It's Not A Good Sign When...

[Will]

The only positive thing to think about is that compared to the eye watering depreciation these cars suffered when they were new, even a £12k repair bill is a relative drop in the ocean. I know that’s easy for me to say, but compared to a newer car that’s still depreciating heavily all of the time and losing money even when it doesn’t throw a leg out of bed it’s something to think about

If you were to keep the car another few years, then it would soften the blow.

If you’re not intending to keep it long term then perhaps a decent used engine could be a more cost effective alternative?

Best of luck with it Dennis

 

[Scott_F]

I thought this thread was going to be about finding your girlfriend's phone number scrawled inside a cubicle in the gents toilet so things could be worse......

 

[E55BOF]

I thought this thread was going to be about finding your girlfriend's phone number scrawled inside a cubicle in the gents toilet so things could be worse......

That will be my next thread...

 

[E55BOF]

Very bad luck. That's the problem with valve gear --- the sudden transition from gradually increasing minor engine wear/noise to that noisy self destruct threshold can happen in an instant.
CLS63/E63 Timing Chain Issues (M157)

The weird thing is, when being run to try to diagnose it, the cam/injector timings were all spot on...

 

[E55BOF]

theres a couple of engines for sale in Germany for about 7k and 1 is very low mileage.
worth to give it a look.

Definitely worth a look. Can you post links, please?

 

[Will]

MERCEDES E63 AMG M157 5.5 L V8 Bi-Turbo COMPLETE ENGINE,550,bhp,2013,30k | eBay

Any good?

 

[E55BOF]

To an old fashioned ear, it sounds as if a chain has given way at some point and the PO thought he'd got away with it, can con rods be so soft that over-boost has bent them ? A horrible thing to find, you have all my sympathy.

There was/is no damage to the valve gear or piston crowns on either cylinder bank, so no mechanical contact, so no chain gave way. The rods are only very slightly bent; the bends were only apparent when watching the pistons rising and falling in the bores when the crank was turned. Weird...

 

[AMGeed]

Bad luck Dennis. Really sours the ownership of such a nice car to be facing such a huge repair bill.
I'd certainly be looking at one of the engines Bruno mentioned or Will linked above instead of fixing this one.

A Tier 1 warranty is a must it seems for this particular engine.

 

[st13phil]

There was an intermittent misfire at full bore last summer, which was put down to a break in the wiring to the intercooler pump; that was repaired. Only fault codes were for misfiring, and high IAT.

The stuck tensioner is just happenstance, but the damage has nothing to do with the known chain & tensioner issue.

Terry thinks the damage must be down to overboosting at some point, and it's worst on No. 5 because that and No. 1 are the two cylinders which run hottest. His opinion as that for some reason it did not go into limp mode fast enough to protect the engine.

I did some mousing around a long time back when I read elsewhere on t'interweb about M157 engines with bent rods and it doesn't seem to be a common issue (fortunately!) on standard engines, with the examples that I did find only happening on ones that have been mapped to produce extreme torque levels e.g. 1200Nm+.

Interestingly, Weistec comment about their W.4 turbo package:

While the M157 engine is a very robust engine in factory form, a couple of weak links have been found at extreme power levels. The most common is a bent connecting rod. If the engine is producing a sustained 1000 lb-ft of torque (820-850 lb-ft at the wheels) or more, all it takes is one knock event to bend a rod.

(my emphasis).

I wonder if the misfiring was a contributory factor? Random things can happen at high loads / engine speeds when you get misfires, and a knock sensor isn't going to save it.

On a separate note, I'd also be cautious of a second-hand engine without known provenance and especially so one that was out of a car that I couldn't see running. However, if someone's willing to offer money back if it turns out to be a duffer then it would be an easier and cheaper route than rebuilding the existing lump, with the risk being the cost of installation / removal if it turned out to be bad.

 

[Will]

You’d also probably be able to get something back for the old one. Someone will want it for parts or to rebuild for high power etc

 

[E55BOF]

Thank you gentlemen. I've sent a message to the seller of the one Will identified, asking for the engine number, the VIN and the car registration concerned so I can do some checks. It's a long way out of his league judging from his feedback, so if he gets back to me I'll need to go into how he comes to have it for sale; why is it not still in a 2013 30K mile E63?

I haven't asked whether he'd refund anything if it turns out to be a dud; I'll keep that for if I think it may be worth a punt.

 

[grober]

Came across this guy Tasos on YouTube who has things to say about the M157 got a link to his vids from this thread.
bent connecting rods --- tasos speaks - MBWorld.org Forums

HIS VIDEO COLLECTION

Tasos Moschatos

 

[E55BOF]

Came across this guy Tasos on YouTube who has things to say about the M157 got a link to his vids from this thread.
bent connecting rods --- tasos speaks - MBWorld.org Forums

Interesting. Slightly bent rods? Check. Higher than expected oil consumption? Check. Engine ran perfectly, owner unaware of the problem? Check. I think he's spot on.

 

[clk320x]

You've taken the E63 Biturbo into Terry Gates to have a top end rattle sorted when, after several days, he rings you in the morning, and the conversation starts; "It's stripped down to the bare block...".

When I bought it, a year ago, six years old on 86k miles or so, with a full MB service history, and it already had the uprated chain tensioners from the factory, and no start-up rattle, so if necessary, all it would need would be the check valves. I wondered about taking out a Tier 1 warranty. Perhaps lulled by all those high-mileage bulletproof M113s I'd had, and the fact that it was six years old and ran perfectly, I decided not to.

I wish I had...

To cut a long story short, the rattle seems to have been the secondary injector on No. 5 cylinder. However, five bent conrods, a stretched timing chain, a stuck and ineffective secondary chain tensioner on the 1-4 cylinder bank and one severely damaged bore and piston (No. 5) also came to light.

View attachment 85783View attachment 85784View attachment 85785!!!!!!

Until the rattle started a couple of weeks ago, the engine still ran perfectly; no unusual noises, no vibration, pulled like a train.

So looking on the good side, it will be rebored, and have all-new pistons and conrods (£3K+), reconditioned cylinder heads, and all-new chains, tensioners and check valves; virtually a recon engine, in fact.



On the other hand, it will cost me an armannaleg, a kidney, the sacrifice of my firstborn son, droit de seigneur for Terry with my beautiful virgin daughters, and selling my other sons into slavery...

Worth it? Well, I could buy a pretty decent E55K estate for what it will cost me. Hmmm....

Oh, how I wish I'd taken out a Tier 1 warranty...

was this the purple S212 estate debadged?

 

[bob6600]

Sorry to read what as happened, sometimes I hate cars!

I wonder if it's worth contacting Acid@MSL? He may have or know of someone who has an engine/parts? Long shot I know

 

[Baldbloke]

Interesting. Slightly bent rods? Check. Higher than expected oil consumption? Check. Engine ran perfectly, owner unaware of the problem? Check. I think he's spot on.

He certainly had a point about the wrist pin/gudgeon pin not being able to support/centralise the piston with such an acute taper towards the top. Wonder what MB/AMG reasoning for such a design?


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[Bellow]

To cut a long story short, the rattle seems to have been the secondary injector on No. 5 cylinder. .

What is a secondary injector? Is this a GDI motor?

 

[Bellow]

There was an intermittent misfire at full bore last summer, which was put down to a break in the wiring to the intercooler pump; that was repaired. Only fault codes were for misfiring, and high IAT.

I wonder if the misfiring was a contributory factor? Random things can happen at high loads / engine speeds when you get misfires, and a knock sensor isn't going to save it..

Lost the Weistec quote which mentioned 'one knock event'. High IAT would/could cause that. One hell of a repair bill for a broken wire....

 

[alabbasi]

He looked at that possibility, but only found used engines for sale in the US; around $12-S14000 ish, plus of course shipping and import duties. Even then, you end up with a second-hand engine, of unknown provenance and which could have problems of its own. Too much of a lottery for me...

Not worth the aggro. My philosophy on this type of problem is to not rush in, but instead wait for a similar car that had been blasted in the rear to show up on Copart and buy it. It will probably cost about the same as a used engine and i would typically recover much of what I spent selling off parts.

 

[Bellow]

He certainly had a point about the wrist pin/gudgeon pin not being able to support/centralise the piston with such an acute taper towards the top. Wonder what MB/AMG reasoning for such a design?


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I wouldn't read too much into that - and the forum comments don't either.
Engine designer has the choice to restrain lateral motion of the rods at either the big end or the small end. If you don't want the extra heat at the small end, restrain at the big end. The piston's motion in all directions but reciprocating is via its skirt and the cylinder wall. The rod only controls reciprocation.
Bending occurs when the compressive load on the rod exceeds it's capability and starts to buckle. That tendency is determined also by its 'end fixity constant'. That constant due to freedom to rotate around the pins axes and the required clearances (for oil film) is in essence, non-existent. The tapered small end eye is likely of little consequence and will be that way to promote oil flow and hence cooling. Were it so that a full width small end eye could offer restraint - it would merely transfer the load to the piston leading to excessive loading of it against the cylinder wall.
The cross-sectional area and distribution of metal in the main part of the rod is the key to avoid bending.