I am considering purchasing my C230 coupe when the lease is up in 3 months. It has been very maintenance free and a kick to drive,excepting the head was replaced under warranty at 30k miles which concerns me. From the Forum, I have read the carbon build up/ head replacement problem has been a somewhat common problem. Any experience/ advise would be welcome. I normally keep a car past 100k miles & am concerned the prior head problem may re-occur before I hit that mileage.

 

Why not buy the extended warranty up to 100K then?

Are you saying the head gasket fails or the upper engine must be rebuilt?

 

There was a loss of compression/ rough idle due to a defective valve. If I buy the car, I was planning on the extended warranty. I'm just concerned this may not be a good engine. Not sure if this is why MB dropped the 4 cyl. engine in 2006 for US cars.

 

No, I think the reason they killed off the four cylinder (only temporarily; I guarantee you it will reappear if cars become more green in the next few years) because people didn't want to pay $30,000 for an underpowered POS. For the life of me I could never understand why Mercedes Benz, a captain of luxury, would introduce a C-Class hatchback. That's like taking a huge step backward. What we see now with their bigger engine line-up is their need to compete with the power of BMW and AUDI. Luxury is great, but for 20 and 30 somethings with cash, a slow Mercedes is the mark of age (as in, old man car). Plus, with the declining value of the dollar (meaning that Mercedes are becoming more expensive in America), Americans need to feel that all the extra cash needed to buy the car is worth it (even though, according to most dealers I know, 80% of Mercedes are leased when coming off the showroom floor).

 

Existence of 4-cyl Benzes has its own reasons.

In Europe, an average car buyer can enjoy the ownership of a MB. Over there, it is more about practical purposes. So many people will buy smaller Benzes like 1.3L 1.5L 1.6L 1.8L, and use them for day to day errands. It's not about POWER or STATUS.

Here, it is more about Luxury....Power.....Status. That's why Benz has to kill the four-banger line here. People tend to associate the name Benz with Luxury and Power. So no one in the right mind, here, would buy a 1.8L Benz. Why would they? There is already a proven and popular solution, called Civic.

 

The C230 Kompressor was more powerful due to the supercharger although the engine was a 1.8L. The owners of the new C230 Sport which has the 2.5L are suffering from insufficient power.

 

AMEN

 

What do you consider insufficient power?
My present daily driver - Jetta tdi is having only 90 HP.
I am the best on green lights on 99.999 % of occasions and haven't seen anybody faster, than me on the long freeway trip (although some cars can temporarily beat me on grades).
Than my first own car was 21 HP Fiat 126. Would be hard to compare it with US "macho ideology".

 

i meant.....insufficient power = inefficient in terms of engine size.

my rule of thumb for efficiency is 200hp for 2.0L engine.

so....2.5L V6 giving about 190hp is what?

90hp out of 1.3L engine aint bad, i have np with that.

btw, isn't TDI turbo-charged diesel?

 

Turbo Direct (?) Injection. It is 1.9 liter. Far cry from Ford cdi I rented years ago in France, but so far the only diesel (with 30-years old technology) easily available in US.
I am waiting for the new Mercedes-es cdi to age, so I can import one from Canada without putting 3-rd mortgage on the house.
You are talking about per liter output. To get 100HP/liter takes twin-turbo, supercharger, or 2-cycle.
The 600 cc 2-stroker on my PWC (fits between knees) is 110 HP rated and this is older model.
Such a stress is appreciated on 450 lb craft, but I don't think I would like to own car with such an engine (at least not for long).
The famous for last few decades 454-s with the cheap technology have been quite reliable, thanks to low stress on them.
Took 7.8 liters to get 200 HP (on carburated model).