Should I buy this E55?

How much should you figure for yearly maintenance? That all depends on how many miles you intend to drive the car. Most Mercedes owners would not consider 80,000 highway miles high mileage. I don't know of any problems specific to that model. However, worn or stretched timing chains are not uncommon with the mercedes 8 cylinder engines such as the 4 valve/cylinder 4.20 and 5.0 liter engines. I would expect the E55 engine would have the same weakness. But you can check the timing chain for wear and you can have the chain replaced if necessary. Usual maintenance will include brake work and lubricant changes. It should not be much worse than any other mercedes using synthetic oil.

The mercedes factory manuals spec 2 degrees of chain stretch at 20,000 km on their double roller diesel engines. It's time to think about a new chain when you start seeing higher amounts of chain stretch like above 6 degrees. I popped a chain on a 617 diesel engine at 208,000 miles but I didn't have any chain noise prior to the chain breaking. My machinist tells me that it's usually the plastic chain guides which break off and damage the chain. I tend to agree with him. The upper guides would be the ones I would pay attention to as they get hot bolted to the heads. The chain tensioner and lower guides don't seem quite as delicate.

IMHO the thing to be concerned about in a specialty model vs. its standard version is the cost of its specialty parts. I don't know what exactly these are on a E55 vs. an E500 but you can bet that whatever they are they'll be expensive.

You ought to get a quote on the cost of insuring this car before you plunge.

Good advice! I can't imagine the insurance cost on a E55 could be much worse than a E500 but you should check before you write a check to buy the car.

Parts prices are anothe matter. Parts prices on the limited production cars tend to be much higher than the regular production models. A cracked cylinder head on a E55 is likely to be very expensive but if the car is well maintained you shouldn't have problems. But I did have a friend with an S class AMG and he had a rear axle damaged in an accident. The new axle was over $10,000 (well at least that's what he claims).

Why? It's a totally different 3 valve/cylinder engine.

FWIW, I've never seen any variant of this V8 (113) engine ever need a timing chain replacement.

E55s are expensive to maintain, here in the UK consumable parts like brake pads and discs (rotors) are between 3 and 4 times as expensive as the same components for other model E class.

Big wheels means big tyres, and the big engine makes short work of them, especially on the rear.

Personally I wouldn't worry about the mileage, 80k is no big deal in this day and age. Its going to cost more to keep an E55 than any other E class, but think of how much fun you are going to have driving it...

Thanks to all for the information. Insurance will run about $1200 per year. I have a great Merc mechanic locally. Unfortunately, the car is

The price is excellent for a car that sells for a huge sum of money! There is no better car sold by MB than an ////AMG! Follow MB's maintenance in the manual and enjoy a fabulous machine. P.

I'm trying to decide whether

If you pay my airfare from Oz, I'll drive it over for you!! I own a 500SEC so the E55 should be a blast.

Mac