Deanyel-

The only reason I mentioned the oil thing is the excessive sludge that was in my car's heads from being run on Pennzoil. I'm surprised those two oils are considered premium anywhere (I'm not trying to be argumentative) unless you're talking about their "premium" "synthetic" "other marketing buzzword" blends. Here in Denver they're pretty cheap, and expensive is Mobil-1 for $4 a quart. I'm not a fan of parafin-rich oils, but this is not the thread to get into it.

The big thing to consider is how much varnish is there, and the type of oil used can contribute to this. When I took my 560's heads into the machine shop that does all the head work/valve jobs for the largest indy and one of the dealerships, the guy asked me how many miles the engine had on it. I told him 70K, and his responce was "That looks about like 270K" having mis-heard me. When I corrected him he was shocked and asked me if it was pennzoil or quaker state. Someone who does ~5 mercedes valve jobs a week reacting like that spoke volumes to me on brands of oil.

Anyway, the owner letting you take off a valve cover would be big. Since getting the SEL I've decided I want a 560SL as well. I won't seriously consider another 560 without seeing under the valve covers. If necessary take the car to a mechanic and have them take the cover off. If you have a digital camera, take a pic and I'll be happy to give you an idea how it ranks on the clean-filthy scale if you can't tell yourself. I'm sure many people around will be happy to help on that too! Let us know how it went!


Good Luck!


Scott