My wife bought an '83 280SL Euro from her dad. the car has about 205,000 miles on the m110 engine. The engine is consuming about 1.5 qts of oil per tank of fuel around town. Ive been told that the valve stem seals are leaking. If this was a chevy small block I would have no problems fixing it, But the m110 engine takes me out of my comfort zone.

Can anyone give me any information on what I am getting in to with this project. If the seals are leaking is that an indication of the guides having excessive wear?

Are there any tech manuals out there that cover the M110 engine in great detail?

Thanks for the help

The M110's are great oil burners as they age. It could be seals, guides, or rings or all of the above. You need to do a compression and leak-down test to tell for sure.

You can try the seals alone, but you need a good valve spring compressor that will work with the OH cams, and compressed air blown in through the spark plug hole to hold the valves up.

The Haynes manual "Mercedes Benz 280 123 Series" has a good section on the engine.

__________________
Chuck Taylor
Falls Church VA
'66 200, '66 230SL, '96 SL500. Sold: '81 380SL, '86 300E, '72 250C, '95 C220, 3 '84 280SL's '90 420SEL, '72 280SE, '73 280C, '78 280SE, '70 280SL, '77 450SL, '85 380SL, '87 560SL, '85 380SL, '72 350SL, '96 S500 Coupe

I am constantly hearing people that want to do a valve job when all that is necessary is VG seals. Well the M110 engine is the exception to the rule. It is a terrible job. It is atleast half the work of a whole valve job. One must remove the cam housing and then approach like other motors.

With 200k pull the head and repalce the guides. The bottom ends are pretty good.

__________________
Steve Brotherton
Continental Imports
Gainesville FL
Bosch Master, ASE Master, L1
33 years MB technician

Thanks.
Are these M110 heads known for warping when removed?

Should have looked at the manual first.

I had a good experience with a rebuilt head from Adsit (www.adsitco.com) on my 280C.

But it was a lot of work to get everything apart and back together, even with the engine out of the car.

__________________
Chuck Taylor
Falls Church VA
'66 200, '66 230SL, '96 SL500. Sold: '81 380SL, '86 300E, '72 250C, '95 C220, 3 '84 280SL's '90 420SEL, '72 280SE, '73 280C, '78 280SE, '70 280SL, '77 450SL, '85 380SL, '87 560SL, '85 380SL, '72 350SL, '96 S500 Coupe