Hallo. About a month ago I bought my first merc - a 1990 230ce. Lovely motor. No toys, no leather, 150k, but £1700. Generally very good nick indeed. Is that par for the course for a basic w124 coupe? (the price I mean...)
My previous vehicle, a BMW E30 coupe, was constantly thrashed and woefully
neglected but never let me down even though it croaked (is timing belt failure at 112k miles after absolutely no maintenance the car's fault?
) However, my sniffings around would suggest that a w124 of this vintage is a car that deserves a lot better. The rather embarrassing trouble is that I don't know where to start. Do you just go into a garage and ask for a "service"? I'd rather be more specific without waiting for a problem to actually manifest itself, but I don't have a scoob what to ask for, or how often it should be done. And I don't want to get ripped off - at the moment I am at the mercy of the unscrupulous. Any pointers would be much appreciated.
There is only one thing that bothers me about the car: the huge build up of negative pressure in the petrol tank - violent hiss on release of filler cap. Normal? Or should cap have vent? It looks like the original cap, but I can't be certain.
Great forum, by the way, very informative. In fact I suppose I could have answered these questions myself with a bit more looking, but, er, I didn't.
Cheers.
My previous vehicle, a BMW E30 coupe, was constantly thrashed and woefully
neglected but never let me down even though it croaked (is timing belt failure at 112k miles after absolutely no maintenance the car's fault?
) However, my sniffings around would suggest that a w124 of this vintage is a car that deserves a lot better. The rather embarrassing trouble is that I don't know where to start. Do you just go into a garage and ask for a "service"? I'd rather be more specific without waiting for a problem to actually manifest itself, but I don't have a scoob what to ask for, or how often it should be done. And I don't want to get ripped off - at the moment I am at the mercy of the unscrupulous. Any pointers would be much appreciated.There is only one thing that bothers me about the car: the huge build up of negative pressure in the petrol tank - violent hiss on release of filler cap. Normal? Or should cap have vent? It looks like the original cap, but I can't be certain.
Great forum, by the way, very informative. In fact I suppose I could have answered these questions myself with a bit more looking, but, er, I didn't.
Cheers.
