Roscoe52

I have been trying to locate a nice example of a '97 or '98 SL500 for the last few months but with very little success. The few that I have looked at have been "ridden hard and put way wet" as the saying goes. Seem to be a lot of rough ones out there, last week I traveled to Florida and checked a few SL's out but all were very rough, perhaps that is just a FL-specific thing?

Any suggestions about finding a good one? I'm in Houston but happy to travel anywhere to get the right car. I have been using all the usual online resources and while there are a lot of cars out there it is tricky to work out the real condition of each car. For example: I found a nice 40th Anniversary model in Illinois, but while the pics of the car look great, the engine bay pics show corrosion around the RH cam timing cover and down the front of the engine, and because IL is in the infamous Salt Belt I will probably not pursue that car. Perhaps I should only look South and West of the Salt Belt states?

Also I must confess to being tempted by one particular SL600 that appears to be in great shape - how horrific would the fuel consumption be as compared to the SL500, would there be a lot of difference? I also wonder about the handling with 330 more pounds in the front - anybody care to comment on the 2 models? The 600 has every trim option.

Thanks in advance, all replies welcome.

Roscoe52

Update: I finally found a very nice 1998 SL500 SL1 in January of 2015. The car had lived it's entire life in South Carolina and Georgia and is in great shape overall. It has the panoramic roof option as well as a wood trim steering wheel and the lighter-looking AMG wheels (which I prefer). I put Texas plates on it last week.

For anyone else who is still searching: FWIW I found www.autotrader.com to be the most useful of all the cars-for-sale websites overall.