I am the first and only owner of 1985 300D (123 chassis) with 280,000 miles. I recently sent in my car to the shop that has serviced my car in the past 4 years for air-conditioning system check-up. The owner told me that I have oil leak from turbo seal which I did not notice before. Anyway, they repaired it. After getting the car back, I notice a few drops of oil on my garage floor. When I sent my car back to the shop, I did get the warrantee service for the turbo seal oil leak (it leaked again), but in addition, I was told that there were 2 more leaks besides turbo seal, there were leaks from filter gasket, and valve cover gasket. and crankshaft seal. Again, I have them repaired all the leaks. So far I have spent about $350 for repairing the leaks. Yet, when I get the car back, I notice more oil leak. When I sent it back again, I was told that this time the leak comes from cylinder gasket, crankshaft seal and the upper oil pan. To repair the cylinder gasket alone would cost me about $1,850. I addition, they strongly recommended rebuilding cylinder head since they will have it out of the car anyway. This will cost about $800.

Before I send my car back to the shop the last time, I placed a card board underneath the car just in case. I inspected it yesterday and found one cluster of oil drops centered about 3 feet from the front bumper and at the center line of the car. My question is, does this appear to be the spot where cylinder gasket leak would be? Also, I found several other drops located about 10 inches toward the passenger side from the spot of gasket leak and are parallel to the spot of gasket leak, could this be leak from the upper oil pan? I thought I’d see crankshaft seal leak at front of the engine, I did not see it.

This shop specializes in MB repair and I have had good experience with them. I have so far had no reason to suspect any cheating, but is it likely to be so coincidental that I have oil leak from all these places within about 3-4 weeks time frame? Are the charges reasonable?

Thanks in advance to anyone who could provide an advice.

Dalton