Mercedes E320 CDI | Shed of the Week
Big is beautiful
A narrow escape this week as the Discovery 3 that Shed was planning to bring to your attention was sold before his Amstrad word processor had had time to warm up. A shame in a way as it looked like a good car, but the harsh truth is that cheap Discos often look like good cars but generally aren’t. There was a time when Shed would have been happy to own a Disco, pulling it apart and putting it back together again in an attempt to sort out that week’s problem, but he’s past all that now. These days he wants the motoring equivalent of the postmistress: something with a bit of class, that starts on the button, and that won't give him too much grief.
In what passes for Shed’s mind that means something like this Mercedes E320 CDI estate. He knows there’ll be some outraged squeaking on the forum at his selection, but this isn’t one of the notoriously rusty gen-two W210s from the late '90s/early '00s. It’s a potentially notoriously troublesome gen-three W211 from 2005.
At least it’s not rusty - or doesn’t seem to be at any rate. There’s been no mention of corrosion on any of the MOT certificates, the last of which was carried out last August when the only advisories were for thin front brake pads and front tyre treads that were in a similar state. While we’re on the subject of braking, the W211 has a lurking banana skin in its Sensotronic Brake Control (SBC), a Daimler/Bosch-developed electro-hydraulic brake system that used a computer to apply the right amount of brake pressure to each wheel. Sounded like the answer to a question nobody had asked, boring old hydraulic systems having been doing a perfectly good job for yonks, but you have to remember that this was a time when the car industry was mad for anything with a chip in it. Predictably it all went wrong, leading to a 680,000 vehicle recall in May 2004 and another one for a piffling 1.3 million or so cars in March 2005.
By 2006 M-B had given up trying to make SBC work on the E-Class, switching it back to conventional hydraulic braking. Ironically, expensive Mercs like the SL, Maybach, and SLR were left to soldier on with SBC because it was too expensive to re-engineer their braking systems. If true, it seems odd that Benz were allowed to get away with that, especially in litigation-happy markets like the USA, but Shed leaves all legal matters to his lawyers (Bob the Binman with his dogeared diploma from the postal degrees department of Oxforde University – the ‘e’ is important) so he won’t be commenting on any of that here.
The good news on this is that in August 2018 Mercedes-Benz extended the warranty on all the main SBC components to 25 years from the warranty's original start date, with no mileage limit, so believe it or not this 2005 car still has five years worth of SBC coverage left. Obviously there are other W211 things that might well blow up, most of them resulting from the mis-direction of electricity (wonky SAM modules playing merry hell with the lights, wipers, central locking etc) but also more tangible stuff like water pumps, thermostats, suspension components and the like.
If you get a good ‘un though you will be pleasantly surprised by the smoothness, efficiency and comfort of the 201hp, 369lb ft from 1,800rpm, 0-62mph in 7.7 seconds E320 diesel wagon. Shed reckons his gen-one S124 is more practical than the gen-three 320 by virtue of it not having any space-robbing curves in its body design, creating a boxiness that makes it capable of accommodating the most unlikely sounding loads that would never fit into a W211, like a wardrobe, a dozen hay bales or half of a medium-sized tree. The 124’s rear windows also lend themselves nicely to the fitment of blackout curtains, an important feature for Shed.
He also enjoys the evocative Berlin rattle and manly exhaust cloud of its normally aspirated straight-six 3.0 diesel. Namby-pamby types reading this might prefer the W211’s greater refinement and, let’s face it, power, given that there is practically none of it in the 3.0 diesel S124. The only bits of spec that Shed’s 124 can match the 211 on are Electric Windows and Arm Rest, but Shed doesn’t care much about that and he has certainly never felt the need for Driver Information as Mrs Shed gives him all he needs and more.
The dealer certainly likes his 320 anyway, telling us not once but twice that it looks and drives superb. He also tells us that the ‘full logbook is to hand’, which for those of you unfamiliar with car dealer speak from the 1950s means that the registration document is available. Shed has never had a vehicle pass through his establishment without a V5 so he’s not sure why dealers put this in their ads as if it’s a huge achievement we should all be marvelling at. Are V5s actually rare? Is Shed the exception rather than the rule? Perhaps a reader who is in the trade can explain.
Being a 2007MY, it was made after MB addressed the faulty balancing shafts in the earlier V6 petrol cars (easily established on t'internet from the engine number) and, if shed is correct, it shouldn't have the troublesome brakes either. It's a rather lovely car for stress-free wafting around and I'm sure this shed has a similar feel to it.
My 2007 car had failing SAM units that liked to present a menu of issues on the dash board - very few of which were diagnosable by my local grease monkey. The auto box freaked out, the hill hold didn’t, etc.
However, went like the brown stuff off a shovel, was extremely comfy and had a banging stereo. Had to virtually give it away months after buying it. Very much preferred my S124 as well.
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