Quote:Doubtful that Porsche would consider producing a part which has almost no history of failure. The two cases Jay highlighted are not necessarily indicative of an absolute defect of the tensioner itself without contributing factors ( improper tensioning or subsequent adjustment of the balance belt after replacement, neglect in checking the proper function and lubrication of the rollers and other components, etc etc at least thats what Porsche would argue ) . Heck, they didnt even want to take responsibility for the pinion bearing failure which was a very well documented factory tolerance setting error and affecting numerous cars, so I do t see them being too worried about overall brand reputation if a few 968s here and there disappear off the roadways because of NLA parts . If they were 911s , thatd be a different story . But hey, I do hope that Im wrong and Porsche will be convinced to remake this, and any other critical parts for which there are no alternatives and can render the cars useless, although I doubt theyre worried about their reputation if that happens to a few 968s..
As I posted above, according to my guesstimate, Porsche had 5,000 spare tensioners in stock at one time. 30 years later, theyre NLA. Given there were only ~13,000 968s ever made, going through 5,000 spares in 30 years leads me to discount the almost no history of failure bit.
Mine technically didnt fail. It was replaced during a routine belt change because it was seized. I suspect many were replaced like mine was, or simply as part of routine maintenance.
I wish Id have kept my bad one, it would be an ideal core to send it to the guy on eBay thats rebuilding them, as a trial.
