: LN Engineering prices its ceramic retrofit under $1,000 and the oil-fed IMS Solution under $2,000 for parts, plus 10 to 14 hours of labor adding $500 to $3,000 or more at a US shop, and three to four more hours to borescope the cylinders first. The Turbo, GT2 and GT3 engines run their intermediate shaft on pressure-fed plain bearings and, as PCA states, did not suffer IMS failures. Rear main seal leaks: Wikipedia attributes chronic early cases to improper machining and says the current PTFE seal addresses most of them. Bore scoring and cracked cylinders on both the 3.4 and 3.6 are the other engine-out fault; some early 3.4 blocks left the factory sleeved and a slipped sleeve is a known failure. Water pumps and air-oil separators fail. No fetched US source prices a bore-scoring repair.

The first question on any M96 car is what has been done about the intermediate shaft bearing. A 1999 car has the dual row; a 2002-2004 car the single row; a 2000 or 2001 car could have either, and the only way to know is to look with the transmission out. A retrofit receipt names the kit (LN's ceramic retrofit, the IMS Solution plain bearing, or a Pelican kit) and should sit beside clutch, rear main seal and often air-oil separator invoices from the same visit. LN advises borescoping the cylinders before a retrofit, so a retrofitted car may have a record of its bores. Anything leaking from the bottom of the engine and gearbox, coolant or oil, is a walk-away in PCA's guide. Blue smoke on startup points at the air-oil separator. Cabriolets built through 2001 have a plastic rear window that clouds and cracks; 2002 and later cars have heated glass. On the Turbo there is no IMS exposure; PCA's checklist asks for corrosion checks, suspension on lowered cars and a diagnostic run on Tiptronic cars. A production specification settles X50 on a Turbo and X51 on a 2004 car. A DME over-rev report is standard on any manual 996. Headlights are the easy check: Boxster-shared units to 2001, Turbo-style Bi-Xenons from 2002.

All figures are US dollars, as of September 2026; classic.com figures came through a rendering fetch. classic.com benchmarks the 996.1 Carrera at $27,600, with manual coupes at $30,207 and Tiptronic cars at $22,057 to $22,270; its lowest recorded sale is $4,600 on January 18, 2026. It benchmarks the 996.2 Carrera 4S at $38,515; the only 4S sale fetched directly is RM Sotheby's $49,280 for an 11,700-mile 2004 Cabriolet in St. Louis in 2019. The Turbo page shows 679 sales averaging $60,721, from $23,425 to $182,047; no individual lot was fetched. Turbo S: classic.com's average is $83,050 across 88 sales with a $229,600 top; rows include $119,000 for a 19,000-mile manual coupe on June 7, 2025, $85,000 for a 13,000-mile manual cabriolet on June 10, 2025, $59,000 for a 66,000-mile cabriolet on June 3, 2025 and $70,496 for a 27,000-mile Tiptronic coupe on April 29, 2025. RM Sotheby's sold a 13,000-mile 2005 Turbo S Cabriolet for $112,000 in Atlanta in 2018. 40th Anniversary: benchmark $45,703; Bring a Trailer results of $66,666 (14,000 miles, June 24, 2026), $50,500 (53,000 miles, June 26, 2026), $54,444 (41,000 miles, February 19, 2026) and $40,299 (37,000 miles, March 31, 2026), $55,000 at Barrett-Jackson West Palm Beach on April 18, 2026 with 28,000 miles, $63,250 on PCARMARKET on February 26, 2026 with 13,000 miles, $36,333 on Cars and Bids with 98,000 miles, and a 59,070-mile car with a fresh IMS bearing at $40,500 on PCARMARKET, undated. No 996.2 Carrera result was fetched.