Tom, your advice makes helluva lot of sense. Gotta blink at those who believe they can just toss in a set of *imballanced* oversized pistons..... thinkin they're doing the kinda work that matches Stuttgart specs. Hell, most people dont even realize the original pistons are ballanced to the rods and crank at the factory as a unit - and the process caint be duplicated without blueprinting the engine.

Meanwhile turning crank journals and installing oversized bottom end bearings strikes me as an equally crazy waste of time. Too many things can go wrong with a sloppy build and if these engines aint miked and ballanced to spec then they'll tear themselves apart.

GTB, if you want to entend engine life by another 200k miles (at least) after reaching the millenium halfway mark then replace the rings and you'll probly be good to go. But look for aftermarket SOFT METAL Swedish Rings! They make em specially designed to mate with high mileage MB pistons and bores that will not cut into the walls and cause piston slap.

And when you pull the cyl head then condition of valves and guides will speak for themselves. The general rule on rebuilding MB engines is that *less is better then more*. Notso long ago the #1 killer of 220Sb m180 engines was sloppy machineshop work where nobody knew how to even plane a cylinder head for a simple valve job within clearances without removing too much metal, thus over-compressing the chambers and then killing the rod and crank bearings.