Ausmbtech

I finally got around to writing a post about my 55 Engine conversion.
I went a different path to US based conversion as Australia doesn't have any reasonably priced donor engines and Importing one would cost me about as much for shipping and customs as the engine itself.

I started with a ML55 engine from a written off car and a damaged W203 C55 engine. Stripped both down and used bits from each (most parts from the ML55 engine). Unfortunately the pistons in the C55 were damaged so I had to make to with the 10.5:1 compression pistons. I had the pistons crowns ceramic coated and the skirts friction coated. The Rod bearings were also coated as they are a wear point, crank bearings don’t seem to show much wear even on high mileage engines so I didn’t have them coated. I had the engine rebalanced, the original engine balanced was within 3 grams already so it’s pretty good for a mass produced engine!

I used the C55 heads with late type double valve springs, nothing more than a light skim and cleanup. I didn’t port the heads as I didn’t expect large gains without some drivability or low end losses. I did however fit a set of PTE cams I picked up a few years ago, I was very anxious to see what they were like after having them for so long. The cam lobes are visibly larger than E55, C55 and ML55 cams that I also had lying around. I did have them measured, but seeing PTE hasn’t advertised the specs I’m not going to be the first to advertise them. Interestingly the E55 cams have zero valve overlap.....explains why they pull from such low revs but drop off above 4500rpm.

Assembly is pretty straight forward for the M113, The only hard part was getting time to work on it. When the engine was about 80% complete then I removed the standard engine a borrowed the remaining parts such as wiring, exhaust headers, coils, etc.

One the engine was fitted it started straight up with no issues. I gave it about 500km/300mi to bed it in then had it dyno’d. I was mainly looking for a confirmation about the AFR’s as I was still using a stock ECU. They were fine throughout the range, a tune will be done once I’ve put a few more mile on the engine. The only issue I ran into is that it does run hotter than the 43 engine. Not enough to be concerned around town but I do a lot of track days in hot weather so I’m getting a bigger radiator custom built. Not something that the average 43/55 conversion requires.

The engine sounds beefier than a 43 or a stock 55, the PTE cams have a slight rumble at idle that makes it sound that little bit more special. They do loose a bit of the low end torque over standard cams, but once it’s over 3000rpm they really wake up and don’t drop off at all, the dyno showed hp still climbing strong as it hit the rev limiter. Considering a C43 weight and diff ratio a little less torque off the line isn’t noticeable at all unless you do a back to back with a E55. It managed 229.9rwKw on a mainline dyno. There’s probably a little more in it, I’ll go chasing it later in the year once I’ve got the cooling sorted

I replaced A LOT of parts, I really don’t want to know what the final cost was. I certainly wouldn’t recommend going down this path, 99% of you should do it the more common way of fitting a donor engine from a E55 or similar.
Here are some pics from the build. There is enough info about the swap on the forum now, I don’t have much to add to it in terms of the swap but thought some on here would like to see a little more about the inside of a M113.
If you want to know something specific about the build then let me know.

Ausmbtech

Some more pics

Ausmbtech

A few more pics

Ausmbtech

a few more again

Ausmbtech

last ones

cm60k

WaaaaaaaaW,

Excellent jooooooob MaaaaaaN,,



ZAYED,,

Sulaco

Thank you so much for documenting this build!

Is it just me? I thought all AMG engines were hand built, balanced, and blue printed? So the 55 engines still being so close to balanced is normal right?

Pagz

Thanks for sharing!.

Always great seeing somone go the extra mile to restore!. I have the same problem with replacing parts, I was a bit suprised how many parts were worn when I pulled mine down. Did you end up replacing the timing chain idle pully carrier? the load side was well worn on mine even with good service history. Also note you removed the LH bolt in the clockwise direction, I managed to do mine in the anticlockwise which wasnt so good(hobby mechanic qualification showing through).

Ausmbtech

I replaced all gaskets and seals, all bearings, all timing gears, both chains, oil pump, piston rings, breather hoses, water pump, idlers, tensioners, p/s reservoir, EGR valve, knock, cps, cam, oil, O2, maf sensors and oil cooler. It added up quickly.......... But a big thanks to MB Atlanta, I bought a lot of parts from them and it made it a lot cheaper than buying genuine parts locally.

The engines are hand assembled and balanced from factory, but they aren't blueprinted.

DRBC43AMG

Great job! My mouth's watering

Super B

Thanks for sharing. 4 bolt mains and a floating cylinder design. Pretty cool. I like how the main caps are set deep into the block. Wonder what those bottom ends are capable of power wise.

Sulaco

People with the m113k are hitting like 600hp, right? Not to mention the Maclaren SLR. There's a ton of power hiding in there but typical how no one makes proper performance upgrades. Same with the venerable m104. It's a hell of a good straight 6 like the bmw straight 6 or the 2j Toyota motors but we have no idea what they're capable of. Turbobandit scratches the surface but they're still missing a few links in the chain. Imagine a totally built bottom and top end with a real full bore twin turbo. They hit 800 to 1200 hp in similar straight 6's all day long. Any of you true gear heads care to elaborate? What could we hit if there was a real market for m113/104 upgrades?

DRBC43AMG

I didn't know these engines had piston skirt oil squirters. Nice

mickey13

Nice. Not a gearhead so I can't contribute much but it'd be nice to see a c43 built up instead of swapped out. Curious if the cost is negligible. 5.4 is going to run at least 2500 plus costs if you source the job out and the supercharger runs several thousand more.

Ausmbtech

They're actually 4 bolt mains at each end of the crank and 6 bolt mains for the remainder of the caps (2 for M112 and 3 for M113). Everything from the M112 240 engine through the the 55 M113K use the same design and even the same bearing shells. It was built very tough!

DRBC43AMG

So I can now say that my C240 wagon with the M112 engine is like a baby M113. Indeed similar engines with 2 more or less cylinders. That's good design and manufacturing practice saving costs too.

Sulaco

M112 is essentially an m113 with 2 cylinders chopped off and a balance shaft added to counter weigh the shakiness.

Super B

I was wondering about that it. It looked like there are cross bolt holes on the inner caps in some of the pictures but couldn't quite tell/see a bolt head in the block webbing on both sides. Very impressive block.

benzslo

nice write up.

do you have more info as far as the differences on the cams throughout the years and models?

i'm using cams and engine from a 2000 e55. i love the torque, to me that is what it is all about as a driver. i do notice it flattens out a little in the higher rpm, but man I love driving it around town, effortless bottomless torque just in day to day driving makes for a spirited drive always. I wouldn't mind experimenting with cams from other years/models if there is a noticeable difference.

I'd be reluctant to go with total aftermarket cams, only because it shifts the powerband up, like you said the power climbed still all the way to redline? Do you have a way to adjust shift points? As far as I know with ME2.0 the tuners I've talked to can't do much with changing shift points, and if you can't, no sense in making power where you're not even able to tap into it.

Saaboteur

Nice pictures, very cool. Did you do any machine work at all, or did you limit it to strip down and rebuild?

Seems to me that the rod small ends are split open, not cut. Pretty cool.

I miss my C43. The new owner has had it since November, but hasn't driven it. His wife is making him sell his original C43 before he can drive the swapped car!

Sulaco

Hah. My wife loved mine so much she made me find her one.

Pagz

Ausmbtech,
Did you lap the valves/seats?. I've just spent the morning cleaning all the carbon of my exhaust valves, went to refit and noticed all seats are shinier towards the middle of the head, I know mb use steel inserts so lapping could be painfully slow,but is it really worth it?.

Cheers

benzslo

It's worth it to lap them, use a little valve grinding compound.

Ausmb, did you compare oil pumps? I also had a 05 e500 motor and I found that oil pump had about 33% more teeth.. under driven. I used that one and had to use that pump chain also, longer.

Ausmbtech

Not all 55 Cams are the same, they all have different profiles to suit the characteristics of each vehicle. The early E55's (ME2.0)have HEAPS of low end torque, they had the highest of the N/A 55's but they do tend to drop off at higher revs. Awesome cam for daily driving but not if you like dyno numbers. ML55's have the same cams, less toque though due to tuning differences.

Late E55's (ME2.8) seemed to have gained more top end with only a slight drop in low end torque. Still biased to being a "daily" cam, still unsure if this was due to cams alone to some software tweaks as well.

C55 cams moved towards a lot of mid range torque, revs well, very broad torque band but less peak torque than W210 E55's. I fitted a set to my GF's E55, less wheel spin off the line, more top end but less of that American big block muscle car feel.

I've seen the SLK55 cams but haven't measured them. The lobes look much more aggressive than E55 cams, I don't believe it's only a 265kw engine running those cams, it would be a fair bit higher. They didn't need much low end torque, the power band didn't need to be as wide as it had a 7spd along with a short diff ratio so they had more of a HP focus than "traditional" AMG cams. They have similar size lobes (visually) to PTE cams.

I am going to get the rev limit raised by 500rpm when I get a tune done. The cams are a bit of overkill but I can still spinup 265 wide semi-slicks easily in the dry so more toque at 1500rpm wont be much help but I do quite a few track days and I need the power between 3500 and redline so I'm hoping they will be perfect for that sort of usage.......either way I'm taking the PTE cams out......I like the lumpy idle too much

benzslo

Good info, thanks for sharing. I may keep my eyes open for some stock c55 cams. I do know the slk ones are definitely different, those cars shift higher, at like 6700 rpm and they pull hard all the way up.

Have you compared the stock 43 cams to any of the 55 versions? I wonder how they would compare... The 43 comes to life with rpm, but there are alot less cubes there too. I'd be curious how they fit in though.