2002 911 Carrera 4S Coupe 6-Speed Modified

I’ve been following this 2002 911 Carrera 4S 6-speed closely all week as it has been upgraded with a 4.0-liter flat-six State 1 Performer engine from Flat Six Innovations, which in my opinion, is the ultimate fix for the 996’s bore scoring issues, and something I wish I did to my C4S years ago when I rebuilt the engine.

So what exactly is bore scoring? Due to how 996 and 997 engines were designed, the right bank of cylinders typically runs hotter than the left bank of cylinders which results in those cylinders becoming oval in shape and sheering off metal from the cylinder wall. This wear debris is hard and abrasive and circulates in the oil throughout all internal components, causing a multitude of collateral damage.

One “fix” for this issue is to literally throw away all of the mechanical parts typically affected by this issue, machine down the cylinder walls, and add LN Engineering’s “Nickies” aluminum Nikisil plated plated cylinders, which not only protect against bore scoring happening again, but also allow you to increase the displacement. And there’s no replacement for displacement. 😃

Our Spotlight car is one such 996 that has received this upgrade and is finished in Polar Silver Metallic over a Black Full Leather interior. It features 18″ Turbo-look wheels, Bilstein dampers, xenon headlights, a Kenwood head unit, and shows 95,000 miles on the odometer. The car shows typical wear for the mileage inside and out and has front end damage listed on the CarFax.

Had this been your typical 90k-mile C4S, I would have expected it to sell somewhere in the low to mid $30’s with the accident on the CarFax and wear. But, it hammered at a final bid of $42,996, definitely on the higher end of comps thanks to the Nickies build. With cost raging from $15-30k for the repair, I wouldn’t go buying a car in order to do the repair and then sell, but I’d definitely bid on one with the work done, and would add Nickies cylinders to mine if I had to rebuild the engine again.

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