Would someone be kind enough to advise me of the specifications for motor oil in the new CDi diesels? I have the opportunity to buy some Mobil Delvac 1 5w-40 CI-4 rated synthetic oil at an attractive price and was wondering if this was a suitable product for this car. Does Mercedes provide free maintenance on their new cars? Thanks

'Free' maintenance, including oil changes, is provided for the first 4 years up to 50K miles in the U.S.

D1 or Mobil 1 5w-40 SUV oil is fine, also Shell Rotella T Synth. I am not sure if MB 229.3 covers disels, but 228.3 does and any dino 15w-40 meets it. As far as I can tell the specs are identical except cold-cranking and MPG stipulations.

Motul VW 505.01 oil is available at IMPEX.com, cheap. 505.01 is the latest pump-dusse spec for VW diesels.

I use German Syntec 0w-30 in my gasser.

I'd stick with the 5W-40 delvac, its among the best oils for diesel engines. I'm running Mobil 1 15W-50 now in my E300, im switching to delvac for the next oil change.

Mercedes DOES NOT provide free maintenance on '05 or newer cars. Its over. Check with your manuals, there will be a list of approved lubricants on one of those little booklets somewhere. I believe synthetic oil is a requirement of every mercedes automobile engine in production.

But they did in '03 when this thread was started! However, the 320 CDI wasn't offered then in the US....was it?

Nope. The E320 CDI is new to the US for '05. Dang I gotta pay attention to the dates huh?