HELP/ADVICE..

[John Tinsley]

Happy New Year to everyone. I joined this forum about 18 months ago having bought a CLK240. I must say that I've thoroughly enjoyed owning it (and still do) it's been ultra reliable and I've have had some great fun listening to the burble in the excellent summer that we've had. I've also had some great help from this forum.

I'm now thinking of trying an SL. I'm looking at two, one 05 reg, one 07. 55,000 @ £13000 and 57000 @ £11000 respectively. Both 3.7ltr.
Any thoughts /advice on what sort of value at those prices and what are they like to live with? Clearly I'm going to get less mpg than the CLK but will they match cost re the reliability?

Looking forward to some interesting discussion. Once again, best wishes for New Year to all.

Regards
John

 

[LostKiwi]

SLs are more complex than a CLK. For a start there is SBC braking, then there's the roof and that's before you get into options such as comfort seats etc.
Reliability won't be as good (on average) as the 240 - the M112 is pretty much bombproof whereas the M272 can have issues with cam magnets leaking. Economy will probably be in the same ballpark as the CLK.

 

[mercmancdi]

SLs are more complex than a CLK. For a start there is SBC braking, then there's the roof and that's before you get into options such as comfort seats etc.
Reliability won't be as good (on average) as the 240 - the M112 is pretty much bombproof whereas the M272 can have issues with cam magnets leaking. Economy will probably be in the same ballpark as the CLK.

That news will not brighten up Johns new year. Lol.

 

[John Laidlaw]

At least they won’t have ABC though!
Both look like they’re a bit pricey imo?
Loads of 230 SL350s around to choose from if you’re prepared to travel

 

[John Tinsley]

Hi, thank you for the replies so far. The 57 one has now gone. Do they all have SBC?

 

[McDonald]

Nice low mileage on each. Condition is the most important. Service history. Number of owners. List of extras. They're fabulous cars, but complex, always with cost implications.

 

[ajlsl600]

ditto. doing it again ,i would go non abc, which is a great system , so long as someone else picks up its running costs . its a beautifully proportioned design. just a little over complex for long distance relaxed driving, for me anyway. i wish i could be a kick the tyre ,light the fire car driver, yrs of training/ experience prevent this .

 

[LostKiwi]

ABC on non-V8 is an option. On V8s it's standard.

ABC is worth having only if you're prepared to pay the bills when it goes wrong. Personally I like ABC but fully understand people not wanting to take the risk.

 

[ajlsl600]

i like it too ,but would seriously look at coil over if big abc drama came up ,but no kit that i know of exists for vdoz , no room for torsion bar and required links .. dumping abc ,dumps a lot of weight on v8 as well as future costs . its simply too complex/expensive, not to mention recovery costs ,bent wheel arches. if it collapses as there is no get you home default. which is nuts , like leaving home with no spare.

 

[Monday]

ABC on non-V8 is an option. On V8s it's standard.

ABC is worth having only if you're prepared to pay the bills when it goes wrong. Personally I like ABC but fully understand people not wanting to take the risk.

ABC was an expensive option on the R230 SL350, nearly as expensive as buying an SL500 with ABC as standard. So it is pretty rare on the SL350 - many owners are grateful for that! R230's had SBC though until quite late on.

A poster above suggested that 50,000+ miles was "quite low mileage". I think you will find quite a lot of very low mileage SL's around (in the sub 30,000 range). They tend to be weekend cars/garage queens at least early on.

I bought my 57 reg SL350 in 2011 at 11k miles and sold it in late 2015 at about 25k miles. In trying to value it, I saw a lot of similar cars on Autotrader at similar mileages.