Need some advice from the wise and experienced.

My 1992 400e is coming up to retirement. I put about 2600-3000 miles on a car a year only, though whatever I get would be my daily driver. For that milage I don't want to spend a tremendous amount on a new car, it simply does not make sense in terms of depreciation; and I like older german cars with some soul in them. But I also need something solid and reasonable in terms of upkeep. The 400e has served that purpose well for 6 years. bought it for 4k never had it break on me, had some years with 1k or more of repairs, and others with none beyond oil changes and other maintenance, etc.

I am beginning to look around for a suitable replacement and have recently been tempted by a 1996 s600. black on black/grey; visibly it is great shape, perfect interior/leather and paint minus a minor scrape on the front corner fender. everything seems to work. drives like a dream. both throttle bodies just replaced along with rear shocks. about 70k mileage 12k but probably could get it for a bit less, also would sell or trade the 400e.


Before I send the car over to my trusted swiss german mechanic for checking just thought I would ping the forum, which has given me some great guidance, on whether I have am simply delusional on the ability of a 1996 v12 to fit the needs listed above.

The forums are a bit split on the v12s between whether they are a relatively reasonable in terms of maintenance, with the m120 being not much different than the m119 in terms of costs of upkeep, and those who say that if you have to even ask about maintenance costs of a v12 then you have no business even thinking about getting one. the 1996 has done away with caps and rotors, does not have the biodegradable wiring harness, etc. The heat build up is a concern as I live in a hot and humid place and almost all of the issues I have had with the 400e are perhaps reasonably attributed in part to age and in part to a really hot engine compartment adding wearing parts (belt tensioner, every 2 years, caps and rotors, every 2-3 years, cracked tubes, worn out cooling fans, electronics baked, etc). plus the mono-wiper that had to be replaced because of baked/dried grease in the gears, headliner collapsing due to dried out glue, etc. Thus, I am a concerned about a v12 in a coupe body baking everything unless they figured out a better cooling and airflow system. Then there is the factor that the 600s coupes are not as common as the sedan models, making replacement parts, engine or otherwise, rather more rare and thus costly.

I can do some things, caps/rotors/plugs, minor fixes, belts, new headliner installation, r&r an instrument cluster, that sort of thing. But I am not looking for a hobby.

for the money or a bit more i could get a 2000s era c or e class merc or a 3 or 5 series bmw with similar miles however. or I could jump the germanic ship ( I rented a g37 a year ago on a trip and i have to say I was quite impressed and it made me think there may be non-german, more reliable, alternatives. Doubt either the newer mercs nor alternatives wil have the same "soul" as the old w124 or w120s however. But soul can be high maintenance. on the other hand, its a nice nice ride.
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Christopher

400e >> 1992 >> 196k miles
Black Pearl Metallic/Grey Interior

No ownership experience but I've seen a more M120s in California junkyards than M119s. That engine bay looks like a world of pain.

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CENSORED due to not family friendly words

I know a close acquaintance of mine (late dad's old freind) he had one of them brand new.

According to him

The car feels like nothing else he's driven with wheels. The smoothness of the engine and the solid flat torque acceleration is addictive.

The cost to upkeep the car in good shape is quite high, think about sparing 4000/year. Not that you will need to dump the 4 grand every single year but still it may ask for that.

He also says that these cars love to be sped on long highways, keeping them stashed away for too long is injustice.

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2012 BMW X5 (Beef + Granite suspension model)

1995 E300D - The original humming machine (consumed by Flood 2017)
2000 E320 - The evolution (consumed by flood 2017)

Mus,
I too live in a hot area. It will be 118F here in a couple of days. Summers stay in the low 110's. I got in the habit years ago with my E420 to raise the hood when I put it away for the day. I am always amazed at the heat that comes off the engine. It just takes a second to do this. I have never had a heat related problem with my V-8 that we have had for over 8 years.
Anziani
'97 CL500 137K
'95 E420 130K