Hi

To anyone that has bought a used clk55, have there been any major concerns. I know electrical issues exist in the 03s and less in the 04s. I want an 05 mostly due to DVD nav.

What about carfax, is it true lemon claims don't always show?

Do people drive these cars hard?

I have never bought a used car before so I am concerned.

Do extended warranties help keep ownership costs down, or are most claims denied?

Thanks for any advice.

 

Don't know about lemon claims, but I do know that not all accidents show...I've personally looked at several cars which had clean carfaxes accident-wise and had clearly had bodywork.

Well, you have to figure that if someone buys an uber-performance vehicle, they are, in all likelihood, going to drive it harder than Granny driving it to church (although I did see a Granny driving a supercharged S55 once)...so I'd assume that at a minimum, they're going to see brief full-throttle excursions, high speed driving/cornering and occasional hard braking; at a maximum, they can see everything up to and including track use.

Yes, they can often keep ownership costs down. No, the good ones don't deny claims unless they can show abuse, etc....however, you need to be able to show that it was maintained according to factory specified maintenance intervals, so it would be good to have service records for the vehicle (if servicing was done at an MB dealer, you can get these records from them).

 

Thanks Improviz

If carfax is so questionable, then why do people consider it important? I suspect if the title is in question that would show up, but otherwise it is almost useless?

I also know people drive the cars as they are designed, I even drove my clk320 and bmw 330ci pretty hard at times, just want to know if tracking them is common or any other "severe" driving.

What about cars that have been modified, especially by younger owners, do you think that means they may have been less than careful with their cars?

John

 

No, it isn't useless (quite the contrary), but neither is it a 100% reliable source for determining whether a vehicle has been in an accident. I've seen cars on there with recorded accidents, saved me the time of going to look at them....one car which had a great price had *two* accidents recorded!!

BUT, and it's a big but, this is a hit-or-miss; not all accidents are reported, and even if they are, not all of them are in Carfax's database. I looked at a Lexus awhile back which, when I hit it with the paint depth guage, turned out to clearly have had major bodywork on the back end, yet its carfax report didn't have any record of an accident. So while it can save you some time in terms of weeding out *some* wrecked vehicles, it in no way, shape, or form has a comprehensive list of all accidents. So always, always always have a vehicle checked out for prior paintwork and/or bodywork, and to see if it's ever been flooded. (here is a great page on how to inspect a car; there are many others with photos out there, google "paint body damage flood" etc, you'll find some showing how to spot paint work...look for overspray, fisheye (google this, it's a great easy way to spot paint), orange peel mismatch, tape lines (google all of these too), and also how to spot weld lines that aren't factory.

Anyway, back to Carfax: it will also show salvage/flood titles, and this again can save you from buying a clunker. So it's certainly worthwhile to pull a carfax on a car (make sure the vehicle you look at has the same VIN as the carfax, btw!! don't want to get tricked if someone subs a "good" VIN for their real "lemon" VIN in their online ad and hope you don't notice), just don't depend upon this entirely.

When I buy used, I try to stay with cars that've stayed in one state, preferably one that requires a yearly registration so that mileage is updated on the records at that time...this makes it easier to spot rollback, etc., and it's less likely to have had a "washed" title (flood/salvage title in one state, "washed" into a new title by retitling it in another state)

I would say that hard driving is probably more common than with either of your previous vehicles, as is track use, *but* track use is still a minority, so it's kind of a luck thing...

I would say that if a vehicle has had performance mods done to it, odds are it's been driven harder than one which has not. Wrt the CLK55s, it's more rare to see them modded extensively, because the mods are ridiculously expensive and add a negligible amount of power.

The supercharged ones are a bit more likely to be modded, because as with turbocharged cars, it's pretty easy to get a big increase in horsepower with simple mods, but I digress...

 

Improviz

thanks again, very insightful. I appreciate your input and time.

I would be able to detect minor body work as I have done it in a previous career.

Will carfax show title history? you mention having more interest in a single state car, is that hard to determine?

thanks again

john

 

It does show title history, and in which state it was titled....also in many instances has somewhat of a service history. Here's a carfax report from an '06 Lexus GS300 that should clarify.

 

Improviz

Way cool, thanks so much for your time.

John