Riley Steed

I most definitely did not make this video but just stumbled across it. I agree with some of his points but the fuel injection was new to me? If you’re bored watch it and let me know what y’all think.

thebug44

I thought they fixed most of these issues in the facelift models?

G_Money

Yeah you thought that lol

Jasonoff

Decent vid indicating all the addressable issues.

NotABaller

cant watch, any summaries please? does this apply even to facelift engines?

icon420

ha! literally just seen this video yesterday as well

juggernaut1

Saw this the other day to via the UK forum. Most motors have their problems, this just has more of them. Then there is the limp mode "feature" after a few hot laps. Yep, we all bought a great German engineered car fellas

Tasos Moschatos raises similar issues in his youtube videos as well.

hachiroku

they've only fully designed something like less than 5 production engines from the ground up (M156, M157, M177, and their variants. the V12 started from a Mercedes casting and branched off in development at the request of Pagoni). still...BMW's are designed to fail so it forces you to repair or to buy new. Mercedes nor AMG designs anything in this fashion.

the only thing not fully resolved is the design of the camshaft adjusters. when they become noisy they still for the most part are fully operational.

Ludedude

Lot's of clickbait and half truths in that video. Look at the positives of the platform instead...the bottom end is stout, oiling is good, power and torque curves are nice, high rpm limits etc. I've had my share of high dollar motors that might as well have been built from glass (I'm looking at you Chevy LS-7) and that's unfortunately part of what comes with performance cars. It's not a beige 2003 Camry...

Jasonoff

That's how they get people to watch, fill it full of entertaining fluff. It did address all the fixable potential issues though. B+ for effort.

Adi-Benz

Oof gotta love the SL

But why get an SL63 with M156 when you can get the SL550 with a 4.7TT and make more horsepower for less, ya kno

AMGonFire

Facelift model fixed most of this. The fuel injectors and the adjusters are really the only issues with facelift models. My adjusters have been making noise in startup for 4 years had them replaced still makes noise. Even so it runs 11s in the 1/4 and sounds like a beast doing it.

SGTzAMG

Because the R230 SL facelifted looks BAD AMF! R231...on a other hand...ehh

Celicasaur

But when that LS7 is actually working though......

Quite true. But....it suffers the same problem as the CLS, E and S class with this motor....they're too heavy for an NA motor to make them truly exciting/scary. That weight advantage of the W204 makes it a good match.

Adi-Benz

I do like the R230 and have been looking to buy one + widebody / black series body kit it.

I'm game for a 500/550/55 though.

Ludedude

You're not kidding. It's legendary for a reason, just needs some work to make it reliable and GM never did own up to any issues even though they changed the valve guide and valve design mid run. I had heads, cams, headers, straight pipes out the back, no cats At the end of the day, a wheel failure on track happened. Too much power I guess But yeah, I mean, 600 whp with bolt ons for a janky old chevy block with pushrods.

I'll say this, AMG did a better job repairing and owning up to defects than GM ever did.

Jasonoff

Wasn't it the machining of the valve guild housing that was garbage? I remember reading about meat heads just changing to copper guides with solid SS valves which would only 'mask" the problem that would eventually happen later once the material broke down.

Mully78

Looks like he bought an 09 C63, wonder if its a former owner is a member here?

Ludedude

There were a few issues. The sodium filled exhaust valve was too fragile at the neck for one. The other issue was that a certain number of heads were machined improperly with geometry that put pressure on the valve stems and guides causing failures.

Merc63

115,000km on mine with half of that under stage 3 weistec power and it purrs like a kitten.

exhaustgases

Looks like the same old cutting corners and building cheap and pricing high. There is a reason for the cam lifter problems, that have been pretty much eliminated on other manufactures engines. Any guess's ?

BLKROKT

My guess is that all you trolls should stay in this thread and debate it endlessly and leave your stupidity out of the rest of the forum threads.

Did I get it right

hachiroku

False...every manufacturer who has used a cam adjuster has had failure and revision. It is just the mass production manufacturers redesigned theirs and warrantied theirs because they failed earlier and worse.

I have attached a bulletin from Honda. Toyota has has failures...Ferrari has as well. Ferrari just like AMG has not redesigned theirs but have made mention they know there is an issue. Maybe Ferrari didn't make mention but it's known their F430 cam adjusters fail.

If Cam Adjusters tend to fail more so out of warranty than manufacturers have no incentive to warranty these. They should offer redesign though as most Mercedes parts have had many revisions. I can only assume they did not reuse this part or design on any other engine so they literally abandoned thoughts to redesign for the better.

Cam adjusters on the M156 become mildly noisy but continue to function. Other manufacturers see engine failure or in some cases cam adjuster seizing.

In other designs I don't see a definitive design change...maybe more oil galley's that is about it. Functionally all very similar.

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