What used car should I buy? BMW or Benz?

If you have to ask, you should buy a Mercedes.

The CLK is a quite small and responsive sports sedan.

Larry

Get an SLK 320.

My son has a CLK Kommpresser soft top. It is a fun drive in the summer time but not a patch on my 540 or the previous 535 I had. pete

Why do you think they don't let you touch it ??? Because they love it do death. Go to a dealer and testdrive one.

Thats a good one.

I had a BMW a 1992 325IS it went all the way to 252 K something miles and it was still going strong when i sold it after i crash the right front bumper and figured fixing it was not cost effective.

it was strong enough, and small, but felt heavy. maybe that was because the pedal required some presure for it to move. eithe way bwm rocks.

im thinking of getting a 2003 330i, any pro and cons on that one?

"OttawaTrade" wrote

The Smart has 730kg, that is not super heavy. Than there is an "A" class, a "B", a "C", then your "E" and finally "S" and - very exclusive - "Maybach". So you already got one of the bigger mercedes.

In general, DC builds better automatic than manual transmissions. But there shouldn't be any real difficulty with a manual, obviously your car had a technical problem.

BMW is (on average) better in terms of sportive agility. Benz is more comfortable. That's the philosophy of the companies.

Get the technical data from your dealer oder internet, choose some cars and make a test drive.

Thomas

That all depends on your personal geometry and your idea of comfort. I'm 6'3", and I've never found a stock seat as comfortable as BMW's sport seats in leather.

-- Larry

Just pros... buy one!

I am 6-4 and I also think the seats in my e46 are very very comfy. But they are also very supportive for spirited driving.

It depends on you age, do feel old buy a merc, do you feel young and active buy a BMW.

Never buy a SLK because the "K" stand for Kurtz and that means "Short" do you like to drive around in a "shorty" ??

I am 69 and have a X5

Enjoy

I was led to believe that stood for Sportlich Leicht Kompakt

But short might do as well

I thought K = kurz, too.

L may stand for leicht.

Can S generally mean sportlich if the S Class is named thus?

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling

I can see getting "tired" of Japanese cars but you'll likely notice that the maintenance is a lot more expensive on the BMW and Mercedes cars. Also, the reliability (in spite of the claimed "German precision") isn't very good on either German car relative to the Japanese cars.

The fad here at work is to buy 3 and 5 series BMWs. Out of the 4 people I know that have bought these status symbols, all have had problems with them (mostly but not limited to electrical problems). One even caught fire when less than a year old.

b.

Odd.

Two people at my work had their Lexus towed away to be repaired.

The BMW's always start. Of course so do the Chevy's and Ford's so who knows, huh?

All I can say is the cheapest car I have owned in my life, and boy am I cheap, has been a 1986 MB 190E 2.3. Over the life of the vehicle, my cost of ownership was under $0.10/mile. The only real problem with the car was with the valve seals ( A known problem with this car ), The only reason I no longer own it, was after many years, I just got damned bored with it. Now then, if I was silly enough to own an S class, I'm sure my opinion would be radically different.

I was surprised, after buying an ancient BMW, that maintenance was actually cheaper than my older Japanese car. Used parts were easier to come by, and comparatively cheaper. And surprisingly, it was easier to find skilled mechanics who know the cars. The BMW specialists tend to charge considerably more per hour, but the cars take less time to work on.

I dropped the transmission on an E28 and replaced it myself, in less than three hours. I was amazed. Having done this on a couple Toyotas and a Mitsubishi, I was absolutely amazed at how much easier it was on the BMW. Everything just came out and went back in.

I think this is inevitable when you start adding huge amounts of overcomplex electronic crap onto cars. BMW is second only to Mercedes in this, but the Japanese and American automakers aren't too far behind.

In Europe you can buy stripped down BMW and Mercedes vehicles without the huge array of bizarre accessories, but here in the US they'll look at you like a lunatic if you even ask for a manual transmission.

--scott

Don't worry mate, it's not a hanging offence ... yet :-)

Could it be, the ease with which the BMW transmission could be replaced might also suggest the Germans expect to have to do this at regular intervals thus it's made easier than on the East Asian cars whose manufacturer doesn't expect them to fail?

Just a thought :-)

Well, a tranny R&R is part of a clutch job, and a clutch is a regular service replacement item. So I would assume that they actually plan on the mechanicals lasting long enough that you'd have to replace the clutch a couple times.

nate