Merc 320 diesels

[carlo]

Sorry to start another "How good are these" thread for purely selfish reasons, but does anyone have experience of the Mercedes 320 CDI of 1999-2002 vintage. Seems a powerful and well reported car, but anything obvious to look out for? There's a 1999 one very local to me for £1900 with 128000K, looks tempting.

[kinkersaab]

Rust, rust, rust!!!! body panels and inner wings. Broken springs, and scabby wheels. pretty underwhelming cars in my opinion. I much prefer the W124.

[jonathan_dyane]

Rust, electrical problems and the glowplugs seizing in the cylinder head and rounding off.

 

Not nearly as good as older Mercs. I wouldn't have one.

[Lacy]

I had a 1999 300 diesel that I bought for a huge amount of money back in 2003. Only had 18000 miles on it when I bought it and it was absolutely minty mint. Within 18 months it had both front wings replaced, boot lid replaced, rear arches painted (all due to rust). The good news was that as it had a full Merc service history, they paid for the lot! I swapped out 3 duff glow plugs with new original Beru ones only to have two of them die after 6 months. Tried to replace those two and one of them snapped in the head.......moved the car on through a garage by part exing it against a Golf for the wife.

 

I bought the W210 to replace a W124. When the 210 was working it was a smooth, fast, economical motor and a lovely place to be in on a run but build quality wise they were the absolute low point of Mercedes production.

 

£1900 isn't cheap for one of these unless it is an absolute corker with lots of history.

 

Would I have one again?......Nah.....I'd have another W124 and possibly one of the later W211's.....but not a 210.

[Magnificent Rustbucket]

I'm not sure how relevent it is, but my brother had a W220 Mercedes S500 which he got around ten years ago. He kept it about four years or so, by which time it had rust holes in the boot lid, both front wings, rust bubbles on all the doors and the rear arches. It suffered myriad electrical faults and would reguarly strand him. Oh and the air suspension failed. It was a dog.

[carlo]

Cheers for replies. Yes, this was the E320 CDI, W210 one apparently.

 

I find it absolutely incredible that Mercedes had all these rust issues in that period (and for all I know, still do.) Is it mainly cosmetic or structural, and did your £40,000 really buy you such a poorly built car? I've had five Peugeot 405s now from 1994-1996 and not one of them was remotely rusty. This is seriously putting me off.

[meshking]

As I understand it, mb were trying out water based paints and it was rubbish. The s class of my step dad has been fully resprayed by mb at about 5 years old (it's a 1999 car), but it's rusting again around the door bottoms. I think it's mainly cosmetic, rather than structural.

[fiatdaft]

Those w210's rust structurally about as bad as a lancia beta !

[RoadworkUK]

It is odd, and to be honest it seems to be a bit of a lottery the direction your W210 takes itself. Prior to '98 or so they just seem to wear out in the usual ways. Around the turn of the millennium, though, they seem to have been salt-plated from the factory. I frequently see W through 51 plate stuff that's mechanically peachy but bodily ready for frag. That said, you occasionally see examples of that age that don't seem to have sufferred at all.

 

And, yeah, glow-plugs seize, SAM units get full of water and freak out, alarm sirens do the same, usual stuff. I'd have one because they're quick and ride beautifully, and are seriously cheap.

[Spiny Norman]

It's weird though, while the W210 is definitely the worst built car Mercedes ever hurled together, they don't all go the same way. I think there were good years and bad years.

Mine is an early one, an August 1st 1996 car and while there's a couple of slight blemishes round it, it's better than most 16 year old cars and it's nothing like as bad as some of the very last 2002 cars I've seen.

I don't know what causes one car to be so rotten and another to be relatively OK, there's an R reg one round the corner from me and you can't tell what shape the rear arches are supposed to be because they're simply not there anymore.

 

In relation to your question I don't know what the Dizzlers are like but I can say that if you get a good one they're really nice old buses. Wouldn't give anything like £1900 for one though, I'd want two for that.