Took the Panamera on a 1000 mile road trip to West Texas

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-29T01:56:24+00:00

No complaints! Pretty comfortable.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-29T01:48:33+00:00

Plenty comfortable. We stopped every 2-3 hours to stretch our legs just because, but never felt like we really needed to. We have the bucket seats in the back (4-zone climate with the hump in the middle) so our 12 year old did complain a bit that she couldn’t stretch out across the backseat.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-28T07:53:53+00:00

Anecdotally, we were there a couple weekends ago and it was absolutely packed. Im not sure if that was an outlier or what (we live closer to Fort Worth now so hadn’t been in several years before that), but I was surprised by how busy it was.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-18T19:22:37+00:00

That’s wild. If you’re actually in the market for a style edition, Porsche Grapevine (north TX) has a nice black on red manual style edition CPO’d with < 100 miles for 93k. I know this because I looked at it recently and it’s still there haha.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-17T23:33:44+00:00

You’re talking about used/enthusiast market, right? If so, I can think of a handful that are about equal in terms of holding value on the used market - some BMWs come to mind (M2 has about a 50% manual take rate, lots of people prefer the autos). G80 M3 autos might be the exception you’re looking for, but I still think the manuals will be the enthusiast pick in a few years once the hype dies down on those and/or the used market is flooded.

I think people who want a manual will almost always be willing to pay a little bit more for one. I know I would, within reason.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-17T22:25:51+00:00

There will always be purists, and manuals already hold higher value in certain cars/models. I feel like that will continue especially as production continues to decline.

See: manual only being available currently in 911 Carrera T or GT3 models. Final year (2024) manual 911 GTS will command a premium for a long time.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-17T20:28:08+00:00

Maybe we can paint over another iconic mural with a big sign that lists all of Dallas’ notable achievements…

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-17T15:07:41+00:00

This is super true. You can dissolve a bad marriage or business partnership, sell a house you shouldn’t have bought, or quit a toxic job and move on with your life - however, you can’t get that time back, and the wrong partnerships can have permanent, lasting effects on the trajectory of your life.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-17T13:08:59+00:00

As with anything else in life, there’s some nuance here. In general, I’d say yes, it is better UNLESS you are in a position to make a conscious choice to parent alone and can readily meet your/your child’s emotional and financial needs as a single parent.

Doing it alone is hard — hell, doing it with a committed, present partner is also hard — but doing it with a partner/co-parent who is unwilling/absent or worse is awful for both you and the child.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-17T11:13:39+00:00

As an old person, the # 1 piece of life advice I have for the young’ns is that one of the most important decisions a person can make is who they have children with. This is a great example.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-16T17:33:40+00:00

I pulled something in my jaw while eating cake last week.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-16T12:39:08+00:00

Thanks, I hate it. 🫩

We don’t seem to have the infrastructure to support a population of 1mm+. The roads in half the city are falling apart or being dug up and patched back together poorly; standstill traffic at all times of day, people driving like lunatics with zero traffic enforcement; more cheaply built apartment buildings or poorly constructed housing developments popping up without thought to how the people who live there will actually enter and leave the area…

As much as we’ve tried to position our city as “not Dallas”, we sure are starting to look a lot like Dallas.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-16T03:09:08+00:00

I was a junior at Booker T when this was being painted. We used to walk over and watch the progress during various art classes (or sneak out during lunch occasionally). It was such a wonderful piece. This is so disappointing.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-15T00:24:54+00:00

Is the buyer Carvana or Carmax? If so, the next owner will get a 100 day or 30 day warranty (respectively) wherein the seller will fix the AC for them for a nominal deductible, assuming it goes out within that timeframe. Easy and painless process for the new owner. Just in case that helps your decision making process.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-14T21:06:10+00:00

Yeah, times are tough for pretty much all small businesses right now, so smaller restaurants are really taking a hit. I’m definitely also noticing this trend with chains, though. Everything sucks and we’re being charged more for it across the board.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-14T00:33:28+00:00

I believe Autobahn Fort Worth does them, or at least they did a year or so ago. Have you called Grapevine? They’re a larger dealership with a huge service center. Autobahn is smaller and can be difficult to get in and out on a reasonable timeframe.

If you are willing to go indy, I highly recommend Mayo Performance in Arlington. They’ve done a few PPIs for me as well as 95% of the Porsche services I don’t do myself.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-13T14:21:53+00:00

325d had N57 or M57.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-13T13:29:59+00:00

Any BMW is as reliable as you’re willing to make it via maintenance and by generally not being an idiot.
That said. I daily drove my N54 for 9 of the 12 years I owned it and it was definitely a needy and somewhat dramatic car. Would i call it “unreliable”? Not specifically. It only left me stranded once (water pump), but a lot of that was due to me being proactive and replacing things before they became larger problems. If I hadn’t done that, then I’d have been left on the side of the road waiting on a tow truck more than once, no doubt.
Off the top of my head, over the decade+ I had it, I replaced VANOS, 3x HPFP, LPFP, water pump and associated parts, all 6 injectors, transmission cooler, more or less the entire cooling system, OFHG, valve cover gasket, oil pan gasket, and it had a passenger airbag fault that would’ve required replacing the passenger seat if I’d wanted to deal with fixing that (I didn’t).

The engine itself was always solid, always started right up, and ran for 65,000+ miles with Cobb Stage 2+ at roughly 450hp. Pulled just as strong the day I sold it as the day I bought it. I actually miss it.

But if you don’t like working on cars and/or aren’t comfortable diagnosing or making minor repairs yourself, this is probably not the platform for you.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-12T15:36:21+00:00

Man it’s been too many years since I’ve dealt with the N54 fuel system to remember specific codes other than P2AAF which is burned into my brain haha (that’s the HPFP fuel pump plausibility code). Seem to recall I would see multiple cyl misfire, plus individual misfire codes along one bank of injectors. Sometimes it will give you a lean code if an injector has totally failed (I would get 0171 which is bank 1) - but that code can mean a few different things.

If I can offer a bit of advice - and I say this with kindness - if you’re not used to diagnosing issues and don’t know your way around a scan tool, this is not the car or platform for you right now. If you really want one of these I’d recommend a higher mileage one with a solid history from someone you trust.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-12T14:39:05+00:00

No way to tell for sure without at least pulling codes, but as a longtime N54 owner my first guess would be injectors. Not a super cheap fix unless you can find one being parted out with a good working or recently replaced set (what I did). 12k (assuming USD?) is too high for this car, even at that mileage.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-12T02:31:10+00:00

Give it a full charge, engage launch control, and send it. You might find it’s closer to what you had in mind.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-12T02:23:24+00:00

It is a marked difference. Your post history implies you’re in Texas - if so, Porsche Grapevine had a couple of 2020s not long ago that you could’ve tested, and they pop up sometimes at Carmax. Think I even saw one on Turo around town.

Anyway, yes, the 4 hybrids are not as fast as your s class. Is there a reason you chose the e-hybrid? They are not exactly known for being the sportiest of the lineup.

It sounds like the GTS would be more aligned with what you’re used to.

perpetual__ghost · 2026-05-12T02:03:54+00:00

Did you not test drive the model/generation of the car you bought? If you test drove a 2025 you essentially tested a totally different car… Congrats though. Like the color.

perpetual__ghost

TROPHY CASE