Brief update...
The old boxster has been behaving itself over the past few months. She gets used every day and has just ticked over 137500 miles.
I noticed a few weeks ago that when changing lanes the rear end would feel a bit wander some. I had a look and thought the nearside rear wheel bearing was shot because I could feel play in the wheel when wobbling it from side to side. I could also hear a noise when doing it which didn't sound wheel 'bearingy' so I took it to my friend (the Indy). He showed me that if a wheel bearing has gone the wheel will have play when waggled top and bottom, not just side to side. It turns out the ball joint in the rear control arm was shot rather than the bearing which was great news!
So first job today was replacing the old with the new rear control arm:
Then I set about replacing the inner CV boot on the offside rear driveshaft. I've been putting this job off for ages as it involves removing the transmission slam panel, the cat and sensor and the driveshaft from the gearbox.
Once you remove the panel and cat you then unbolt the driveshaft bolts from the transmission - held on by 6 hex bolts. Then remove.
Once this is done you pry off the metal dust cover from the end of the driveshaft, remove the circlip keeping the CV joint on the driveshaft and the cv joint slides off.
Then remove the old cv boot and clean the driveshaft
The next bit is the hardest bit of the job - reassemble the boot and joint. Then pack it with CV grease and try to secure the boot to the CV joint with the funny clip it comes with. Needless to say I couldn't get it tight enough so had to resort to a good old fashioned jubilee clip. What a horrible greasy, sticky job!
Whilst I was in there I remembered I'd bought some decat pipes ages ago so flung them on whilst I was at it.
I then went to the front and put a couple of jubilee clips on the steering rack pipes which were starting to weep.
And to finish off I put on some 15mm rear and 7mm front spacers on for good measure.
I did take more pics but for some reason I can't upload most of them - sorry!
PS: what a difference the decat makes! The exhaust sounds absolutely epic but still isn't droney or intrusive when cruising. I think the steel manifolds, gundo-hack and decat must be the best sounding 986 exhaust set up. Not noticed any loss of power low down either but a noticeable increase at the top end.