Dear blueriomedina:

If your car is an old gasoline one and you have some oil leaks, try to use Valvoline Maxlife engine oil (SL spec) in your next engine oil change. I had some spectacular results with Maxlife on some old Japanese cars, so I think it's worth to try it on your MB gasoline car. It conditions seals and prevents leaks.

BTW, do not use Maxlife oil in a MB diesel car because it's not rated for diesel service.

Maxlife is not snakeoil. Its additive package is very good and includes well-known friction reducers such as zinc dithiophosphate and molybdenum compounds etc...

Eric

Thank you Eric.

I have been feeling like a snake-oil salesmen for suggesting MaxLife.

It is NOT teflon, unobtanium pellets, thickner or anything else. Just has added conditioners. Hey, it works. It doesn't clog valve covers, oil passages or oil filters.

I would never use additives ....

Haasman

__________________
'03 E320 Wagon-Sold
'95 E320 Wagon-Went to Ex
'93 190E 2.6-Wrecked
'91 300E-Went to Ex
'65 911 Coupe (#302580)

one other oil to use is mobil one 15-50. it also has seal conditioners and is a high quality oil that would be great for a low milage car like yours. as to seal conditioner in a can for 3.00, these are too strong for low mile cars.
seal conditioners soften rubber seals that are dried out.
works great on much older cars on there last leg.
some of those seals that are in great shape on your car will be made softer, but if you need it again for those seals,they may be over cooked,then you have a real leak that could have been fixed with one can.
mobil one is worth a try, plus you get extended oil change intervals,better engine life,maybe better milage
seal conditioners in high mile oil or mobil 1 are gentel but do the job imho mobil first then hi mile
just a thought good luck
rich

__________________
88 300E White, sold 9-04
88 190E Black 2.3 sold
90 300CE White, Grey sold 12-24-04
92 400E White,Grey Sold 5-06
90 300CE 91K Signal Red,Black Sold 2007
1989 300CE Smoke silver,Tan Sold 1-08
1993 300E 3.2 M104 motor
1991 300CE White,Grey
1994 E420 beautiful car,gone to new home
1994 E320 Smoke an Parchment.Beautiful car

I'm not sure which engine you have, but if it's like my 2.6 in my 300E, you can make the repair yourself. So why give up now? If you have confidence to make those repairs, you can repair the upper half of the timing cover seal and gasket, with enough patience that is.

Simply remove the dist. cap and rotor button to begin with...and then you will see what is involved from there....The worst thing you would encounter is breaking the "drivedog" (the metal piece which is bolted onto the cam, where the rotor button is attached to the camshaft)....and the replacement part is $20, and two versions are available.....small and large diameter of the hole in the cam ...but if you get a puller, you should be able to remove it without breaking....and upon reinstallation spray lithium grease into the front of the cam, so it won't corrode and get stuck again.

Just be sure to replace the cam seal and the rubber gasket on the bottom of the upper half of the timing cover, and when installing, oil the lip of the seal, and walk it around the cam lip with either your finger nail or suitable object that does not cut the seal. Also place some red rtv on each side (left & right) to seal at the head and lower half of timing cover, making sure each side is clean first (especially the left side which has a recess to the head gasket....this is where the leak develops....spray carb cleaner and let dry on left side before rtv). Just don't use any rtv on the rubber gasket that lays in a ridge, but this is where the tricky part is....to get the seal lip to seat on the cam and the rubber gasket to make the seal at the same time while pushing inwards toward the engine.

Your dealer would probably want to charge you $500 or so to do this, but I know you can make the repair, and save the money. You probably do have the 300E with the notorious leak....like I had. Let us know what model of MB you have....but sixto is probably right....sounds like the leaking 300E.

Good luck, and hope this helps.

__________________
'87 300E | 2.6 engine
Artic White - Navy blue interior, chrome rims, very clean and sharp!
91 300E
89 300E


The rest of my collection are just cars and trucks...no more "automobiles"...

Bluerio, if you decide to do the upper timing seal yourself, you may want to read through these links:

Upper timing seal ,

especially the link from Steve Brotherton:

babcox

__________________
95 E320 Cabriolet, 169K

Thank you all for your suggestions and word of encouragement I think the quality of the members in this forum is what makes this place rock.

I plan to monitor the leak(s) for a while I still have not found out the exact source so that is going to be my priority. I think I will feel allot better once I know exactly where the leak is and I can map a course of action.


Kestas,

Two cars one for the winter and one for the summer, that sounds like the best deal to me unfortunately here in this part of Texas we seem to have a perpetual summer/spring weather so there is no need for two cars, and we have no concerns for rust, so we have been bless in a way. Now if we could only have one car with no leaks (MB) that will be more of a blessing but I take what I got and I will try the best of the situation. If the leak becomes impossible for me to bear then I will consider fixing it myself, taking the car to an expert MB mechanic, or to the dealer.

Eric,

I will not use oil additives, but I will consider using good motor oil with good ingredients like the Valvoline Maxlife you have suggested, I will keep that on mind. For the moment I am going to stick with the Mobil 15-50 which I believe is what the dealer put in my E320 when I first took my car to have it inspected. From now on I will be doing my own oil change (I always have on my cars) I do not believe in the suction method the dealer use to change oil, it leaves too much residue and old oil in the oil pan.

Hassman,

Thank you for your words I hope you were able to fix the problem you had with the power sunroof. I looked like crazy in my Bentley manual, and the MB CD¡¦s but could not find any reference to the location of the switch/relay you were trying to find. If is not a oil leak, then is an air leak, a leak is a leak nevertheless.

Olpos,

From the first moment I got my car 95 E-320, the first thing I did was to take it to the dealer and had all the fluids change, since I did not trust the quality of service or fluids the car had prior to me buying it. In fact the previous owner was using I believe Prestone as coolant (green stuff). Any ways they replace the old oil with regular dyno Mobil 15-50 and that¡¦s what I plan to use from now on.

87-300-E-NC,

Thanks for your imput I have a 95 E-320, it makes you smile one minute, and cry the next.


Again thank you all for the help it is the members along with the good people from FastLane that makes this forum successful.

Bluerio

What we do in life echoes in eternity. Maximus

I have also had great results with Valvoline's MaxLife oil & ATF Stop Leak. Note: I also had very minor tranny seal leaks.

I used MaxLife oil in my 91 300E to resolve valve seal issues/oil consumption. The MB was eating about 1 QT every 1K and has 130K miles on it. I had great results so far, 2500 miles and have not added any oil. If I planned on keeping the car for many years, I would fix it properly by doing a valve job.. I would assume the worst the seals are the less effective it would be.

I believe most additives are worth less, but in my case the Valvoline products mentioned above worked for me..

M104 engine, right?

Watch for oil leaks from the oil filler cap, the gasket gets hard and will leak at speed, runs off the front of the engine.

Valve cover gasket will leak sometimes, too -- usually all over everywhere, though.

Don't know if the upper timing chain cover leaks on this engine like it does on the M103, but that's the right place.

None of the bolts for the tensioner go into the chain case as far as I know, so the work you did shouldn't have had any effect on the leak unless you took the valve cover off and didn't replace the gasket.

Peter

__________________
1972 220D ?? miles
1988 300E 200,012
1987 300D Turbo killed 9/25/07, 275,000 miles
1985 Volvo 740 GLE Turobodiesel 218,000
1972 280 SE 4.5 165, 000 - It runs!

Hello all, after reading all the articles, I am still confused about how to fix the timing cover leak. I have 89 300ce, do I need to remove the valve cover? While I was searching the info., I found one trick to find the leak. You clean the possible leak area and spread some baby power to it, run the engine for few min., you will pinpoint the leak. That's how I found the leak from the very common area for Mercedes W124. I am ready to DIY to fix the leak, can any one give me the step by step details? Thanks.

It may be the upper timing cover. After all, you were working in that area replacing the tensioner. Is it possible that you stressed the cover and thereby disturbed the sealant?

I would remove the fan shroud get a good light and see if the Timing cover is leaking. Although this is a pain to fix, it is less work than the headgasket. However, if the headgasket is original, it will go sooner or later. I know that some people on the forum don't advise just doing the upper timing cover without doing the headgasket. But if that was all that was leaking, I would try to do that fix anyway because it is easier and there is less of a chance to screw things up. The head is very heavy and you would need a hoist to remove it. Also, you have the hassle of dealing with the timing chains and the potential variable valve timing nightmares.

The other thing you could do is spend $100 and ask the dealer to tell you (show you) where the leak originates.

This is why I believe that anyone buying a 94-95 E320 should deduct the cost of the headgasket and wiring harness from the market price of the car - unless these items have been fixed.

By the way, if you need a wiring harness, contact the dealer soon, before the car turns 10 years old. They may replace for free, considering the low mileage on your car.

Once you get these things fixed, you'll love the car. At first, I too was surprised about these kinds of quality problems. But the rest of the car seems pretty well sorted out.

My theory is that the best way to go with a MB is to buy a low mileage Starmark car before the original warranty expires. That way you can extend the warranty for three more years. By then, all the issues with the car are known, and you can get the dealership to fix everything under warranty.

-Charles

Check out this link. I believe it is an 89300CE.
By page 5 there are some pictures of your job.

__________________
-Marty

1986 300E 220,000 miles+ transmission impossible
(Now waiting under a bridge in order to become one)

Reading your M103 duty cycle:
http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/showpost.php?p=831799&postcount=13
http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/showpost.php?p=831807&postcount=14