I did some similar maintenance on mine last weekend.

I knew I had read something about what to do if your top went through a sort of shudder when raising and lowering, but for ages, I did nothing about it. Finally I looked it up and discovered that all I needed to do was put some grease on the rails that the clamshell slides on. Problem solved! I think it was a post by Maurice that pointed this out -- but thanks to all for posting/keeping these simple 5-cent fixit tips for others to find.

I had a bad passenger side cable and upon replacement, managed to break one of pivots ends on the same side. Last week I got the new pivot ends in and finished the job. While I had things apart, I greased the rails and the pivot ends with white lithium grease. I can't really say I noted any real improvement but at least I know its been tended to.

dghii
2000 Boxster S 6speed 112k miles