oblu

Good luck with that. And it's not a sub-$100 purchase either.

Dealer wants >$6 a quart, at what, 6.5quarts? Plus filter. Plus EPA used oil disposal fee. Plus >$95/hr labor rate at a minimum of 1hr. After WA state sales tax, you're looking at close to $165 to go have your oil changed.

Or you can go buy yourself a set of rhino ramps and a sealing catch pan and do it yourself in under 10min on a lazy Sunday morning. Any Shucks or automotive store will have a used oil tank that you can dump in.

And you have the added benefit of not having to risk the lot monkey damaging your car for you and then having to argue with the service manager that the damage was done by them.

Mine's a lease; I'll still change it myself but it won't be a mile before the prescribed service interval. I'm milking this lease thing for all it's worth.

stephensong

Great answer. That's how I took care of all of Harley's.

stephensong

Once every 13,000 miles or one a year.

RLE

<<You are right this is confusing. Why would anybody buy a C300 with automatic transmission, then buy aftermarket HID, Exhaust, spoilers, and on and on. When finished the cost is greater than a C350 and the mods have done little to improve the performance of the vehicle up to the level of a C350. Then after spending on all of the mods, they want to know how to save $20 -$40 on an oil change. I still don’t get it.>>

And wait until the lease company sees what has been done to their property.

Aggressive

I am on the fence here guys. I don't mind spending the money for the oil change, however I worry about what the lot boy does and what dings and scratches the trip to the dealer will afford me.

I definately see the side of the argument here that if you can afford the $40K car but is too cheap to get the service done.

I also understand that when I do work on my vehicles that I will do a nice job and know it was done right. This way I won't have to worry about a stupid lot boy bumping a car and pushing another cars front bumper license plate screw dimples into mine. That happend on my Infiniti. Then they deny it.

rb23lb

ya but why waste all this money on c300 mods that still wont equate the performance to a c350??? you should just buy the bigger engine in the first place instead of going cheap on it and then saving up and doing mod by mod... i dont get the reasoning there

Dema

Don't you have free medical? We pay high health inssurance so can save a bit on cars.

lx Raven xl

LMFAO .. free health insurance. .... theres nothing free here. I pay 250 Euros a month for my wife and me health insurance.

Fuel price today was 1.52 Euros per liter.

Dema

Move to France. You will have also longer vacation there.

lx Raven xl

I do not have any problems with vacation days I have. the problem is the expense of living here. ( 19% VAT-TAX on all purchase is a joke already and if you buy a car you pay 19% plus 13% BPM **** ) I moved from australia cose of me dutch wife.

I do not regret the move as I do not have financial problems. Its just that you guys are lucky for not paying so much on basic things. Enjoy the luxury while you can. Have a coffee at MB dealer and let them do the work.

I am not sure about MB dealers in US , but over here they are mostly very good in service and also are very carefull with cars. Merc here is quite expensive. Actually more expensive than BMW. Audi or Lexus.

Stick Girl

Which dealer is it? I got my car from Ewing and that's where I'll have my services done.

netcruizer99

Park Place - on Lemmon Avenue.

oblu

Yanks don't get the shear amount of taxes and cost of living that EU people pay. But EU people don't get that Yanks don't make crap for money. Sure, everything's cheap here, but it's because otherwise we wouldn't be able to buy anything. Salaries haven't kept up with cost of living for going on 25years.

And in the U.S., if people don't buy crap constantly, the economy collapses.

lx Raven xl

changed my mind so edited the reply. but one thing i would like to mention that salaries are not so high here. I hardly see any difference in my AUS vs NL salary.

oblu

All I've got to go on is my wife (a recruiter) hiring sales people in UK and Sweden for her company. And our company's sales guys in the UK. In both situations they're making 3x to 4x the annual comp package that their U.S. counter part does.

Not a big sample size.

But I also hear about about all the taxes they have to pay, how they took a month and a half off for vacation and only work a mandated <40hr work week.

But who knows how much that applies to real world.

ora12

I should have been more clearer... I don't plan to make that car into a rocket ship. I do plan on modifying the exterior. Things like adding a carbon fiber spoiler and so forth. I'm not messing with that engine hun. If I wanted a faster car I'd get something else. A C350 is only 40 more horse power and I'm sorry but that's not much. Plus I drive in New York, Manhattan. The most I can do is the west side highway and there's police patrolling those areas constantly.

RLE

<<BTW use a thing that sucks the oil, dont drain it. Moviela explained this in another thread. Always use mobil 1 5W-40 Extended Performance and a OEM Fleece filter.>>

Just today my friend JB showed up with his '99 CLK 430 (4.3 V-8) and we changed the oil & filter using my Top Sider, sucking it out the dipstick tube which gets it ALL out.

Took about 30 minutes and I did not get any oil on my pants or the car. We do this every 5000 miles and the car has nearly 70K miles now with zero oil consumption or engine problems of any kind.

He brought along 9 quarts of M1 5W40 EP. The old oil is dumped at the nearest recycle facility.

I will be doing the same with my C300.

oblu

Oh yeah. Top Sider. I forgot about those ... now I know what I'm putting on my christmas list.

There anything I should know about different models?

RLE

<<Move to France. You will have also longer vacation there.>>

But, all those Frenchmen..........And the strikes.....

RLE

RLE

<<Top Sider. I forgot about those ... now I know what I'm putting on my christmas list. There anything I should know about different models?>>

There is only one model, far as I know. About fifty bucks. I think West Marine is having another sale now but I don't know if they are included.

ora12

Where can I get this thing that sucks the oil?

JimPap

I tried to find it on West Marine's website and all I found were deck shoes.

Whoever post where to fine it, please provide a link to the exact item. Thanks.

AsianML

MityVac.

Chaz00Blue

Wow,

I go away for a while and my thread has been hijacked and rambled to death! I just wanted to know what filters people are using. I have seen that some of the parts stores offer some very nice ones, but I haven't seen where to get the OE filters online.

RLE

<<Whoever post where to fine (sic) it, please provide a link to the exact item. Thanks>>

Go to westmarine.com and enter oil changer in the search field.