600S Price Reflections--Goes With The Times
 

Been waiting for the prices of the V12 S Class Cars to come down, well...it has been happening. I found this nice S600 Sedan from a dealer. Wonder what he paid for it?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Mercedes-Benz-S-Class-4-Dr-S600-Se-1995-MERCEDES-S600-V12-TV-DVD-AMG-WHEELS-LOW-MILES_W0QQcmdZViewItemQQcategoryZ6336QQitemZ4633138232

Now with the price of fuel soaring, I can afford to buy it, but can't afford to drive it. The Rich get richer and the Poor get poorer. What else is new? Remember the Sonny and Cher Song, "The Beat Goes On..." ?:scream:

I would imagine starting the car alone would cost $10!

Sad really, my friends dad paid a fair amount more then that for his 95 a few years ago.

They don't burn to much fuel if you keep your foot out of it. They will come darn near close to 20mpg if you drive with an egg under your foot, at 55mpg on nice flat roads.:D

Expect low teens, probably about 560SEL mileage actualy.

New they ran about $130kish.

I get 17- 19 MPG out of my 95 S600 on the highway at 70-75'ish. The motor is actually turning under 2500 rpm. Seem little throttle input is needed to maintain speed.
The S600 is a tank, reliable, and reasonable on gas. If you have the opportunity to own one.... I would highly recommend it.
If you want super-economy....buy a Jetta Diesel. This is a MERCEDES.

How true!:D Its like when people complain about having to fix them, well you bought a $130k car, pay up or trade for a Honda.

Or get the 6cyl S class. All the pleasure with none of the guilt.

While some of the "upgrades" on the S600 such as leather dash and door panels, rear A/C and hydropnumatic suspension are nice they are things that eventually break and since they are only found on the V8 and V12 models cost a fortune to fix. I don't miss them at all in my "stripped" w-140.

The only feature I really like about the S600 is the leather door panels and dash. A lot of the Italian cars such as Maserati's and Ferrari's have leather dash boards and its quite luxurious. The only problem is you can't leave them in the sun for ANY period of time. Most of the time the leather is glued on top of a plastic substrate and the very neat looking seams will start to move and distort over time. Personally I would rather look at Vinal in perfect shape than distorted and warped leather.

In my opinion "most" S600 buyers buy them for bragging rights than actual performance as with most of the other cars. Here in America with our 55mph speed limits we can't even harness the full potential of the 6cyl models let alone the V12's. Its just a case of expensive one upmanship.

55? Who drives 55? Sheesh. Just Sunday I drove down 294 north of Chi-town. Nobody was doing less than 75. I got behind a group that was doing 95 to a hundred for at least 15 miles.
BTW - the SL rides sweet at 100.

Have you been asleep under a rock for the last ten years? The federal double nickel speed limit was eliminated as a bonus under Newt Gingrich' leadership and the "Contract with America".

States now set speed limits and most interstate highways except in some urban areas are 65-75.

Duke

Having been around both, the S320 is a sweet car. But its like comparing beer to vodka, one has a heck of a punch.:D

The S320 is a great car, until you have sampled the S600 then its a bit of a let down. They M104 does a splended job of moving the W140 around but it just lacks the punch that the 400hp M120 has.

Going from SDL to S320, "wow this is pretty cool". Going from S600 to S320, "thats it?":D

Really the entire driveline and suspension are different.

S320 sticker $70kish, S600 $130kish.:eek:

2 is always better than 1. The M120 is basically 2 M104's joined at the crank.:)

Amazing how cheap they are to purchase. Woe be it to you if something should go wrong, I suppose.

Well actualy since the M120 is two M104's, engine parts are not to bad. MB made a million M104's.:D

Its the suspension stuff that I'd imagin would add up. But its a $130k car so whats $5k here or their.:D

12 cents on the original sticker dollar isn't that bad...

that's about what I paid for our 300e and CE...probably a bit less..

since it was a private bid... who knows if the car even sold....someone may have tried to scoop it up..and the owner had to be his own top bidder...

i would really think nothing of paying that much money if it had a standard suspension... i wouldn't want to get into those big bucks....

whats the difference between spending 50 dollars a week to 60 or 65...take lunch to work..or make your own coffee in the morning...

Problem is, where I live, there are numerous people not qualified to drive over 45 miles per hour. My "driving" experience is more like "goober avoidance". I get almost as much stress driving 10 miles to work down a 2-lane road as I got driving 290 to route 83 in Chicago.

On a more interesting subject, I wonder, given the better aerodynamics and efficiencies of modern post-80's cars, if driving 55 vs 70 would actually even save any significant amount of gas. Does anyone out there have a real-time MPG display on their car?

I find my cost per mile is much lower under 100mph. The fuel savings are the most obvious benefit to driving a reasonable speed. Those speeding tickets and defense attorney bills seriously start to add up after a while. In Georgia where I live our fastest speed limit is 70mph. Driving 30mph over the speed limit is a great way to get your license suspended.

I find that my shiny black Mercedes gets noticed by the Barney Fife set. I recently got a nice ticket in a speed trap for driving a scorching 66mph. :(

Hmmmm... Most of the late model Mercedes cars do. My w-140 has one. To answer your question yes there is a difference especially when one goes up and down hills..... There is a difference on the fuel economy guage between lower speeds around 55mph and higher speeds around 70+mph..... One of the biggest things that affect fuel economy is throttle position..... If you maintain a constant throttle position you get a better MPG (with the cruise control) being stuck in traffic and having to accelerate and decelerate with traffic or just not paying attention to your cruising speed is bad on fuel economy.

I fly private planes as a hobby and have done a lot of fuel calculations while flying. Airplanes use GPH (gallons per hour) for their economy ratings. There is a HUGE difference in GPH ratings for cruise speed and departure/arrival flight. There is also a dramatic difference in GPH depending on what percentage power your using.

Most of the gas powered Mercedes do have the economy guage. If you watch it it does go up and down depending on RPM and engine load. Perhaps if you were creative you could do some mathmatics based on the fuel economy and give the guage some rough numbers.