A fellow on this website has a 1996 S500 for sale. He bought the car in December, 2012, with about 46,000 miles; it now has 69,000. The car was dealer maintained before he bought it and he's had it maintained by a dealer since. It sounds like a really nice car.
He lists the things he's done to it during the time he's had it. They include the following:
Rear air ride suspension replaced (47,296)
Repack front wheel bearings and replace seals (47,296)
Engine drive belt replaced (47,296)
Reseal rear differential (47,296)
TT heater hose line replaced (48,942)
Shifter bushing replaced (51,864)
Rear trunk vacuum element (55,197)
PSE Pump replacement (55,197)
Left rear door vacuum element (55,197)
Brakes and rotors; front and back replaced (55,300)
Breather hose on right valve cover to throttle actuator replaced (57,270)
Vacuum hose from purge valve to intake manifold replaced (57,270)
A/C blower motor and regulator replaced (59,244)
Left and right lower ball joints and idler arm bushings replaced (66,224)
Driver side rear window regulator replaced (68,436).
I am thinking about buying a W140 and am curious if it's typical to have this much go wrong with so few miles on it. I suppose some of the things could be expected at 12 years of age, but this sounds like an awful lot of things to go wrong on a car with so few miles. So is this typical?
The service date along with the mileage would give you a better indication. Some components, especially plastic items, do worse sitting than being used. Most of the items I see on this list indicate a car that has sat for long periods of time throughout it's low mileage life. The MB cars with the old school build quality will stand up to periods of dormancy better than most any other automobile ever, but replacement of these items is fairly much normal procedure, especially after all these years. There will upkeep (blood). No escaping it.
I know of a 1995 S500 shock absorber suspension car with 60,000 miles, it has not had any suspension parts replaced and drives beautifully. I think it's on factory brake rotors too.
Makes me think are the miles genuine for all of those parts having been replaced??
Looks to me that some of these items were working ok, but the owner took special care to do predictive maintenance. Good to see that the brakes and rotors, front and back were done. The accumulators for the rear suspension were done which is necessary around this mileage, and resealing the rear differential was necessary because there was an issue with the '94's and 95's that MB acknowledged in a bulletin.
It was probably unnecessary to replace the engine drive belt, but nonetheless a good idea. And replacing the ball joints and idler arm bushings was a good idea.
Window regulators? Common problem.
Whatever, the owner obviously took pride in caring for this car.
I do wonder however about the stuff not replaced like spark plugs, distributor caps and rotors, starter, alternator (the last 2 rarely go bad), wiring harness, evaporator, battery, tires.
From my studied experience with these cars, a lot of little stuff goes wrong in the first 75k.
I have a folder with 3 pounds of documented work done on my '94 S500 at a Mercedes dealership in Malibu, California within the same mileage as you give. The car has 196,000 miles on it now and runs perfectly and everything works. The previous owner had had a Starmark Warranty on the vehicle so I perceive that a lot of work that was done was really unnecessary.
Finally, don't be discouraged by the work that was done on the vehicle that you are considering. Rather be encouraged by the improvements that have been made and which you don't have to do.
Just do the regular maintenance and you will go another 200k with that car if you should buy it.
Sounds to me that the owner of this car really wanted the car in tip top shape and just changed things to make sure its ok .
Just like the previous owner of my car ,he changed all of the rear suspension bushes including hydraulic shooks & bearings only because there was a squeaking noise ,so he changed them all (to much money then brains I guess) ,he also changed the engine harness etc to the later model non biodegradable version by what I can see under the hood .
And BTW ,the W140s don't have rear Air Ride suspension but Hydraulic struts called "Self Levelling Suspension" and then you have to checked if this car indeed has it as an option since not all have it ,S600's yes but not S500's ,to see if it has it ,open the hood & look on the right side under the black covering where the little sliding square access flap is ,there should be a little yellowish coloure'd reservoir underneath it,that is hydraulic oil filament .
The Air Suspension was tested on the w140 but only applied to the later model W220 which I believe was a failure as they fail & are very expensive to replace or fix ,so you lucky there .
On another note ,all the parts that have been changed or fixed are not a big deal ,it just sounds a lot ,because the w140's are a heavy car you can expect the front suspension ball joints to go a little more then any other parts ,thats due to the weight ,but even then it takes a fair while before that happens .
This car looks and sounds like an excellent buy ,grab it before she's gone .:thumbsup:
I would concur with most of what's been said here, as far as both maintenance and age related repairs.
What a lot of people don't understand is that low mileage on an 18 year old car can be a bad thing, too. This is mainly because lack of use for some items will cause them to fail "prematurely" (relative to mileage), making it appear that stuff is literally falling off the car. A well-used example with far more miles could easily have had less work performed on it and be in excellent running condition.
That being said, in my opinion, this is a nice car, but the price is pretty optimistic.
As with any used car, no matter how well maintained and documented the records are, don't think about buying it until you've had a pre-purchase inspection (PPI) performed on it by a trusted independent shop or MB dealership.
Personally, I place little value on low mileage with these cars. I say that because there are many, many excellent examples in the market with more miles for far less money.
I have two W140 vehicles, and they're both hanging around 267k miles, and I believe there are at least another 100k in both of them. One is a 1995 S500 coupe, the other a 1998 S420 sedan. I would drive either one across the country this minute without hesitation.
on a old car I replace rubber,plastic,and nylon bushings in suspension
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