Low miles R63AMG

[MikeInWimbledon]

This “AMG” was one of just 200 made in Alabama, not Affalterbach. It’s an AMG engine and kit in a mid-Noughties family minivan.

They had to shove R63’s out the door. The world wasn’t beating a path to its door for a wide, long 500bhp van built on SUV underpinnings.

Yes, the Labrador has more space at the back when you drive the R63 round the Nurburgring, but it’s still not the best option, on track or off.

 

[milleplod]

I ran a swb, 6-seat R500 for a while, in Tanzanite with sand leather, one-owner from new with every option known to man. OK, not an AMG, but it went like stink, sounded lovely, was so, so comfy....and regularly returned single-figure mpg. It was very practical too, but I only kept it for around 8 months - I sold it to the then commanding officer of HMS Kent, who flew up to East Midlands airport to collect it. I've no doubt that whatever he flew up in used less fuel than the R500 did on the drive back to Portsmouth....

Pete

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

Car magazine achieved 14.4 mpg in its R63

Or a £150 tank of petrol gets you 250 miles.

 

[Will]

Car magazine achieved 14.4 mpg in its R63

Or a £150 tank of petrol gets you 250 miles.

Mid teens is to be expected, but then what does it really matter?

That car has only done 63k miles in 17 years, less than 4k PA.

£2000 a year in petrol - one tankful a month? And that’s at today’s prices. The VED will be £695 too - I just got the reminder through for my GL63

Recommend Tesco Momentum 99, better value for money than Shell’s over priced V-power and there’s usually quite a few filling stations about for those longer trips!

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

Mid teens is to be expected, but then what does it really matter?
That car has only done 63k miles in 17 years, less than 4k PA.
£2000 a year in petrol - one tankful a month? And that’s at today’s prices. The VED will be £695 too - I just got the reminder through for my GL63
Recomend Tesco Momentum 99, better value for money than Shell’s over priced V-power and there’s usually quite a few filling stations about for those longer trips!

That's not fair. That's the same logic that I use to justify V8's and sports cars.
(Like why create an electric Lotus Elise or Ferrari when the damn things only average 2,500 miles a year.)

 

[OnlyV8s]

There's always a bit of banter that there's only 12 right hand drive R63s and only 12 people in the country that actually want one!

I freely admit to being one of those, and a few years ago they were changing hands in the £15k - £20k range I was dangerously tempted and I could deal with the awful running costs.

My cheapest insurance quote was £1100. The VED is £695. But I wanted to use it a lot and factoring in 15mpg was ruinous. Once a month round trip to the parents? £220 in petrol used in a 24 hour period to sit on the motorway. Commute to work? Forget it.

And there is some truth in the above posts - that engine only just fits. And there's a risk it goes properly bang. The engine only comes out once you've dismantled the front of the car, and the air suspension of course, to be able to reach it.

Fortunately, someone in the US has already dealt with this. Let me find the link a minute and post it...

 

[Will]

There's always a bit of banter that there's only 12 right hand drive R63s and only 12 people in the country that actually want one!

I freely admit to being one of those, and a few years ago they were changing hands in the £15k - £20k range I was dangerously tempted and I could deal with the awful running costs.

My cheapest insurance quote was £1100. The VED is £695. But I wanted to use it a lot and factoring in 15mpg was ruinous. Once a month round trip to the parents? £220 in petrol used in a 24 hour period to sit on the motorway. Commute to work? Forget it.

And there is some truth in the above posts - that engine only just fits. And there's a risk it goes properly bang. The engine only comes out once you've dismantled the front of the car, and the air suspension of course, to be able to reach it.

Fortunately, someone in the US has already dealt with this. Let me find the link a minute and post it...

It’s the same engine as a C63, don’t recall seeing too many posts suggesting they’re about to go bang on every advert/buying thread!

I know the M156 has some maintenance/repair foibles but you’d have to be seriously unlucky to have a terminal engine failure at that sort of mileage

 

[OnlyV8s]

Found it...

R63 AMG The Unicorn of my Destruction

R63 AMG The Unicorn of my Destruction

R63 AMG The Unicorn of my Destruction

grassrootsmotorsports.com

mazdeuce PowerDork
2/24/16 3:43 p.m.
The internet tells me Mercedes built 180 R63 AMG's in 2007. 30 were supposed to stay in the USA, but records seem to show that 44 did. I've never seen one. I'm a stay at home dad with four kids. Over the years I've had a Volvo wagon, a first generation Honda Odyssey, and for the last few years, a crew cab truck as my dad-mobiles. The need to seat six negates the overwhelming majority of cool cars, with the glaring exception of the bizarre and poorly considered R63. Why make make a 505hp AWD minivan? I don't think anyone beyond the engineering department had a good answer to that, and as quickly as they were introduced, they were gone.
But I found one, in Florida, and on Friday I'm going to grab a friend and we're going to grab a rental car and we're going to go get it.
This is going to be more of an ownership log than a build thread. Common wisdom says buying a ten year old AMG Mercedes out of warranty is certain to cause immense pain and maritial strife. I don't doubt that for a second, though I harbor a hope that I'm the one guy who gets away with it. I just can't not buy it, even knowing how stupid the whole thing is.

(Page 7 after this pretty cautious IMO lap round a track (in traffic) which you can see for yourself

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mazdeuce UltimaDork
9/26/16 1:39 p.m.
And I'm going to throw up. It's hard to tell but that's coolant in the oil. Signs point to intake manifold gasket maybe. No overheating, no smoke. Sudden coolant loss. CEL. Coolant in oil. I need to calm down. I'll call the dealership tomorrow.

The headbolts are gone on the M156
Page 11 he gets a quote for $57,000 to replace the M156 with a new one.
Page 12 he decides he'll have to do it himself and buys a four post lift for his garage.
.. many months later and with a lot of help from friends...
Page 81 the engine is back in the car.

 

[ALFAitalia]

Its the looks.....just SO ugly.....and least there is plenty of room in it for the owners guide dog!!

 

[OnlyV8s]

Will - sorry I don't know how to do that quote message thing - you are of course correct. Most people are running round with 2006 M156 engines still with the original style head bolts before they were redesigned and still doing fine. That other silver R63 from a few weeks back was at 160k miles for example.

I just think the R63 is unique vs E63, C63, ML63 of that era because (as I understand it) you can't change the head bolts pre-emptively without taking the engine out. I think one of the other R63s which got sold on CC - the black one - had an head rebuild and the seller said in the Q&A that was a £9k job engine out at a main dealer. Maybe someone like Stevenson could do it in situ.

 

[C240Sport97]

One was sold at auction (mentioned on this forum) and ended up at £32k (was it this one?)

same car

 

[OnlyV8s]

Turning back to the auction, no-one has chipped in yet with how high it might go?!?

This one sold on CC previously for £31,800. Plus £2,300 commission fee.

You can see from the documentation it's been picked up by Stevensons and they've done a £5,900 recommission.

So it owes the owner £40,000 no change

Be interesting to see how close it gets....

 

[Will]

Will - sorry I don't know how to do that quote message thing - you are of course correct. Most people are running round with 2006 M156 engines still with the original style head bolts before they were redesigned and still doing fine. That other silver R63 from a few weeks back was at 160k miles for example.

I just think the R63 is unique vs E63, C63, ML63 of that era because (as I understand it) you can't change the head bolts pre-emptively without taking the engine out. I think one of the other R63s which got sold on CC - the black one - had an head rebuild and the seller said in the Q&A that was a £9k job engine out at a main dealer. Maybe someone like Stevenson could do it in situ.

No worries, I understand what you’re trying to say.

I don’t think it’s worth worrying about too much - it’s 17 years old now. If it needs work on the engine at some point, and that necessitated the engine coming out to do that then so be it.

Not many people would pay a main dealer to do work like that on a car of that age - generally it would be taken to a specialist as the bulk of the cost would be labour.

It’s a bit like buying many older sports/prestige car - potential big bills if you’re unlucky, often most owners will not have the misfortune though. But if you worried about it too much you’d never buy one

 

[Will]

Turning back to the auction, no-one has chipped in yet with how high it might go?!?

This one sold on CC previously for £31,800. Plus £2,300 commission fee.

You can see from the documentation it's been picked up by Stevensons and they've done a £5,900 recommission.

So it owes the owner £40,000 no change

Be interesting to see how close it gets....

I doubt they bought it to flip or as an investment etc. You wouldn’t spend that kind of money on it if you weren’t hoping to keep it for a while.

Personally I suspect that it might not make as much as before, which would be a pity for the seller. But compared to depreciation on a new one probably not too bad

I can’t see the value in this sort of car but then I’m not in the market for one. My GL63 has almost half the mileage and more spec/options etc but I suspect that it wouldn’t be worth as much as what that R63 sold for last time around.

You really have to want one of these cars though, someone will but how much they want it will be seen at the close of the auction

 

[BTB 500]

it’s 17 years old now. If it needs work on the engine at some point, and that necessitated the engine coming out to do that then so be it.
...
It’s a bit like buying many older sports/prestige car - potential big bills if you’re unlucky, often most owners will not have the misfortune though. But if you worried about it too much you’d never buy one

To be fair, the engine had to come out of my lowly Vito in order to change the exhaust manifolds on that

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Like any other auction, all you need is two serious bidders - who both really want the car, and who value the opportunity to buy it much more than they value the money it costs to buy it - and the sky is the limit. But without two serious bidders then it will sell for much much less.

Whilst as a curio there is rarity value, in reality a person who spends £40k on a 17 year old R 63 is even rarer than the car. I also suspect that there are even fewer than those who prepared to spend double that on a brand new one, as many would have been on a company’s books.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

I just think the R63 is unique vs E63, C63, ML63 of that era because (as I understand it) you can't change the head bolts pre-emptively without taking the engine out. I think one of the other R63s which got sold on CC - the black one - had an head rebuild and the seller said in the Q&A that was a £9k job engine out at a main dealer. Maybe someone like Stevenson could do it in situ.

It’s not unusual for the M156 to be removed from the car for a serious rebuild anyway, regardless of whether it’s an R 63 or not. Even if it wasn’t intended, some will get dropped because a stud or bolt shears, or sone other complication.

Someone wishing to genuinely do preventative maintenance - rather than react to an issue - will do more than just the head bolts, they’ll be replacing the buckets, maybe the cams, maybe the cam adjuster, and if not replacing them they’ll be scrutinised closely. It makes sense for the engine to come out.

I would say £9k is in the right ball park, it just depends upon how many cams and cam adjusters need to be replaced, so it could easily be less, but could easily be more.

 

[Darrell]

I quite like it.

I’d de-badge it and make the front grill less obvious and make it into a proper Q car.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

My cheapest insurance quote was £1100. The VED is £695. But I wanted to use it a lot and factoring in 15mpg was ruinous. Once a month round trip to the parents? £220 in petrol used in a 24 hour period to sit on the motorway. Commute to work? Forget it.

I’m not sure R/ML/G 63 cost that much more to run than other large - but less interesting - SUVs, especially when you consider the relative lack of depreciation.

Someone close to me has two ML 63 - which is the same as the R 63 beneath the skin - and she’s good enough to even let her clueless husband drive one of them.

Whilst they both have other cars, neither has found a car they like more, or which has the same blend of pace, practicality and anonymity, so they really use them. A lot.

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

Why make make a 505hp AWD minivan? I don't think anyone beyond the engineering department had a good answer to that, and as quickly as they were introduced, they were gone.

Reminds me of that Gordon Murray quote about the need for innovation that solves a problem, not a solution that needs a problem.

"I think a lot of people stumble straight into what they've come up with. And I think that's a mistake.

The first thing you need to get across is what the problem was in the first place. A lot of people think of an idea and then try and think of a problem it could solve."