Thanks manny, will let you know how it goes.

If I owned that new C230 of yours, I would be doing an additional oil change in between the specified interval. So if it says every 20K Km, I would be doing an interim oil change only (not full service) every 10K Km. I may be a tad biased at this point though...

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Chris
2007 E550 4Matic - 61,000 Km - Iridium Silver, black leather, Sport package, Premium 2 package
2007 GL450 4Matic - 62,000 Km - Obsidian Black Metallic, black leather, all options
1998 E430 - sold
1989 300E - 333,000 Km - sold
1977 280E - sold
1971 250 - retired

"And a frign hat. They gave me a hat at the annual benefits meeting. I said. how does this benefit me. I dont have anything from the company.. So they gave me a hat." - TheDon

Heh, heh, great minds think alike.
I changed my own oil after 7500 km , then "A" service at 15 k km and you can bet I will " sneak " another oilchange in there, before the "B" service is do.

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2007 C 230 Sport.

Nice. I wish the original owner of my car had been as sneaky.

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Chris
2007 E550 4Matic - 61,000 Km - Iridium Silver, black leather, Sport package, Premium 2 package
2007 GL450 4Matic - 62,000 Km - Obsidian Black Metallic, black leather, all options
1998 E430 - sold
1989 300E - 333,000 Km - sold
1977 280E - sold
1971 250 - retired

"And a frign hat. They gave me a hat at the annual benefits meeting. I said. how does this benefit me. I dont have anything from the company.. So they gave me a hat." - TheDon

Here are some pics of the oil cap and filler area. The reddish-brown sludge is visible on the sides of the filler area and also down lower on the actual valvetrain.

Pics aren't the best, but that is as close as my digital cam can get.

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Chris
2007 E550 4Matic - 61,000 Km - Iridium Silver, black leather, Sport package, Premium 2 package
2007 GL450 4Matic - 62,000 Km - Obsidian Black Metallic, black leather, all options
1998 E430 - sold
1989 300E - 333,000 Km - sold
1977 280E - sold
1971 250 - retired

"And a frign hat. They gave me a hat at the annual benefits meeting. I said. how does this benefit me. I dont have anything from the company.. So they gave me a hat." - TheDon

So the car came back from the dealer today. The tech who diagnosed the car is someone I know and I trust him, he's a solid guy.

They had the car for quite a while and went over the engine. Total bill was $600, which included 16 new plugs (at my request since they pulled them anyway for testing and my car is due to replace them). What they found was that it appears to be the valve guides leaking. They did compression tests and leak test. Also checked the PCV system and it was fine.

Here are the readings -

Cyl 1 - 150
Cyl 2 - 150
Cyl 3 - 140
Cyl 4 - 150
Cyl 5 - 140
Cyl 6 - 150
Cyl 7 - 160
Cyl 8 - 160

He also mentioned that there was some oil fouling on the plugs and that it appeared to be from one direction only.

So...appears to be valves (guides/seals).

My option now is to have the heads redone ($2500) and dealer says there may be potential for MB Canada help if the heads are sludged when they pull the valve covers. I'm not counting on it though, and I don't think the dealer is either, though they were optimistic about it.

If it is just the valves (guides/seals) then I can live with that. Given what I paid, I'm comfortable having the heads done if this fixes the problem.

Any other opinions?

TIA.

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Chris
2007 E550 4Matic - 61,000 Km - Iridium Silver, black leather, Sport package, Premium 2 package
2007 GL450 4Matic - 62,000 Km - Obsidian Black Metallic, black leather, all options
1998 E430 - sold
1989 300E - 333,000 Km - sold
1977 280E - sold
1971 250 - retired

"And a frign hat. They gave me a hat at the annual benefits meeting. I said. how does this benefit me. I dont have anything from the company.. So they gave me a hat." - TheDon

Well if your trust them, and it sounds like they did a lot of diagnostic work to arrive at that conclusion.

You shouldn't have replaced the spark plugs, now your new ones are just going to foul out.

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2016 Corvette Stingray 2LT
1969 280SE
2023 Ram 1500
2007 Tiara 3200

They may get a bit fouled, but I plan on having the work done soon and I would think any oil will burn off once the heads are fixed? Good point though.

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Chris
2007 E550 4Matic - 61,000 Km - Iridium Silver, black leather, Sport package, Premium 2 package
2007 GL450 4Matic - 62,000 Km - Obsidian Black Metallic, black leather, all options
1998 E430 - sold
1989 300E - 333,000 Km - sold
1977 280E - sold
1971 250 - retired

"And a frign hat. They gave me a hat at the annual benefits meeting. I said. how does this benefit me. I dont have anything from the company.. So they gave me a hat." - TheDon

$2500? Get that in writing as that sounds like a VERY reasonable price for a two-head V-8 job, especially from a dealer. It's what my indie charges, and he's usually about $1K below the local dealers.

If the dealer thinks MB Canada might pitch in if they find sludge, I bet there really is a good chance they will. They deal with these problems all the time and have a good idea of what is going on with regards to goodwill. It's my experience with many MB out of warranty goodwill that MB Canada offers to split the bill with the customer. One exception seems to be the spring perches, as anyone I've known with the issue has had 100% of it covered. Seeing as you have a W210, you might want to dove into that as well as it looks like you're keeping her...

(Oh, and if you're going to have the heads done, don't delay, as the oil is going to destroy the cats, and then you're going to be out several thou more..)

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John Shellenberg
1998 C230 "Black Betty" 240K

http://img31.exs.cx/img31/4050/tophat6.gif