2005 slk 200 Timing Chain

[slksteve]

Hi guys. I just purchased a 2005 slk 200 kompresor , what an awesome vehicle , but have since been warned about the timing chains going . Is this true ? And if so what if anything can be done to prevent this. Or should they be replaced at a certain point.
Thanx
Steve

 

[Jedburglives]

Hi Steve, my reply is bit late but I wanted to confirm that yes this is an issue and its just happened to our SLK 2005 with 77k on the clock. Did you ever get a reply or have any pointers to useful info on this topic. The issue I discovered is down to the tensioner not doing it's job correctly, which made the belt slack. I think that the 2006 models had an upgrade to the tensioner?

Thanks for any info you may have.

 

[BEJ]

Possibly not a chain but a belt.

 

[Jedburglives]

Yes Chain, typo my fault

 

[jaymanek]

This engine is prone to chains and/or the teeth rounding off the sprockets.

This engine is made by Mitsubishi... They seemed very reliable with few common issues, only a breather tube to moan about, but as the cars are getting older more and more are of course failing.

Im not too sure if there is much one can do to avoid the issue apart from regular oil changes to keep the tensioner working. You could change the chain and tensioner but im not sure if they are the main causes of the issue.

The other issue with these engines, which seems to appear more on low mileage cars, is that the two rubber seals between water connections from head to front casing, just simply dislodge and dissapear... We have had a few of these and then this causes the oil & coolant to mix causing most technicians to assume a head gasket fault.

To be honest, I would continue to use the car as normal, if you were to worry about all the things that could fail, you wouldnt even ride a push bike.

 

[Jedburglives]

What the technician told us was that the teeth have been eaten away, they are now only 1 qtr left in height.

The car is at Mercedes now, stripped down. Is it unreasonable to ask Mercedes to cover the cost of repairs on the basis that the car is only 8 years old, has 77k mileage and has always been serviced and maintained by them. It has never gone elsewhere. We ourselves have only had the car for two years, off their forecourt.

 

[Jedburglives]

BTW Technician told us that the tensioner failed to auto adjust, causing chain to be loose.

 

[jaymanek]

Yes we also suspect tensioners cause the issue... You could push for a contribution and you may be lucky as you have kept the history all dealers..