One of my friends has a 2002-52 C230K SE auto and it recently developed a bad misfiring problem.
She is the 3rd owner and has put 50k of the 80k currently on it (we get car allowances which are a mixed blessing but its basically a company car), she's the 3rd owner and it hasn't had solely Mercedes main dealer servicing, mainly independant recently although through reputable garages, no corners cut in terms of cost it was mainly for quality of service.
So anyway, its misfiring badly, she took it to one garage and they decided it was an ignition coil issue which I suppose was logical because the symptoms were much the ame as on my misfiring Octavia RS from years ago, smoke, petrol smell and 1 cylinder not doing much.
£150 later and its still the same so it went to another garage.
they have told her its a known fault on these cars of this age and its carbon buildup on a/some valves and they will need replacing. the cost, an eye watering £3k+ (this is if they can't "burn" it off by hammering it stuck in second for a while or by using some sort of cleaner(hasten to add this is a well known local mercedes specialist so we're confident they're not just peeing in the wind to make money))..
So the questions...
1) Is £3k+ a reasonable charge for fairly major engine work on one of these?
2) Is anyone here aware of the problem?
3) How much is a whole new engine likely to be?
4) She's been told mercedes may pick up the tab for some of it but they have to spend £500 on diagnostics to prove the case then mercedes may make a percentage contribution to the repair, does that sound realistic? And given its 3rd owner and not main dealer serviced is that just good money after bad?
And any more comments welcome.. I don't know what to suggest to her.. they thing is worth no more than about £6.5k in working order so a 50% repair bill is a total shocker.
In full working order parkers says its worth £6k trade which I think sounds high, any opinions on that?
She is the 3rd owner and has put 50k of the 80k currently on it (we get car allowances which are a mixed blessing but its basically a company car), she's the 3rd owner and it hasn't had solely Mercedes main dealer servicing, mainly independant recently although through reputable garages, no corners cut in terms of cost it was mainly for quality of service.
So anyway, its misfiring badly, she took it to one garage and they decided it was an ignition coil issue which I suppose was logical because the symptoms were much the ame as on my misfiring Octavia RS from years ago, smoke, petrol smell and 1 cylinder not doing much.
£150 later and its still the same so it went to another garage.
they have told her its a known fault on these cars of this age and its carbon buildup on a/some valves and they will need replacing. the cost, an eye watering £3k+ (this is if they can't "burn" it off by hammering it stuck in second for a while or by using some sort of cleaner(hasten to add this is a well known local mercedes specialist so we're confident they're not just peeing in the wind to make money))..
So the questions...
1) Is £3k+ a reasonable charge for fairly major engine work on one of these?
2) Is anyone here aware of the problem?
3) How much is a whole new engine likely to be?
4) She's been told mercedes may pick up the tab for some of it but they have to spend £500 on diagnostics to prove the case then mercedes may make a percentage contribution to the repair, does that sound realistic? And given its 3rd owner and not main dealer serviced is that just good money after bad?
And any more comments welcome.. I don't know what to suggest to her.. they thing is worth no more than about £6.5k in working order so a 50% repair bill is a total shocker.
In full working order parkers says its worth £6k trade which I think sounds high, any opinions on that?
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