You can ask over there, the manual they have should include W222 info as well.

 

Yep, bought it from MB of Louisville who was recommended on here.

I bought it because I considered keeping it, otherwise I never would have let it go out of warranty before trading it in. Lease was 48 months

 

Thanks for the clarification. I forgot you had a 48 month lease, I've only ever leased on a standard 3-year term, and never with MB. Thanks!

 

Are these from the first time it leaked or after it was repaired and it leaked again?

 

No this is after the repair. The valve cover leak was invisible, it only showed oil in the spark plug holes.

 

That is how mine has shown up.

 

Anybody buying a used S560 should add this to their PPI!

 

I did my plugs at 50k, no oil.
I checked again last week now at 80k, no oil.
Mine was made 11/18
what year and month was your car made?
Check the door sticker on driver side door.

 

I no longer have the car, but if I remember it was built in early 2020. I bought it in November of 2020.

 

Mine is currently in for repair so I will let you know when I get it back. Good to hear you have had no issue!

 

also curious as to the month and year of your car.
can you tell us that?

 

It is a 2019 first offered for sale in November 2018 according to the Carfax.

 

check the sticker on the driver door pillar.

 

October 2018 is the date on the pillar.

 

I had this job done this week, took 4 days with $510 labour cost. Gasket comes as a silicon tube and at the same time replaced many minor seals:

1. Vacuum pump gasket
2. Expansion plugs.
3. Fuel high pressure pump o rings.
4. Vvt solenoid o rings.

i was having a minor leak in spark plug area cylinder #2. Car millage 71k

 

Mine was done at the dealer under warranty however only one side needed repair. I assume yours was done at an independent shop?

 

yes, indeed it is an independent workshop specialised in European cars. I did both sides as a precaution, I was afraid that this leak damage my double head coil.

 

I'm having this problem on my 2018 s560. It started to misfire on cylinder 2. I pulled the coils on the left side and two of the spark plug wells have some oil in them. Doesn't look like a major leak. I'm wondering if I can just replace the seals on the ends of the coil packs?

Also, does anyone know what's involved in replacing the oil separators?

Thanks

 

Joe, a couple questions on your situation ... how many miles on your car and what is your typical oil change interval? Curious if any pattern, some people attribute this to long oil change intervals.

On my car I changed the plugs and cleaned out the plug boots and now it's running fine. How long it will run well is hard to know; the oil I found might have taken six years to leak in there or started leaking six months ago, no way to tell. At least pulling the coils and plugs is a fairly easy DIY job.

I sprayed a generous shot of deoxit cleaner up into the boots and used a q-tip to reach up inside and get out the residue. Perhaps others have different/better techniques?

I'm interested in changing my separators, but there are two issues: First, the entire intercooler assembly has to come out and that seems like a lengthy job. Second, for some reason, no one knows the part number for the left separator. Dealers I get parts from say the only way to get the right one is to take off the old one and give them the number off it. Very odd. The right separator number is in the system and easily found.

Can a separator be 'washed out' with cleaner of some kind and put back on?: Would be interesting to cut one in half and see what's actually inside it. A cleaning solvent might or might not reach into all the areas where gunk is present. Another question is if we replace the separators how much will that help the leakage into the plug bores?

 

Oh, and btw, did you only do one side of the engine? I suggest you go ahead and do the other side too.

I did the right side first and found a lot of oil on # 2; the car ran better after doing that side, but then I found more oil in # 5 and 6 on the left side, so the best plan is to do all eight.

 

Tom,
I did pull both sides just now and am waiting for parts. I decided to replace the sparkplugs and in searching discovered that there are new OEM boots. They have 3 rings around the outside that look like they might do a better job of keeping oil out of the plug wells. FCP Euro has a kit with OEM plugs and the new boots. That's what I ordered, they come next Tuesday. If you ever go in there again then I suggest replacing the boots.

What I found is a fairly significant amount of oil in the wells for 2 and 3 and on the other side for 7. Probably explains why I had a misfire fault on Cyl 2.

The oil separators are still a question. I agree that excessive pressure in the crankcase could cause the valve cover leak. It's also been suspected as a cause of oil seeping through the camshaft sensors/actuators and getting into the wiring harnesses. I'm trying to figure out a way to measure crankcase pressure. On most cars it's easily done by pulling the dipstick and connecting a hose to the dipstick opening. Unfortunately, this engine doesn't have a dipstick. I'll figure something out.

Having said that, minor leaks from valve covers are a fairly common problem on many engines. I may also look at maybe running a bead of RTV under the valve cover joint above the plugs to see if I can direct the oil elsewhere.

Definitely looks like the intercoolers have to at least come loose to get the separators out. I do wonder if there's a way to flush them, maybe with compressed air? They're basically just catch cans. A hose from the valve cover feeds into the top and extends down into the can. Another hose at the top then goes to the air intake before the turbo. Any oil dripping from the input hose falls to the bottom of the can where a hose drains it back into the engine. There may be some loose filtering material in there, but probably not much. Would like to see the insides of one.

My S560 allegedly has only 25K miles on it. I say allegedly because I suspect someone had a module plugged in that stops the odometer from advancing. Not sure. Worst case it has about 45K miles based on other evidence. Still shouldn't be looking at clogged oil separators at that mileage.

Just found this video on common problems with the M176 / M177. It mentions the oil separators. Odd, but after mentioning a number of scary expensive problems he concludes that he would not have any other engine.

 

Very interesting post Joe, thanks. Do you have a part number for those newer plug boots with the rings? Sounds promising.

As I mentioned in the earlier post, I kinda think low mileage cars are more susceptible based on the small number of cases discussed here. I looked at a Carfax report on a low miles 2019 recently and it showed new plugs at 23k miles. That's oddly early to do plugs and I wonder if maybe they found oil and that's whey they changed them.

 

Wow, that’s a nightmare engine-out for a valve cover gasket on a modern S-Class? Unreal. MB’s complexity is getting ridiculous. Glad you caught it under warranty, because that’s easily a $5k+ job otherwise. Surprised it’s not more common, but these M176/M177 engines seem to have random leaks. Hope it’s fixed right let us know how it drives after.

(And yeah, ELW can be sketchy with gaskets good thing your advisor fought for it.)

 

You will need to do the valve cover repair job, just replacing the seals on the coil packs isn’t going to solve it. The oil separators come out as part of the tear down for that repair. Change the oil every 5k miles going forward.

Its not an engine out job. They tear down the front end of the car but they do the job with the engine in. Rear main seal is an engine out job.

This isn’t a Mercedes thing, it’s the hot vee engine design

 

I’ve never seen a single incident similar to this with the BMW hot-V engines. It must be a Mercedes thing. At least it’s not as common except with the mbenz hot-vs

The most recent Mbenz V8 engines continue to show common expensive service items.