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Well, today I visited Benz Elite Automotive an Eddie has been working on a ML63 for a few days now. Eddie mentioned that the M156 had blown head gaskets, which was causing a massive oil leak.
Eddie has since pulled the engine out and replaced the head gaskets, he said the when he was removing the head bolts two of them were stuck. One had the head just sitting in the head, the head bolt had rusted thru. And one wouldn’t come out, as it was severely rusted in the head.
The owner choice to only replace a few bucket lifters, which didn’t make any sense to me not Eddie. There were many other things, that one would change out since the engine is already out of the car, like a thermostat, water pump, engine mounts, oil cooler o-rings, timing chain and guides etc. But the owner choose to do the bare minimum to car the vehicle back on the road.
What concerns me is that future issues will pop up, because he neglected to have them addressed. But hey it’s not my vehicle. Emile tried to purchase the vehicle for $6500, but the owner wouldn’t sell. The ML63 needs about $7000 worth of work, to get it dialed in.
I mean, I was in the same situation when I got my head bolts replaced. Two were rusted out and snapped when the mechanic had them in his hands. He recommended me changing some lifters and so I did but the opportunity came up to swap in black series lifters, and black series engine mounts, and new camshafts. The list goes on and on, but so does the cost. Maybe he also didn’t want to dive into that deep pit and had the mentality of, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
Last edited by Saurabh914; 03-18-2021 at 12:07 AM.
Slap it back together and dump it - I mean trade it in, toward a new car. Obviously, preventive maintenance and any efforts to maintain a vehicle is not part of the program for this owner.
Slap it back together and dump it - I mean trade it in, toward a new car. Obviously, preventive maintenance and any efforts to maintain a vehicle is not part of the program for this owner.
And this is why I carefully inspect any car which I wish to purchase. There is always a chance the previous owner decided to take a shortcut to save a few bucks but they do not tell me about the issues and yet they still wish for top dollar!
For what it's worth, individuals that do this sort of thing really **** me off. If you cannot afford to maintain the car do not buy it! And most certainly do not attempt to dump unknown (to me!) problems on me.
Please do not misunderstand me, if the individual invested serious money into correcting the issues, I would pay top dollar for the car.
The owner bought the ML63 for $6000, and I don't understand not wanting to spend $6-7K on a engine rebuild, but this engine had blown head gasket and massive oil leaks. So, why not address all the weak points, and make this engine bullet proof, that way you have no worries in the future. The M156 doesn’t have issues with the bottom end necessarily, but head bolts, cams and lifters yes. But surprisingly his cams looked good. But, I didn’t understand the mentality of only changing a few lifters, why not replace all of them, to eliminate any failures in the future. If my engine had to come out, I would replace the front and rear main seal as preventative maintenance. But not this owner 🤔 There are a lot of things he choose not to address.
It’s obvious the owner plans on keeping this vehicle, even after my mechanic offered him $1000 over what he paid for it, and he didn’t want to sell it.
Well today, I dropped off the my E63, to have the brakes flushed, differential fluid changed, transmission fluid and filter changed, and replace the oil temperature sensor. This sensor has my OCD going wild.
It get up to temp, then starts fluctuating between 74 -86 degrees Celsius. I have replaced it in the past, with an URO unit from Rock Auto. But today, I purchased a MB part hoping this corrects the issue.
I'm hoping that a $43 dealership part is better then a $8 one from Rock Auto.
But the good news, is that while at Benz Elite Automotive, Eddie finally go the ML63 engine back in the vehicle. As I mention earlier, the owner elected not to get many services done while the engine was out.
Just the bare minimum to get back on the road. This definitely didn't make sense to me, but oh well. It's not mine.
03-17-2021, 08:58 PM
