buying 2011 E350CGI petrol rather than 350 diesel, bad idea?

[philcray]

I have seen a 2011 E Class estate 350CGI petrol Sport for under £30k with good spec and low miles. The default is of course to buy a diesel but is the petrol really a bad idea.... The 350 seems quite rare (unpopular perhaps?) but I imagine is a silky smooth drive and probably not much worse on juice than the 350 diesel in the real world?

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/2011...

The list price is over £40k + extras so it has dropped well over £10k in less than a year and looks a sensible price.

I would look to keep for at least 5 years by which time petrol may well have come back into vogue so could be a good buy....?

Any thoughts welcome, especially if anyone has experience of the 350 petrol engine.

Cheers

Phil

[firesafetydave]

Hi Phil,
Not really answering your question but, i have a 350 CDi sport estate and love it.
Had it about 16 months now, 30k miles and an average mpg of just over 33. i do drive quite hard most of the time. i have driven like ms daisy for a day and it goes up to mid 40's , but boy is it boring.
The big thing at the moment to consider is that petrol is nearly 10p a liter cheaper in most garages.
Whatever you choose, a fantastic car.
DAve

[philcray]

Thanks Dave, great to hear your thoughts on the car. I have to say that petrol is looking more attractive and the new 350 petrol has a claimed 38mpg on the combined cycle which sounds ideal (might even get 30mpg + in real life perhaps!)

[r129sl]

The diesels are impressive but, ignoring fuel consumption and depreciation and such like, the petrol motor is so much nicer. Smoother, softer, more progressive, longer-legged. I always find the short bursts of mega torque offered by these diesels to be unsatisfying and thuggish and somewhat difficult to deploy with finesse, whereas the petrol motor is gloriously refined. In an ideal world, I'd take the petrol over the diesel. As it is, I can't afford either! The petrol car will probably cost you a bit more (not much if you don't do a lot of miles) but if you can afford it, I'd enjoy it.

[CarbonBlackM5]

Depends on what type of roads you are going to use and the amount of miles I guess.

When I was looking at a W203 C Class it was a toss up between a 320CDI or a 350i. I do 12 miles a day so the extra cost of diesel just wasnt going to justify buying the CDI and the price of the car was higher too.

In the end I got a C350 and as an example today I did a 225 mile trip to Birmingham seeing customers and got 28mpg and that was doing a steady 80 on the way up and a little faster on the way back. Not bad for 272bhp and the new 350 is supposed to me much more econonomic.

I reckon you have made your mind up by the sounds of it

Go petrol.

[tcant]

I have the new 350 petrol engine in my C class coupe. I drove from York to Reading early on a sunday morning, A1, M1, M25, M4, A329m without stopping and not going over 80mph. I was amazed at the trip computer when I got back (see picture). The 350 blue efficiency petrol engine is superb, smooth and responsive.

[Carmo99]

tcant said:

I have the new 350 petrol engine in my C class coupe. I drove from York to Reading early on a sunday morning, A1, M1, M25, M4, A329m without stopping and not going over 80mph. I was amazed at the trip computer when I got back (see picture). The 350 blue efficiency petrol engine is superb, smooth and responsive.

Tcant - What's the green ECO light for?

[tcant]

Carmo99 said:

Tcant - What's the green ECO light for?

The ECO light shows you have the start / stop technology switched on. I didn't stop on my run from York so it wasn't actually required.

Tell you the truth, I normally switch it off, it turns the engine off too quick for my liking (even whilst momentarily paused at a T-Junction for example). Not sure it improves fuel ecomonmy that much having to restart six cylinders every time you come to stop.

[Dunit]

tcant said:

I have the new 350 petrol engine in my C class coupe. I drove from York to Reading early on a sunday morning, A1, M1, M25, M4, A329m without stopping and not going over 80mph. I was amazed at the trip computer when I got back (see picture). The 350 blue efficiency petrol engine is superb, smooth and responsive.





Thats very impressive with that average speed!

[amokwa]

philcray said:

Thanks Dave, great to hear your thoughts on the car. I have to say that petrol is looking more attractive and the new 350 petrol has a claimed 38mpg on the combined cycle which sounds ideal (might even get 30mpg + in real life perhaps!)

It also has the same hp as the turbo-charged 335i

[firesafetydave]

I think that economy from your 350 petrol is great, but at those speeds the diesel would have got another 10 miles to the gallon.

[tcant]

firesafetydave said:

I think that economy from your 350 petrol is great, but at those speeds the diesel would have got another 10 miles to the gallon.

I agree with your statement but it all depends on the miles you do a year.

A new E350 diesel costs £2,000 more than an E350 petrol (according to the merc price list for the same variant)....

So, say you do 10,000 miles a year and the petrol does 30 mpg and the diesel 40 mpg, you would use an extra 83 gallons of petrol (with 4.55 litres to the gallon @ £1.32 per litre) at an additional cost of £500. Deduct from that the extra 7p per litre you would have paid for diesel over the 10,000 miles (£76). The net additional cost of driving the petrol version is £424 per year. You would need to keep the car 5 years to recoup the extra £2000 you paid for it in the first place.

Also, servicing costs are higher on a diesel, so from my somewhat simple logic, unless you are doing serious mileage per annum a petrol 350 is cheaper overall.

...and of course you have the joy of driving a silky smooth petrol rather than an oil burner as well (this is pistonheads after all).

[philcray]

I am still in 2 minds on the 350 petrol v Diesel debate.... Not sure if anybody knows if the 2011 model 350 diesel has had a significant upgrade? This one on autotrader claims 265bhp and 44mpg combined which is up from around 235bhp and 30mpg combined of the 2010 model, is that correct as it seems quite an improvement?

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/2011...

Cheers

Phil

[Aeroresh]

Yeah, it was upgraded earlier in the year along with some other improvements to the gearbox + stop start eco and some minor trim changes.

Waiting for my new E350 CDI cabriolet to be delviered next week so cant comment on economy yet but judging from the interweb, it does seem alot better in the new models.

[philcray]

It has thrown a bit of a spanner in the works re my petrol decision....

I have also seen an 11 plate E350cdi Sport estate at MB Colindale for under £30k with 9,000 miles and good spec eg full leather, 7 seats, COMAND etc

The car is only 6 months old and must have listed at around £45k so that is quite a chunk of depreciation....

[Aeroresh]

another oonsideration should be the time of year.

I went into my local dealer who was keen to meet his end of year targets and managed to get pretty much 20% off the new list price as long as it was a car that they could lay their hands on and be delivered before the end of the year. Certainly beat any broker price I could find by a fair chunk and meant I could have a spanking new car for less then they were asking for year old cars.

Id imagine going in tomorrow or after boxing day, alot of dealers would be very keen for a deal!