Benz916

I have a 1998 c230 with 55k on it. I bought it at 51k. So can somebody explain to me what this whole sludge thing is about. How do you get sludge in the engine. I sorta know about this, but would like to learn more. If say you do have some sludge or whatever in the car....can you remove it somehow or only when your engine fails on you?

sph17

In 1998 MB changed from a 7,500 miles maximum reccomended interval between oil changes to the FSS (Flexible Service Schedual?). The FSS keeps track of the number of gallons of fuel consumed, and tells you to change your oil at a predetermined amount. If you get great gas milage you could go 10,000, maby close to 15,000 miles between oil changes. If you had syntetic oil in your car, this probably would not be a problem, but supposidy MB put conventional oil in at the factory, and people started to have problems with sluge and oil related problems with cars on the FSS. Conventional oil starts to break down when old and contaminated with engine products of combustion.

There was a class action law suit, and as you probably are know, MB has placed an extended warranty for sluge related engine problems with some FSS cars.

Rincewind

that waranty is extended to 150k

and you get a coupon for a fere oil change at the dealer

Benz916

sounds good. So lets say you did have some sludge build up...but not bad enough to hurt the engine....is there any way you can check to find out how bad it is or what can you do to fix the problem?

mjtray

You may want to consider running some some engine cleaning oil through your engine the next time you change your oil.

Basically you drain your old oil, fill it with the engine cleaning oil, run the engine up until its warm, then drain it, change the filter and refill with either synthetic or semi-synthetic.

The engine cleaning oil is designed to get rid of all of the sludge and crap that builds up in your engine and keeps everything nice and clean and clears out the oil ways in your engine.

You will notice what a difference it makes, as your engine oil will stay cleaner/golden for longer.

davis449

I don't remember where they positioned the oil resevoir on the V6, but I know on my I6 I can open up the oil cap and look inside and get a general idea as to whether there's oil sludge or not.

Benz916

Thanks. I'll get some of that stuff and run it through.