PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum - View Single Post

sublettd · #6 07-04-2009, 10:07 PM

I'm not sure you'll get much in the way of an SL for $8,000.00. If you do find one for that price, you will likely need to pour some bucks into it in order to get it up to speed. Maintaining one of these older SL's is not cheap. Buying injectors at $25-$30 bucks a pop is small change when compared to some of the repairs which will inevitably come.

I just finished a complete engine rebuild of my '85 500SL (Euro) and it ran me roughly $10,000.00. The only things in the engine that weren't replaced were 7 pistons, 8 rods, and the valves. Heads were ground, one cylinder was honed and an oversized piston put in it. Rings, camshafts, cam towers, all the bearings, timing chain, tensioner, rails, front and rear seals, oil pump, oil chain, water pump, power steering pump...and the list goes on. Engine was pulled twice, ultimately resulting in boring out the head bolt holes and putting timeserts in the heads.

The aluminum block is a booger when it comes to retorquing the bolts. It's almost inevitable that you will pull one or more threads. I have one thread that came out totally intact in the threads of the head bolt. One other thread came out in pieces. Putting timeserts in the heads has pretty much made the engine bullet proof if the heads have to be removed again. The catch with putting timeserts in the engine is you must purchase a plate with the pattern and exact angle in order to properly align the holes. Plate costs $600.00 thru Baum tools. My mechanic ate the cost of that himself. Said he would need for for future engine rebuilds. Nice guy.

My mechanic gave me a once in a lifetime deal. I got all the parts at his cost and 60 hours of his labor at $45.00 per hour. He put a lot more time into it than that, even with my helping and doing most of the scut work. I now have an engine that should be good for another 150,000 miles. The body was pristine, or I'd never have undertaken the engine rebuild.

One caution for anyone replacing the rings in one of these aluminum engines. The rings MUST BE CHROMED. We priced the rings from Mercedes and they wanted $160.00 per piston. German Auto sold them for about $22.00 per piston. The catch was that theirs are not chromed. We wound up going to Total Seal and having a set of rings manufactured to Mercedes specs for about $25.00 per piston. Interestingly, after we had ordered the rings made, we learned they now have gapless rings available for the engine. The benefit is about another 10 horsepower. Wish we had known they were available and we would have gone that route instead.

These older SL's are great to drive, but are not cheap to own and operate--even if you do much of the work yourself.