Tourist Delivery - Day 2

OK, I'm back. It's 1:00am in Deutschland and I have an internet connection and some time to write. So here we go.......

Day two was a mixture for us. We started early, still jet lagged, but we got some much needed sleep last night. I woke up around 8:00 am (by alarm clock) because I wanted to be lucid when Mr. Heinisch called to tell me what they found wrong in my car. He said we would get a call some time between 8:00 - 9:00. Well, 10:00 came and still no call. I'm getting nervous and Ina is getting anxious. Finaly we decide to go get some breakfast to pass some time. We got one block from the hotel before my phone rang. By the time I got it out of my pocket, the call was gone, and there was no caller ID tag. Damn, we missed it. So we immediately turned around and headed back to the hotel to see if we had a message there.

Back up in the room, no message, now Ina is pissed (Ina never gets pissed). She tells me, "This is crazy. We're not waiting any more, we're calling them." I got Mr. Heinisch on the phone and he seemed very surprised that I had not yet been contacted. He told me, "Please...., I will call you back in 5 minutes, no longer, I promise." We hang up. Minutes later, he calls back and tells me that he has great news. They found the problem, a defective slave cylinder, a one hour job, and they have already replaced it. He tells me that the car is ready and that he will send a car for us. I ask him, "Are you absolutely sure?". He says, "Yes, we have extensively test driven the car and everything is perfect now."

Twenty minutes later, we get a call from the front desk, "Hello, there is a Mr. Florbach here for you." We head down and are greeted by a very nice guy named Nicko Florbach. He is well dressed, very polite and he leads us to a Cayenne Turbo waiting outside. We stuff our luggage into the back and we are off. Very nice guy, very friendly and talkative, very apologetic. He squeezed the power on a couple of times, and I have to say, that freaking SUV took off. Anyway, he brings us back to the service center, where they restore vintage Porsches, race cars and so on. There is a Carrera GT out there, along with a pristine 356 (don't know the year) and lots of other cars. It's obvious that his is not your average service department. I glance into the back, and I spot my baby right away. It's the bright red one among the sea of black and grey Porsches. Amazing how the Guards Red stands out among a crowd.

We are greeted by the manager, who's English is not that great, but he tells us that they need a few minutes to bring the car out (which I can see, because it is obviosly burried in Porsches) and he invites us to an espresso, cappuccino, sparkling water, etc.... Nicko takes us to the building next door for a beverage as they are bringing my car out.

During our cappuccino, I tell Nicko that I am concerned about towing damage. I tell him that I didn't like seeing those straps around my wheels like that and would like to inspect them for scratches or damage. He say, "Yes, of course. Please, have a look at it when it comes out. If anything is damaged we will surely replace it" as if any other course of action would be ridiculous.

A few minutes later, the Manager comes back and tells us, "The car is ready." We walk outside and there it is. I hit the ground and inspect the wheels like you can't believe. Amazing, not even a micro scratch. And the car looks better than it did when I picked it up. They have removed every finger print and bug. This was way beyond a wash job. They detailed the damn thing. OK, so we put our luggage in the car, bid farewell to Nicko and off we go.

Instantly, from the very first shift, I can tell that the shifter is all together different. That heavy super notchy shifter I talked about on day 1 was gone. Obviously an indicator that something was wrong from the very beginning. This thing is shifting like a premium sports car should now and the sport shifer is now showing it's value. Very nice. But I am still nervous, so I decide to stay close to Zuffenhausen for a nice test drive, just in case. We head over to Leonberg, a near by city that used to host a Formula 1 road race. We drove through town looking for those roads, finally asked someone to help us find them, and we did. There was a very windy road that was very cool, but the car was still too new to me and we were dealing with a little traffic. But the car was still shifting very nicely. We decide to carry on.

Folks, I can't begin to convey how nicely we were treated by everyone at Porsche. It was absolutely amazing and a big part of why I didn't go nuclear. They were all just so damn nice and sympathetic. Top notch customer service, unlike anything I have ever seen in the states.

OK, I need to share my planned break in procedure for you to understand our day. We all know what the manual calls for, keep it under 4,200 for 2,000 miles (3,000 km). Well, when we were taking delivery of our cars, I overheard the delivery specialist discussing break in with Jim, the guy I met who was picking up his Boxster. He told that he should keep it under 5,000 RPM for the first 1,000 km, and then the car is ready to go. He also told Jim that he should feel free to run the car through the gears, all the way to 7,000 very briefly if he wanted to, but not to allow the engine to spend any sustained time above 5,000 for the first 1,000 km.

When my car was delivered to me, I was told the same thing by my delivery specialist. I asked Harald why this was different from the procedure in the manual and he said that most people don't follow instructions very well so they make the recommendation very conservative hoping the result will be 5,000 for 1,000 km. OK, debate away.

The manual says one thing, the Porsche rep says another, and the people in the know say something else. The one thing that everyone agrees on is:

• Continually vary the engine speed
• Warm the engine properly before driving, especially before hard driving
• No short trips, bring it up to temp
• Never labor or lug the engine
• Take it easy (in some way) for the first X miles

I have rebuilt several motorcycle engines, a couple of car engines, and I know a thing or two about how they work. I understand most of these recommendations, but I have never understood a fixed RPM limit that is tied to a specific mileage. It makes no sense to me. Do you mean to tell me that a Porsche Cayman with 1,900 miles on it will be damaged by 6,000 RPMs, but one with 2,001 miles on it is ready to hit 7,000? What happens inside that engine on that 1,999th mile to prepare the engine for 3,000 more RPM? That's crazy. It's like over sheltering a child. If you protect them from everything, and then turn them loose on the world at 18, you are going to have big problems.

I will follow the bullet points above, no questions asked. But I am going to stray a little on the RPM limit. Here is how I am going to break MY Cayman in.

I will adhere to the 4,200 RPM limit with 0 miles on the odometer. Then, I will continuously raise my RPM limit over the next 3,000 km. I will set my limit to 4,200 + the odometer reading (in km). This will progressively prepare my engine for high RPMs and not go from low to high RPMs like a light switch. Using this method, I will not reach 7,000 RPMs until I have 2,800 km on the clock (1,750 miles).

So, right now I have 856 km on the clock. That means I have worked my way up to 5,056 RPMs. And I have been progressively pushing the limit a little further with every km.