Free guide · 2008–⁠2012 · direct-injection flat six · 345–⁠385 PS

Porsche 911 Carrera 997.2: what to check before you buy

What this car is, and the six questions that decide whether the one you are looking at is a good buy.

Last Real Engines · updated 19 October 2026

In this guide · 6 chapters

1. Who built it, and what they built
2. The six questions that decide whether this car is a good buy
3. Which years, which specification
4. What it is worth
5. What it is actually like to own one
6. The buying guide — €24

Who built it, and what they built

From the outside it is the 997 you already know: the round headlights, the shape, the engine behind the rear axle. Underneath, the 911 Carrera that went on sale in July 2008 has a new engine. Porsche's US press kit said it plainly: although both engines "carry the same displacement designation as their immediate predecessors, both are substantially different than last year's." CAR magazine's first drive opened with the same thought: "Same-again styling hides some great technical innovations."

This guide covers that car, the second-generation 997 Carrera family, which people call the 997.2: Carrera and Carrera S, Carrera 4 and Carrera 4S, as Coupé and Cabriolet, plus the Targa 4 and Targa 4S. Porsche launched it at Germany's 85 Porsche Centres on Saturday 5 July 2008, starting with the rear-wheel-drive Carrera and Carrera S coupés and cabriolets. Porsche had presented it to more than 800 journalists a month before, at its development centre in Weissach. In the US the same cars are the 2009 model year and went on sale in September 2008; the Carrera 4 and 4S followed there on 25 October 2008, and the Targa 4 and 4S in the autumn. Porsche gives 2012 as the last year of the 997.

The engine

Two flat-six engines, water-cooled and naturally aspirated, both with Direct Fuel Injection (DFI):

• Carrera, Carrera 4, Targa 4: 3,614 cc, 345 PS (254 kW) at 6,500 rpm, 390 Nm at 4,400 rpm
• Carrera S, Carrera 4S, Targa 4S: 3,800 cc, 385 PS (283 kW) at 6,500 rpm, 420 Nm at 4,400 rpm

Both rev to 7,500 rpm and both have a compression ratio of 12.5:1. Porsche's US kit gives the gain over the engines they replaced as "from 325 to 345 PS" for the 3.6 and "from 355 to 385 PS" for the 3.8.

Direct injection, and what "first" means here. Direct injection means what it says: in Porsche's words, the fuel goes "directly into the combustion chamber rather than in the intake port." Porsche's claim was "for the first time in a Porsche sports car, the engines boast a direct fuel injection system." The words sports car matter: Porsche's UK release adds that DFI had been "standard on the Cayenne V-engines since 2007." The injector sits between the two intake valves and works at up to 120 bar. Direct injection allowed the higher compression ratio, up from 11.3:1 on the old 3.6 and 11.8:1 on the old 3.8, and it let Porsche drop the secondary-air injection into the exhaust. Porsche's UK release says the engines are six kilograms lighter than before and "outperform EU5 emissions regulations."

A new engine, not a revised one. Porsche lists the changes: a two-piece crankcase with the crankshaft bearings built in, where the old engine had a four-piece case with a separate bearing housing; a closed deck instead of an open one, which Porsche says "increases stability and durability while helping reduce oil consumption and friction"; new one-piece cylinder heads that carry the camshaft bearings; and smaller, lighter valve tappets, which allowed the red line to rise "from the previous 7300 rpm to 7500 rpm." VarioCam Plus, Porsche's "intake valve timing and lift system", stayed.

The oil system, and no dipstick. The engine has what Porsche calls an integrated dry sump: "The oil reservoir is located inside the engine, making an external tank unnecessary." The pressure pump matches how much oil it delivers to what the engine needs. And there is no dipstick: "an electronic monitor measures the oil level and displays the result on the instrument cluster."

And the one thing everybody has heard of

If you have read about any water-cooled 911, you have read about the IMS, the intermediate shaft, and the bearing at its end. The reputation belongs to the engine before this one: the car magazine evo names "a bearing at the end of the intermediate shaft that drives the camshafts" and scored cylinder bores as "the two known issues with the gen-1 997 (2004-2008) flat-six."

Here is what Porsche says about this engine, in its own 2009 press kit:

"Further weight and complexity are saved through the elimination of the intermediate shaft needed to drive the timing chains on the old engines. Thanks to new, highly resistant timing chains, that shaft is not needed."

Read it closely, because the precise words are worth more than the folklore. Porsche says the shaft is gone. It does not mention the bearing, and it never presents this as the answer to a problem. The statement is about the direct-injection Carrera engine: the 997.2 Turbo has its own engine, which Porsche's US material calls entirely new, and Porsche describes the GT3's as "based on the famous GT1." Neither is in this guide.

What it does mean is that the first question every buyer of the earlier car has to ask does not arise here, because there is no intermediate shaft. Other questions move up, and the one we would put first is how the engine has been revved: in Porsche's own words, the engine's control unit stores over-revs. Chapter 14 starts there.

The gearbox

A six-speed manual was standard. The option was new: PDK, Porsche's seven-speed double-clutch gearbox — in Porsche's own description, two manual gearboxes combined in one unit, each with its own clutch. Porsche's UK release: "The new generation 911 is available for the first time with the new Porsche Doppelkupplungsgetriebe (PDK)." It "replaces the Porsche Tiptronic S automatic transmission previously offered on the Carrera and Carrera S", weighs 10 kg less than the Tiptronic S, and "shifts gears up to 60 per cent faster than a conventional automatic transmission." The idea came from racing: Porsche's own history names the 962 as "the first racing car with PDK", a winner at Monza in 1986.

The steering-wheel controls are the thing the testers argued about. CAR: "you push the switch away to climb the gears, pull towards you to drop back down. You'll get used to it, but it's just not as intuitive as rival systems." evo, looking back in its used-car guide, calls the sports steering wheel "with the optional paddles, rather than the wheel-mounted 'buttons'" a must.

Four-wheel drive, and the Targa

The Carrera 4 and 4S dropped the viscous coupling of the earlier car for PTM, Porsche Traction Management, an electronically controlled multi-plate clutch that sends drive to the front axle as needed — a system, in Porsche's words, "originally developed for the Porsche 911 Turbo." A mechanical locking rear differential became standard on the four-wheel-drive cars. The body is wider: Porsche's brochure gives "an extra 44 mm at the rear wings." You can tell a Carrera 4 from behind by the reflector strip between the rear lights.

The Targa 4 and 4S are four-wheel drive only. The roof is glass, 1.54 square metres of it in two parts: a sliding front section that, when fully open, slides "within seven seconds beneath the tailgate", and a rear window that is hinged "and can open like a hatch, making the Targa 4 and Targa 4S the only cars in the 911 model range with this feature," as Porsche's US kit put it.

How many there are

Porsche gives one figure: 213,004 cars of the type 997 between 2004 and 2012. That is the whole generation — the first series, the Turbos and the GT cars included — and we found no figure from Porsche for the 997.2 Carrera family alone. Elferspot, a Porsche marketplace and magazine, gives 15,146 Carrera and 35,570 Carrera S for the 997.2, with rear-wheel drive, four-wheel drive and Targa combined, but does not say where the numbers come from. Treat them as an indication, not a count.

How the figures in this guide work

How much work each job is, not what it costs. Every point in the buying guide carries an effort level — an hour or two, half a day, a day, two or three days, or a week or more in the workshop — plus a line saying whether the money sits in the part or in getting to it.

There are no prices, and that is deliberate. What a job costs depends on which country you are in and which workshop you walk into, so a figure we cannot verify is worse than no figure. If you want an amount, ask any workshop one question — what is your hourly rate? — and every effort level in the buying guide becomes your own number, in your own currency.

None of this is advice about one particular car, because we have not seen the car you are looking at. Have every one of them inspected before you buy, by someone who knows this engine.

The six questions that decide whether this car is a good buy

These cars are now fourteen to eighteen years old, and on this one a piece of paper from a Porsche Centre or a specialist tells you more than the paint does. Six questions.

1 · Has anyone read the over-rev log — and will the seller let you see it?

Porsche's own service information, whose header names the Carrera and Carrera S, says it in one line: "Overspeed events are stored in the DME control unit" — the engine's control unit. It keeps a record of how often the engine went past its permitted speed, and Porsche itself uses that record when it judges engine damage and warranty claims. The stakes are in the same document: among the possible results of over-revving, Porsche lists damaged valves and pistons, cracked timing chains and changed timing. On a manual car Porsche names one cause in particular: "changing to the wrong gear." evo's used-car advice for any Porsche sports car is that "having the systems checked for over-revs and the car's true mileage should be standard fare." A car with no intermediate shaft still has a memory, and it is evidence no test drive can give you.

2 · The recalls and campaigns — done, and can somebody show you?

Few apply to these cars, which makes the ones that do easy to overlook. Porsche ran a workshop campaign on the clutch pedal switch of manual cars, which it says "is scope specific to the VIN", and a US campaign to replace the high-pressure fuel injectors of some 2009 model-year cars because, in the words of the US summary, defective injectors "may have been installed." There is a US recall for seat-belt anchor plates on cars built in a short window in 2011, and a British recall on the Carrera 4 and 4S whose build dates the record does not give. Germany's motoring club ADAC lists no recalls for the 997 in its database. Whether this car is included is a question for its VIN, the vehicle identification number, and a Porsche Centre can answer it.

3 · How was it driven — and how was it warmed up?

We found no Porsche document that treats seized or scored cylinders as a known fault of this engine, other than as a possible result of over-revving. Hartech, a British Porsche specialist, does write about it: it calls it "a much more infrequent occurrence" than the bore scoring of the older engines, and says the failures it has seen are "very small in number." What it adds is the reason this question is here: all the ones it saw happened "in cold weather and with drivers admitting that they impatiently drove flat out very soon after setting off." FCP Euro, a US parts specialist, warns of the same thing. A car that was allowed to warm up before it was used hard has had a different life from one that was not.

4 · What oil, how often — and is the engine dry?

There is no dipstick, so the owner's habit of checking the level on the instrument cluster is part of the history. Porsche's retrospective gives these engines "an extended service interval of 30,000 km" (about 18,600 miles); we found no Porsche oil-consumption limit for the car. Elferspot's buyer's guide calls the engines reliable but says "you should keep an eye on the oil consumption and even more on the engine case for leaks." Invoices with the oil, the date and the mileage on them are the evidence.

5 · Manual or PDK — and what has the gearbox had?

Both are well regarded: evo calls the manual robust and PDK "reportedly very sturdy too". But each has its own paperwork. On PDK Carrera and Carrera S models Porsche issued a repair instruction for a fault that shows the message "Gearbox emergency operation", and Elferspot says the gearbox benefits from its oil being changed sooner than Porsche specifies. On manual cars there is the clutch pedal switch campaign from question 2. Either way, the question is what has been done, and whether there is an invoice for it.

6 · What is in front of the engine, and underneath it?

The engine is in the back; the radiators are not. evo warns that "the aircon condensers and coolant rads, which are behind the vents in the nose" can be prone to pinhole leaks. Elferspot points to the coolant lines, which "consist of many individual parts and different materials", to corroding exhaust clamps and manifold flanges, to dampers on which rust and leaks "are not uncommon", and to wishbones and strut mounts that do not last very long. None of these is the engine. Together, they can decide whether the first two years are quiet ones.

What the answers add up to

A car with a clean over-rev log, its campaigns done, a dry engine, a documented oil history and a front end that has been looked after is a car whose owner mostly faces the ordinary work of a sports car this age. A car without that evidence may be just as good — but you cannot tell, and the price should say so. ADAC, reporting Germany's TÜV inspections, says the 997 does "hervorragend" — excellently — with a defect rate far below average and no assembly that stands out. That is a statement about the generation. The six questions are about the car in front of you.

An answer only helps if you know what it means. The buying guide takes each of these six apart, adds the things that are simply fourteen to eighteen years old, and says for each one how much work it is, what tells you about it at a viewing, and whether it has to be done now, within a year or two, or can be left. It comes with a card you print and take with you, with the checks in the order you do them.

Which years, which specification

Year of build, model year, and which one you are being told. Porsche launched the car in Germany in July 2008; Porsche's own later texts say "July 2008" in one place and "autumn 2008" in another, and ADAC says August. In the US the same car is a 2009. So an American "2009 911" and a European "2008 911" can be the same car, and a European 2008 car can also be the one before it. For the end, Porsche says 2012; ADAC says 2013. We follow Porsche.

How to recognise one, in Porsche's words. "When viewed head on, the most notable differences are the new, horizontal covers for the BI-XENON™ headlights and the L.E.D. daytime running lights, which extend over the air inlets." From the side, "new, larger exterior mirrors with aerodynamic twin-arm mounts"; at the back, "all the lighting elements, save the Reversing lamp, are now light-emitting diodes." Inside, a touchscreen: Porsche's US release made PCM 3.0, "which includes a new touchscreen feature", standard on all new 911s. We found no Porsche description of a different engine lid, so we do not use the lid as a sign.

Which cars are not this car. The Turbo and the GT3 of the same years carry other engines and are outside this guide. Porsche lists the Carrera GTS, at 408 PS, as the car that "closed the gap between the Carrera S and the GT3"; it and the limited editions are not covered in detail here.

Standard and optional. PASM, Porsche Active Suspension Management — the adjustable dampers — is "fitted as standard in the S models and is optional for models with the 3.6-litre engine", and lowers the car by 10 mm. The PASM sports chassis was a further option, for coupés only and only with 19-inch wheels. On the US spec sheet the Carrera stands on 18-inch wheels (235/40 front, 265/40 rear) and the Carrera S on 19-inch (235/35 front, 295/30 rear). Sport Chrono Package Plus with PDK brought launch control; Elferspot adds that a PDK car without it has no Sport Plus mode.

The brakes tell you something, but not everything. Porsche fitted black callipers to the 3.6 cars and red ones to the S models. The ceramic brakes, PCCB (Porsche Ceramic Composite Brake), were "offered as an option for the entire model range", and Porsche says "PCCB systems are identified by their striking yellow brake callipers." Yellow paint can be applied by anyone. The original option list is the proof.

The engine code trap. Elferspot's buyer's guide calls this engine the MA1. None of the Porsche documents we found names the engine type; the one Porsche code that appears is 9A1, the prefix of its part numbers. For parts, search under the VIN, not under a name from a forum.

Beyond that, look for a car nobody has modified. Factory wheels, standard ride height and the original engine software are what you want. The exhaust is the exception: Elferspot writes that corrosion on clamps and manifold flanges means "many of these 911s no longer have their original exhaust system underneath", and that a good-quality replacement "need not be a disadvantage." What matters is that someone can tell you what was fitted, and why.

What it is worth

This is the hardest thing to establish on your own, and it does as much as anything to decide whether you buy well. We are not going to give you a price list — it varies by country and by month, and it would be out of date before you used it. We are going to give you the method.

On this car, the evidence sets the price. Two 997.2s with the same mileage can be very different cars: one with a recent read-out of the over-rev log, its campaigns done and every service on an invoice, and one with a stamped book and a story. That difference usually outweighs colour and specification. evo's used-car view is that "there really is no such thing as a 'cheap' one anymore", and that "Cabriolets and automatics will command a lower price, as will cars with higher miles or issues to sort." Elferspot says that on average the 997.2 costs noticeably more than the car before it, and puts part of that down to there being fewer of them.

There are three kinds of car for sale, and each one deserves a different offer.

The documented car. Full history, invoices tied to mileages, a Porsche Centre printout of the campaigns, a recent read-out of the over-rev log, and an owner who knows what was done and when. Asking price at the top of the market, usually justified.

The tidy car with no paperwork. Drives well, sounds right, and the owner says it has always been serviced. The hardest of the three, because what decides this car — how the engine has been revved and warmed up, what the gearbox has had, what is happening behind the nose — is exactly what you cannot judge on a test drive.

The project. Known faults, price adjusted to match. A car with a warning light and no diagnosis is not a project but an unknown.

How to set the three against each other. Take the asking price, work through the questions in this guide — and the lists in the buying guide, if you have it — and add up what is coming in the first two years. Call that the entry price, and compare entry prices rather than asking prices. Price coupé, cabriolet and Targa separately, and manual and PDK separately; a Carrera and a Carrera S are different cars to price as well.

Where to look: your country's big classified sites, the Porsche specialists, the marketplaces that specialise in Porsche, and the auction sites. Follow the market for a month before you go and see anything.

What it is actually like to own one

It is a compact, quick, rear-engined car that feels like a 911 from the first corner, and most of what the testers wrote comes back to that. CAR: "It's all still recognisably 911 inside that snug cockpit." evo calls the 997 "arguably the Goldilocks 911", and its writer John Barker went further for the whole generation: "last of the compact, narrow-body cars, last with HPAS" — hydraulic power steering.

It drives better than the car it replaced. CAR's first drive found that the changes to the suspension "have completely eliminated the old car's tendency to bob its nose up and down in response to changes in road surface and elevation", while "the 911's trademark steering remains intact." CAR's tester in a Carrera 4S PDK called it "technically one of the finest 911s yet."

The sound is where opinions part. Direct injection made the engines cleaner, and evo's later verdict is that it "was claimed to dull some of the typical raspy flat-six 911 character." evo's first drive in 2008: "It sounds like the free-breathing flat-six it is, but the colour has faded." CAR heard "that distinctive direct-injection rattle at idle, but you can't really hear it from inside the car", and found the 3.8 "harsh, gritty" until you really go for it — concluding that "there's still considerable appeal in the sweeter 3.6 litre engine hooked up to a manual gearbox."

Manual or PDK is a matter of temperament. CAR called PDK "the greatest dual-clutch gearbox we've yet tried" — and then, of the steering-wheel controls: "until they fix those paddles, we'll stick with the manual thanks." evo: "Technically yes, but some of the emotion is missing compared with a proper DIY manual." The website The Truth About Cars was blunter: "PDK stands for Porsche Delight Killer." Drive both before you decide.

Four-wheel drive is a real choice, not a compromise. evo's view is that the 997.2 Carrera 4S became "a fine driver's car in its own right", and that any four-wheel-drive 911 will be more usable more of the time in changeable weather — with the note that the four-wheel-drive cars "could go through front tyres with more of an appetite."

It is not thirsty for what it is. Porsche's own headline at launch was "under ten litres per 100 kilometers for the first time ever": 9.8 l/100 km for the Carrera Coupé with PDK. We found no long-term owner's figure to set beside it.

It is more practical than it looks. The US spec sheet gives the coupé 125 litres under the bonnet and 205 litres behind the front seats. The Targa's opening rear glass makes loading easier still. evo calls the Targa "arguably the black sheep of the 997 range", the 997 with "the highest centre of gravity", and notes that "time as ever has softened perceptions."

What it gives back. A naturally aspirated flat-six that revs to 7,500 rpm, hydraulic steering, a manual gearbox if you want one, and the shape everybody recognises — with an engine that its own maker called all-new. This guide does not treat it as an investment. It is a car you buy to drive.

The buying guide — €24

Everything above is what the car is. This is what you check.

Twelve faults that belong to this engine, taken apart one by one, with how much work each repair is and how to tell which of them you are looking at. Sixteen things that are simply fourteen to eighteen years old, every one with how much work it is, what tells you about it at a viewing, and whether it has to be done now, within a year or two, or not at all. What the sources say about corrosion and water on these cars — evo in 2025: "rust is not an issue with these cars yet" — and where the paint, the nose and the exhaust still deserve a look. What Porsche means when it says the intermediate shaft is "not needed", and how to read the over-rev log the engine keeps — Porsche's own six ranges, and what the gap to the hour meter tells you. The viewing in twelve steps, including the two moments that come only once. The sentences you say to the seller, and how to build an offer out of what you found.

And a card you print and take with you — sixty-seven lines, in the order you do them. That comes as a separate file, because nobody wants to print a whole guide to take a few pages to a car park.

This is what one of the sixteen looks like

1 · The power distributor, and the corroded pin

An hour or two to diagnose and fit the new pin · Cheap part, easy access

Porsche bulletin TI 41/14 covers "All 911 Carrera models (997)", "Model Year: As of 2005 up to 2012". The complaint is a vague one, which is exactly why it is worth knowing: "various malfunctions in the vehicle electrics (fault in PCM, failure of power windows or similar problems) or various error messages displayed in the instrument cluster." If the workshop finds "a corroded pin in the power distributor" as the cause, the pin is replaced with a modified one from a repair kit — pin, sealing ring, shrink-fit hose and mounting parts — not the whole distributor. The bulletin gives no labour time.

Leave it when the electrics behave. Now, as a diagnosis, if several unrelated electrical complaints turn up together — and the pin is worth checking before anybody starts replacing control units one by one.

And this is how the card reads

• 1 · Which car is it
• 2 · Round the outside, before anybody starts it
• 3 · The roof
• 4 · The engine lid, cold · engine off, key out
• 5 · The cold start · the seller starts it; nobody revs it
• 6 · The drive · gently until it is fully warm

What €24 buys, put next to what it saves

The rare cylinder seizure is a week or more in the workshop, with the engine out; a new engine wiring harness is two or three days. The cheapest check of all is a read-out of the over-rev log before you agree a price. The guide is €24. It will not stop any of that from being needed — but it does tell you which of them you are looking at before you agree a price, and that is the whole of the difference between paying for a car and paying for someone else's postponed maintenance.

Why there are no prices in it

Because a price we cannot verify is worse than no price, and because a price would be wrong for most of the people reading this anyway. Workshop rates across Europe differ widely, and so do parts prices. A quote from a specialist in one country tells you nothing in another.

What does not change is how much work a job is — that follows from what has to come off the car. So every point in the guide says whether it is an hour or two, half a day, a day, two or three days, or a week or more in the workshop, with a labour figure where a source gives one. And it says whether the money sits in the part or in getting to it, which is what lets you tell a fair quote from a bad one.

If you want a figure, ask any workshop one question — what is your hourly rate? — and every effort level in the guide becomes your own number, in your own currency. One question, and the answer is actually true for you.

How this guide was put together

Because you should know before you pay for it.

• Every fault and symptom comes from a source the guide names, the manufacturer's own documents first. The effort levels are our assessment, unless a source gives the hours.
• Where a bulletin is American, it says so; where a fault rests on one specialist — bore seizure, which Hartech calls very small in number — it says which one, and where we found nothing, it says that too.
• The effort of every job is counted item by item and checked against the list before every edition.
• It says as plainly what you can leave alone as what you have to do. Fourteen of the sixteen age points start from leave it.

Leave your email address at the checkout and both files arrive straight away: one guide and one card, as two pdfs. No subscription, no account.

Have every car inspected before you buy by someone who knows this engine. This is general information about the model and not advice about a specific car.

← The full Porsche 911 Carrera 997.2 guide