RE: Mercedes-Benz CL600: Spotted

[anonymous-user]

People tend to get excited by people adding up warranty/dealership invoices as an example of how much these cars cost to run, but in most cases there are alternative repair solutions available that are sometimes a fraction of what a main dealer would have charged to repair the same fault 5-10 years ago. It for that reason the old "Its a £100,000 car, so has £100,000 running costs" saying makes my teeth itch.

A couple of examples:
Front and rear valve blocks for the ABC system are listed at around 2 grand EACH. Its the seals that always fail, but are not available via Mercedes, but are available 'aftermarket' for 60 quid a set and fitted within a couple of hours for anyone half competent with a spanner.
ABC/Tandem pumps are again listed by dealers at between £1500-£2000. Its a LUK pump. ECP will supply exactly the same pump with exactly the same part number for ~ £750, or refurbished pumps are available for ~ £350 from a number of suppliers.
Even with staff discount, the quote to repair my EIS failure on my 600 was close to £1000, and would require me to have the car recovered to a dealer. I had the switch refurbished, with a longer warranty than a brand new switch for £350. And I didn't need the car recovering.

Does that make them 'cheap' to run. Hell no. But in terms of the performance you get from a 600TT or 55K car, they are fairly reasonable. Lets not forget that the other car packing similar performance anywhere close to this sort of money also have known faults blown out of proportion by the internet - V10 M5 spin bearings. C5 RS6s nom transmissions. 5.0S/C Jag engines randomly fail. Etc.

However, as mentioned previously by other posts, I don't think it is worth bothering with a non FI 55/600. Similar running costs as the FI cars, but are a 1/3 of the hp down on a 55K or 600TT. A non TT 600 is arguably the worst of both worlds, with it still having expensive coil packs, ABC AND a dodgy oil cooler seals that require the heads to come off (all for the sake of a couple of poorly placed bolts), but only a meager 350bhp.

[Chestrockwell]

At the time there was nothing like this on the road, average cars such as golfs focus’s and corollas were all very simple cars, not even traction control or even temapture gauges in some instances.

This car is basically a money pit with all the feautures / sensors and all sorts that could go wrong.

I wonder what it will be like in 18 years to buy a focus or golf, that most have the same feautures as this CL here. Will they give you the same bills?

[E65Ross]

Chestrockwell said:

I wonder what it will be like in 18 years to buy a focus or golf, that most have the same feautures as this CL here. Will they give you the same bills?

No

[Hairymonster]

chris333 said:

keegs111 said:

This car was sold at auction in March for £5300 including fees

https://www.historics.co.uk/buying/auctions/2018-0...

Private seller now. Would be interesting to know the reason for sale...

The chance to enjoy a big luxo-barge for a few weeks then turn a quick £1,500 profit before any big bills are looming?

[R4PID]

J4CKO said:

There are cars that are money pits, this is a money quarry or money sink hole

Even with my predilection for ageing German liabilities this is too much, it doesnt really have enough interest or want factor to make it worth the potential agro, dont get me wrong, sure it is nice but it isnt all that powerful in the scheme of things and these are in the hinterland of old Mercs, nowhere near classic and looking a bit old.

Completely agree. The reason its so cheap is simply because there is zero demand.

[daemon]

Hairymonster said:

chris333 said:

keegs111 said:

This car was sold at auction in March for £5300 including fees

https://www.historics.co.uk/buying/auctions/2018-0...

Private seller now. Would be interesting to know the reason for sale...

The chance to enjoy a big luxo-barge for a few weeks then turn a quick £1,500 profit before any big bills are looming?

Or bought specifically to resell at a profit.

Hes either a trader, part time trader OR maybe has bought it and stuck a price tag on it and is going to enjoy it in the meantime until it sells - probably with a bit of profit to boot.

Edited by daemon on Sunday 8th April 16:06

[xcentric]

keegs111, how did you know it was sold at auction? either great search skills, or you've got a pretty good memory!

edit: I'd rather have an S class, I think - waftability, possibly aged less (its those headlights that make it show its years), and probably smaller bills.....

[anonymous-user]

Aes87 said:

They only dropped the 5.8 V12 because it was too expensive to build - it is a proper masterpiece, and finds its best manifestation in this glorious coupe.

One of the great Mercedes.

No way the 5.8 was dropped because of costs; It got replaced with an engine very similar in displacement and design but with two turbo chargers and a 1/3 more power.

Are you sure you're not confusing the 5.8 with the DOHC 6.0? I'd agree that the earlier M120 is a proper engineering marvel. The 5.8 in comparison is a bit 'meh'.

[Motorrad]

Twin turbo or nothing. Replacing the coil packs on these NA V12s could fund the extra purchase cost of the more powerful car.

[nicfaz]

WorldBoss said:

People tend to get excited by people adding up warranty/dealership invoices as an example of how much these cars cost to run, but in most cases there are alternative repair solutions available that are sometimes a fraction of what a main dealer would have charged to repair the same fault 5-10 years ago. It for that reason the old "Its a £100,000 car, so has £100,000 running costs" saying makes my teeth itch.

A couple of examples:
Front and rear valve blocks for the ABC system are listed at around 2 grand EACH. Its the seals that always fail, but are not available via Mercedes, but are available 'aftermarket' for 60 quid a set and fitted within a couple of hours for anyone half competent with a spanner.
ABC/Tandem pumps are again listed by dealers at between £1500-£2000. Its a LUK pump. ECP will supply exactly the same pump with exactly the same part number for ~ £750, or refurbished pumps are available for ~ £350 from a number of suppliers.
Even with staff discount, the quote to repair my EIS failure on my 600 was close to £1000, and would require me to have the car recovered to a dealer. I had the switch refurbished, with a longer warranty than a brand new switch for £350. And I didn't need the car recovering.

Does that make them 'cheap' to run. Hell no. But in terms of the performance you get from a 600TT or 55K car, they are fairly reasonable. Lets not forget that the other car packing similar performance anywhere close to this sort of money also have known faults blown out of proportion by the internet - V10 M5 spin bearings. C5 RS6s nom transmissions. 5.0S/C Jag engines randomly fail. Etc.

However, as mentioned previously by other posts, I don't think it is worth bothering with a non FI 55/600. Similar running costs as the FI cars, but are a 1/3 of the hp down on a 55K or 600TT. A non TT 600 is arguably the worst of both worlds, with it still having expensive coil packs, ABC AND a dodgy oil cooler seals that require the heads to come off (all for the sake of a couple of poorly placed bolts), but only a meager 350bhp.

This post is absolutely spot on. As an owner of a (different) 55k car, it's those or the 600TT that are worth it, not this one. And those idiots spouting "if you can't afford to buy it new you can't afford to run it" are indeed clueless.

[ocrx8]

I really dislike the way the c-pillars blend into (or don’t) the boot. I must be in the minority as most seem to think it’s an elegant design.

[406dogvan]

We had a CL500 of this era in for some electrical work last year (seats, SAMs and tracking some drain) - owner blew-through most of a grand but at least the modules are mostly non-coded/can be swapped for used bits (most of which are probably broken - obv)

He wasn't hugely worried as he'd thrown 5 times that into the engine and had plans for more spending - he said he'd found 'the best one he could' - he'd spend FAR more than this BEFORE the work started (I think a 500 probably sells for more than a 600 for this reason)

If we're honest, the build quality wasn't there - I went to move the seat and the switch panel ( in the door ) fell out - the boot auto-close wasn't working (I suspect that car had been hit and wasn't 100% straight) - the engine sounded rough even tho it had been throughly gone through etc. etc.

You're taking on a major moneysink but it's a nice looking one - a service alone would buy you a nice shed (car or actual)

[406dogvan]

nicfaz said:

This post is absolutely spot on. As an owner of a (different) 55k car, it's those or the 600TT that are worth it, not this one. And those idiots spouting "if you can't afford to buy it new you can't afford to run it" are indeed clueless.

There's still a massive dollop of truth in the £100K car has £100K running costs thing

Not everything can be bodged or worked-around - even in this era and a newer car (say post 2010) is FAR worse.

We had a 2009 ML recently with an indicator fault - the ONLY solution was a new rear SAM from MB (over £2000 and an 8 week wait) which has to be coded by someone with STAR + subscription - that's the sort of thing you have to accept with cars like that, almost £3000 to make the indicators work

The CL500 we had took a used SAM but that was still £350 and whilst it solved the drain/crash issues the old one had, it had a few quirks of it's own so it needs an occasional 'hard reset' to keep it chooching...

A V10/12 will also ruin you just on consumables - plugs, coil packs, the sheer amount of oil etc. - even a cheap service is costly.
My boss ran an S6 (V10) and still notably winces if you say "coil pack replacement" or "intake flaps"

[KillerHERTZ]

ocrx8 said:

I really dislike the way the c-pillars blend into (or don’t) the boot. I must be in the minority as most seem to think it’s an elegant design.

Its referencing the W111 rear window, which is a thing of beauty:

[keegs111]

xcentric said:

keegs111, how did you know it was sold at auction? either great search skills, or you've got a pretty good memory!

edit: I'd rather have an S class, I think - waftability, possibly aged less (its those headlights that make it show its years), and probably smaller bills.....

I was there, had 4 cars in the same auction

[Tommie38]

In a car like a CL, I agree that the non FI motors aren’t worth the bork risk.

That said, the NA 55 engine in other cars makes a lot of sense - it really is a fantastic motor. The trick is to buy it in cars that aren’t horribly complex (go for CLK, SLK, C) and avoid ones that rust (anything pre 2003 ish).

[lord trumpton]

5.8l V12 with a measly 360hp and 18mpg

fk off.

[Hairymonster]

406dogvan said:

nicfaz said:

This post is absolutely spot on. As an owner of a (different) 55k car, it's those or the 600TT that are worth it, not this one. And those idiots spouting "if you can't afford to buy it new you can't afford to run it" are indeed clueless.

There's still a massive dollop of truth in the £100K car has £100K running costs thing

Not everything can be bodged or worked-around - even in this era and a newer car (say post 2010) is FAR worse.

We had a 2009 ML recently with an indicator fault - the ONLY solution was a new rear SAM from MB (over £2000 and an 8 week wait) which has to be coded by someone with STAR + subscription - that's the sort of thing you have to accept with cars like that, almost £3000 to make the indicators work

The CL500 we had took a used SAM but that was still £350 and whilst it solved the drain/crash issues the old one had, it had a few quirks of it's own so it needs an occasional 'hard reset' to keep it chooching...

A V10/12 will also ruin you just on consumables - plugs, coil packs, the sheer amount of oil etc. - even a cheap service is costly.
My boss ran an S6 (V10) and still notably winces if you say "coil pack replacement" or "intake flaps"

Not everyone that lusts after big old barges like this had the necessary skills to keep one running themselves by spending time on the users' forums and learning the tricks to avoid ruinous running costs.

I would LURVE something like this, but I know the first time I switched the ignition on and saw loads of red lights coming on and not disappearing during the pre-flight checks, I would be worrying about which of my children's body parts it may be necessary to sell to get the thing repaired!

These SAMs (Signal Acquisition Modules) sound like a complete f***ing nightmare. £3k to get the bloody indicators working. What sort of manufacturer thinks this is the way to go, such that a relatively simple, yet obligatory car function needs that sort of dosh to sort out? (yeah, I know, Mercedes) - No wonder KIA's 7 year 100k warranty is such a hit. Such are the perils inherent in luxo-barging :-)

Does anyone know how to change the cam-belts on my Maserati BiTurbo? Who knew that those oblong-shaped headlamps, of which there were 2 on either side of the Maser, were the same units fitted to a Fiat 127 of the same era?

(Haven't really got a Biturbo, despite having lusted over them since the early 90's. If you want a serious moneypit......)

Edited by Hairymonster on Sunday 8th April 22:49

[ArmaghMan]

Tommie38 said:

In a car like a CL, I agree that the non FI motors aren’t worth the bork risk.

That said, the NA 55 engine in other cars makes a lot of sense - it really is a fantastic motor. The trick is to buy it in cars that aren’t horribly complex (go for CLK, SLK, C) and avoid ones that rust (anything pre 2003 ish).

p

Every time a topic like this comes up some idiot will say ANYTHING pre 2000 or ALL W210s, or all 1990s Mercedes will be a total rust bucket.
They don't all rust.
Some have absolutely no rust anywhere

[Fattyfat]

ArmaghMan said:

Tommie38 said:

In a car like a CL, I agree that the non FI motors aren’t worth the bork risk.

That said, the NA 55 engine in other cars makes a lot of sense - it really is a fantastic motor. The trick is to buy it in cars that aren’t horribly complex (go for CLK, SLK, C) and avoid ones that rust (anything pre 2003 ish).

p

Every time a topic like this comes up some idiot will say ANYTHING pre 2000 or ALL W210s, or all 1990s Mercedes will be a total rust bucket.
They don't all rust.
Some have absolutely no rust anywhere

Do you still have that? I remember seeing it for sale, looked very very clean