advice welcomed

[chrisf-1]

Hi again everyone i have been looking at a 53 plate sl350 the early new shape, i know about the water ingress and roof issues but it is dry and working at the moment so preventative measures would be welcomed on that , are these the 7G tronic box and are they any good if it is, and is this the engine that has issues with the timing balance cog and what do i need to check out to see if it has had the problem rectified ???? would also welcome any advice on buying one of these as i consider this a lot of money to spend on a 12 year old car but they are nice, many thanks Chris

 

[AMGeed]

I think a 53 plate SL350 will have the 5 speed auto and not the 7 speed.
I haven't heard of that engine being a problematic one.

 

[oldguy57]

Just bought an 04 plate sl350 has 5 speed but only 23k on the clock. Fantastic car and scored plenty of points with BH. There are shed loads out there so if you choose wisely with a good service history you probably wont regret it.

 

[chrisf-1]

The reason for hesitance is that i had one of the first 7 G-tronic on a 55 plate CLK 35O and my mercedes specialist did not even complete the first service it had the ML272 engine and according to his box of tricks it had expensive problems waiting to get worse with the timing cog teeth creating a lot of play in the chain i believe it was caused by the balance cog and shaft and i wanted to know if this was the same engine as i lost a lot of money on that car in a motor trade auction

 

[grober]

Check your engine no against details in this thread. If its an M272 its essentially the same engine.
http://www.mbclub.co.uk/forums/engine/137229-complete-m272-engine-thread.html

I take that back evidently till around 2006 it was the M112 engine which was a tough old thing. It has 12 rather expensive long life spark plugs so check on when they were last changed. Other thing that goes wrong is the variable inlet flaps and motors on the inlet manifold- irrc this comes as a built up unit so expensive if there's problems. Other thing to check is the active suspension hydraulics if it has them- ABC was an option on the 350 I think.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_SL-Class_(R230)

 

[chrisf-1]

Hi thanks for the reply but i do not yet own the car or made an offer, from your reply it seems that an 2003 350sl does not use the the ML272 which one does it use then and does it involve horror stories like my last thanks Chris

 

[grober]

It uses the M112 V6 ENGINE which is the V6 engine Mercedes used before the M272. Fundamentally a strong engine if looked after appart from the inlet manifold problem which is easily fixed except for the expense of the replacement part. Of course all engines wear out eventually if not looked after.