2023 | A 986 S

Over the last few years, I've noticed that my Boxster's front side marker lights (even the one that wasn't half full of water when I bought the car) were starting to look old and dull. For that matter, I had always thought that it was just kind of dumb that the Boxster's long skinny front side marker lights only have a single bulb at one end. Why have a lens shaped like that if it only projects a single point of light?? My way of solving these "problems" was to replace the OEM side markers with a set of shiny new aftermarket lights that are filled with LEDs.

This is the OEM lens lit by a single LED bulb. I had replaced the original incandescent bulb with the LED shortly after I bought the car.

The marker light connecter plugged into the LED bulb with the OEM lens removed.

The new LED light in the back and the OEM light in the front. The new lights came with a resistor that was not needed on my car.

The back side of both new and old. Note the little rubber snorkel on the back of the old light. This was transferred to the new light to help keep water out.

The new light installed, looking like it belongs. The spring on the back that holds it in place is not shaped quite the same, so it was a wee bit harder to install.

This is the best part. The LEDs illuminate all of the new marker light's lens. This looks much better to my eye.

Updating the marker lights was the only "special" Boxster project for the year so I thought I'd document some of the normal maintenance stuff that I hadn't shown before. Let's start with changing the oil

Supplies gathered and ready to go! My car does have a spin-on oil filter adapter, so it doesn't use the OEM canister filter. Note that I use a new crush washer every time.

Unless you have a lift, you'll need to jack the car up. The photos don't show, but I use stacks of wood blocks as a backup to the jack stands when I work under the car. No sense taking chances.

My LN magnetic drain plug is removed with a 8mm Allen wrench.

Draining the oil. Be sure your container is large enough to hold over nine quarts.

Removing the oil filter with a plier type filter tool. This works much better for me than the strap type tool I used to use.

Tightening the drain plug with a torque wrench. It would be a BAD THING if the plug were to fall out so it's important to get it right!

The oil filler is in the rear trunk. I've always thought that it would be too easy to drip oil on the carpet while refilling so I use a funnel and a splash guard that I made from a scrap of closed cell foam.

I bought a filter cutter tool so I could check the filter media for signs of stuff that shouldn't be there. Looked good.

It was also time to replace the engine air filter. Changing the filter is easy. Accessing the filter is the hard part!

The first step is to open the convertible top about four inches, moving it to "service position."

The back of the top needs to be folded up and out of the way to access the engine cover. Here I'm disconnecting the cables that hold the top down.

The back of the top has a curtain to direct water to the drains. This too needs to be disconnected.

Removing the storage bin.

Disconnecting the behind-the-seat speakers. I had installed this myself so it's not an OEM connector.

With the storage bin out of the way, I could remove the carpet over the engine cover.

And there's the engine cover. With all that other stuff gone, it pops off easily.

This is the engine compartment with the cover removed.

Finally, here's the air filter housing.

Inserting the new filter. Note that I didn't clean the engine. The manual says that it had been coated with anti-corrosion goop at the factory and I don't want to remove that!

Be sure to check the power steering fluid level once you've dug this deep. Mine was fine. Now it's time to put everything back together...

Back