egxpimp

hey guys ! i toook my car for a smog...the guy told me my timing chain is advance by 4 degrees is this good or bad ?
what are the good and bad side effects....

dtkw

If your car has more than 100K and has the chain has never been changed, then it's a good thing to change it. I don't know what the degree more if anything to do with the slack on the chain. If it brakes on you, the result is very painful for you and your wallet. I changed mine at 90K service.

egxpimp

my car has 190k miles on it now....i dont know if it has been changed but my mechanic told me it is a double row chain which shouldnt be a problem* awhile back when i took my car for service* well lets put it this way my car failed smog *california smog* the guy who did it put my car as a 4.5 L v8 engine when its a 5.0 liter engine and he put the model as a 1980 450SLC....i told him im going to go back to make him make the correction...do u guys think my car will pass if i make his *** put it under a 1984 500SEL or 500SEC ...thanks for letting me know about the timing chain though ! if it does need to replace any DIY instructions and tips ? im 19 with no money ! LOL

ninefourthree

having your cams advanced or retarded is never a good thing if you are trying to pass an emissions test. take a look at your smog test sheet and figure out why your car failed. was it the emissions? was it the visual? if it was emissions related, what gas or gasses (HCs, COs, NOx)were above specs?
most likely, you have slack in your timing chain, but it probably not due to chain stretch so much as worn timing chain guide rails. it's likely that your car is in need of costly repairs that are way over your head. I am a 21-year old M-B tech. my suggestion to you is to dump this car as quickly as possible and get yourself a toyota or a honda until you can afford to maintain a mercedes-benz.

egxpimp

i dont think theirs anything drasticly wrong with teh car that i need to get rid of ASAP... it only failed the NOx test at 30mph it passed at idle and at 15 mph... at 30 it failed..one of the reasons why it failed was because i let the car get reallly hot- i know my my radiator is clogged to a point which causes the car to run at really high temp when idle and not moving...meaning no air hitting the radiator.... for the nox at 30 mph it was too high ...i called up the guy and told him im going to go back because he put a model that isnt even close to my car and i want him to redo it....soo timing maybe correct- he used specs off a 450 SLC....which makes no sense or am i crazy ?

dtkw

Timing chain is really not a DIY project. It involved removing a lot of things to get access to it. If you have never done it yourself, have some MB mechanic around your area to shop for prices. I use a generic MB mechanic here. He found a way to bypass a few things to get access and replace the chain with less things to remove. He did that to his own 420SEL and my 560SEL. He said this way it took less time and saves customers' money. But he won't tell you how so don't bother to ask.

ninefourthree

the 450 slc has the same engine and fuel system as your 500 se. a half liter of displacement isn't gonna make much difference

egxpimp

the NO at 15mph was 489 and max it could be is 1277 and avg on most cars is 554 so mine looks good there

at 30 mine was 1381 avg is 468! and max is 1137 ! so im pretty close !

Hattaresguy

Replace the chain and guides before your engine self destructs. On my 603 it looks like a fairly simple job. The V8's are probably harder.

The M116 and M117 should have their chains done at the 100k mark. More so with the M116 you are playing with the devil letting one of those go much over 100k.

egxpimp

Alrite ima do the timing chain guys... i like the car alot so why not and i know its gona last me another good 100 k or so if i take good care of it
.....dtkw wheres this mechanic you talked about located can i get his info so i can contact him see what price quote he can give me ? thanks !
and home much was it for your car so i can get an idea how much he will be charging my empty wallet. haha ha jp


btw....are 500se's rare ? or not really ? are they consider any special to you guys ? just wondering

braverichard

1) Yes the 500SE is rare. Reason? Well, it was never sold in the USA by MBUSA. It is an imported beast. So that's why it is rare. In fact, even the 500SEL that was officially sold in the USA was sold just in 1984 and 1985 in small numbers (mainly due to their stratopheric prices... priced even higher than the 560SEL which came later).

2) The double row timing chains in these cars is an important issue as they are of the interference kind unfortunately. M-B continues to make interference engines even today as lesser brands make non-interference ones. Go figure. So much for a great engineering reputation. My mechanic checked out the chains in my 500SEL with 156K miles which have never been replaced and told me they were fine. I expressed concern for possible damage to the engine when the chain breaks as most people say you should change the chains on that engine every 100K miles. He told me that normally the chains start making a rattling sound right before they break. Additionally, a car that was well maintained, with proper oil changes, should have a chain last long, like 250K miles which is when those engines typically need a valve job. At that point then you can replace the chains as well.

While I think 250K miles is pushing it ( I won't even let my diesel engine's chain go that long without replacement) ,now that I think of it, the owner's manual section for maintenance actually says nothing about timing chain replacement intervals!!

tgentry

For some of us even complete engine rebuilds and full, body-off restorations are DIY projects.

braverichard

Well then you are one of those folks who are really deeply involved in every aspect of the car. No one can know everything. Some of the stuff I can do with electronics are much greater than even rebuilding the entire car. But with cars, I really can't do much more than fluid and filter changes LOL.

dtkw

[QUOTE=egutie6970]Alrite ima do the timing chain guys... i like the car alot so why not and i know its gona last me another good 100 k or so if i take good care of it
.....dtkw wheres this mechanic you talked about located can i get his info so i can contact him see what price quote he can give me ? thanks !
and home much was it for your car so i can get an idea how much he will be charging my empty wallet. haha ha jp

You are in the Bay Area, CA, right? He is a little over 2,000 miles away here in IN. He charged me under $600.00 parts and labor.

Hattaresguy

braverichard whats wrong with interference engines? Honda, Toyota, MB, Ferrari all make them. I can't think of a modern engine that isn't. Heck Ferrari uses belts, if one of those snaps MB's will look real cheap all of a sudden.

braverichard

Actually, right now there are only two Toyota engines in production that are interference engines. With Honda, that number is a little higher but I don't have the exact number. Ferrari - please, these guys know how to make cars go fast. Their quality is zero. I've seen brand new Ferraris blow their head gaskets with less than 2,000 miles on them.

But anyway, what's wrong with interference engines? Well, INTERFERENCE!! That means when your belt or chain breaks on you, it will do its share of work in either bending or completely destroying your engine head, depending on how fast you were driving when it happened. Most Toyota engines today are non-interference, so when the belt breaks, it just rolls off. In fact, I have a first hand experience on this. Toyota recommends that its timing belts be changed every 90,000 miles. I have a friend who owns a 2000 Camry. When he went to the dealership to get a quote on the belt replacement, he was quoted $500. Not having the money at the time, the service advisor told him to just keep driving the car as he saves up the funds, and then just replace the belt when it breaks since the breakage can't do any harm to the engine. He did exactly that and at 128K, his belt broke, he towed the car to the dealer and they replaced it. In fact, I know a guy who drives a 1998 Lexus LS400. 216K miles and he still hasn't replaced the belt (he is the original owner of the car). He is just waiting for it to break then he will replace it. Not that I'd do the same, but when it is a non-interference engine, you have nothing to fear!

egxpimp

well howcome my mechanic keeps telling me i dont need to change the timing chain only if its lose...and that their isnt an exact mileage for a doulbe row timing chain for my car...i mean hes a great mechanic- he fixes Astro Martins to the mazda Zoom Zooms... i even seen him work on Ferraris'....and hes the only one i trust fixing my 500 SE and he does a great job all the time.

Hattaresguy

Get a new mechanic, I have been told at a very poor MB dealership that the M116's don't need the chains done. Yeah right, their is a reason that dealer is probably one of the worst on the east coast.

But you have bigger problems, when the mechanic is tearing down your engine he might as well do the chain and guides. Probably should do a valve job with new cams to while your in their. Then fix any damage running with no oil has done. The bottom end is probably still fine a leak down test would tell you the ring's health. Oil pressure at idle will tell you the bottom end's health.

braverichard

Tell me about ignorant mechanics!!

The one that I often consult (the same one that told me that the timing chain is due for a replacement when it starts rattling) that calls himself a "Foreign Car Specialist" and works mainly on Mercedes-Benzes and BMWs turned out to be a pile of ignorance the other day. I asked him how much he'd charge me to do a valve adjustment for my 300SD which will be needing one soon (since I'm too lazy to work out in the cold ) and he said he's never done one before!! I asked him why and he said that the engine has valve lashes!! I reminded him, "I have the 617.951 engine" I said and his reply was,"what is 617.951?" Then I explained that was the M-B number for the engine, and I even further explained it was an '84. He said all the engines have valve lashes. With him having shown such ignorance, I decided to just mess with him. So I asked him if he could adjust my ALDA and he asked me, "what's that?" I went on to ask him about the infamous B2 Piston problem in those transmissions and he said that once you start experiencing issues that the transmission is probably on its way out. He went on to explain that there's no such thing as "adjusting vacuum on a transmission." Well, let's just say that my car won't be going back to him -- neither the 500SEL nor the 300SD.

Turned out Hattaresguy was right about egutie6970's timing chain. I better get mine done soon before I destroy my engine's head. But still, there's no mention of a need to change the timing chain in the maintenance manual.