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Old 02-09-2008, 09:34 PM
Skippy Skippy is offline
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Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Carson City, NV
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Quote:
Originally Posted by t walgamuth View Post
Mercedes built an excellent car. I believe they still do from a mechanical and safety standpoint. Unfortunately they are nothing special when it comes to electronic gizmos and modern cars have more than their share of that CRAP.

Tom W
I believe this is a generally true statement.

Now just to play devil's advocate, I would like to point out a few examples of excellent American vehicles:

1. My mom's '63 Dodge Dart had 280,000 miles on the original engine when my dad drove it to the junkyard. It was junked partly because it was burning oil at a prodigious rate (could have been fixed with a relatively inexpensive rebuild) but mostly because it had spent its entire life in PA and NJ and had the associated corrosion issues, to which Mercedes of the era were by no means immune. This sort of longevity was fairly common for the 225 Slant Six.

2. The Ford Panther platform (Crown Vic, Mercury Grand Marquis, Lincoln Town Car). I only drove mine to 156,00 miles before I let it go. The guy I sold it to is still driving it. I didn't really have problems with it until I started using it to commute at 50-70 mph on a dirt/rock/mud road to work every day. I could have dealt with some repairs and kept it going much longer, but gas was getting over $2/gal, and I really wanted a diesel. I've heard of many less-abused examples in livery service making it to 300,000 miles or more, and one beyond 500,000.

3. Full-size diesel pickups, of which I'd say the 12v and early 24v Dodge Cummins were the best examples, though even weak-suck 6.2 and 6.5 GM's have been known to last over 300k. Cummins and Powerstrokes with over 500,000 are not unheard of. The Duramax may have as much longevity potential, but they haven't been around long enough for us to know yet.

4. Ford F150 with the 300 straight six aka 4.9L in later years. These have similar longevity to a 225 Slant Six (or an OM617 for that matter). Not much power, but plenty of torque and good on gas. I'd still consider a 2wd F150 5 spd with the 300.
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Whoever said there's nothing more expensive than a cheap Mercedes never had a cheap Jaguar.

83 300D Turbo with manual conversion, early W126 vented front rotors and H4 headlights 401,xxx miles
08 Suzuki GSX-R600 M4 Slip-on 26,xxx miles
88 Jaguar XJS V12 94,xxx miles. Work in progress.
99 Mazda Miata 183,xxx miles.
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