AutoMechanic
Site Donor 2024
Dang I have never seen a car with two spark plugs per cylinder that’s interesting. Bet they were hard to get out I have dealt with rusty stuck plugs before it’s no fun.
Spark plugs changed after 195k miles, and 15 years, Mercedes S500
- Thread starter GON
- Start date
HEMI's and Civic Hybrids are another examples of 2 plugs per cyl
Aircraft engines too
Wow...so many erroneous assumptions in one post...
This isn’t a distributor ignition. The wires are short. Because of room, and the dual plugs, it’s a V-8, remember, they route a short wire to the coil. One coil for each cylinder.
The dual plugs aren’t a flame propagation issue alone, they’re used to measure the quality of ignition through the measuring of ionization energy in the second plug firing.
They used this strategy on many of their engines.
While you’re busy criticizing Mercedes engineers, you’ve overlooked the fact that this engine ran for nearly 200,000 miles on the original plugs.
That is a testament to the good design in this ignition system.
GON
$100 Site Donor 2024
Car is fine. Water did enter the cabin, had to pull up the area under the front passenger floorboard and clean some corrosion. Did the same with the rear SAM, but not sure if it had significant water exposure (don't recall- did the repair a few years ago.
The big issue was water got into the airmatic suspension system. Common issue is the air filter going to the pump had a open in it, allowing water to be sucked into the air pump. The air filter housing needs to be replaced every few years, cost about $10. Very easy job, but is out of sight so many W220s go without air filter protection for the airmatic pump.
What I liked best about this car is the way it was optioned. The 2004-2006 S class are very nice cars, with an average sticker price in the 80k range. But they are slim on options even at that price point. Vented seats, satellite radio, bluetooth, and heated steering wheel are all options. This car had those options, along with the AMG exterior package. Overall, and excellent car.
GON
$100 Site Donor 2024
Didn't, but would think the gap would be larger than .8. I have the old plugs and may do it- right now I don't know where my gauge is....
GON
$100 Site Donor 2024
Actually pulling the plugs were fairly easy and consistent. Mercedes did a good job with this engine in this vehicle. Fairly easy to self fix most things (except replace the transmission fluid).
AutoMechanic
Site Donor 2024
My brother's RX-3 had twin plugs per rotor.
Maybe RX-7/8 too?
AutoMechanic
Site Donor 2024
Never knew there were so many cars with it. I guess it is possible for the other ones you listed to have it also I’m not sure.
Old Nissans too - especially the 260/280ZX and the early 1980s trucks.
I wasn't trying to criticize MB engineers at all - sorry if it came across that way. Previously I owned 2 MB's (C300 and E350) and I thoroughly enjoy MB vehicles so there is zero hate from me against MB.
I will say on the spark plug front my '09 C300 acted up very suddenly when the spark plugs wore out (prob ~86k miles) - what was some misfiring on cold winter starts (20-30 degrees F) became a situation where 2 weeks later my CEL was lit with misfires on 5 of 6 cylinders and a trip to the MB dealer for new plugs. IIRC they were only ~6k miles past scheduled replacement - I was surprised at how it was like a light switch where they were fine one day and 2 weeks later the car would barely run on a freezing cold start.
I have to say my experiences this year exactly mirror what you say. I've been tracking vehicles at local auctions and am surprised by what people are paying OTD, especially since many bids are with no inspection at all (I only bid on what I can go touch locally, not as brave as you).
I am going to read your linked threads; interesting. I had been trying to find a 4matic of that gen S500 earlier this spring/summer. I found two that were too rough and one lovely one, but I was a day late in finding that one and missed it.
I am just about finished tweaking a Volvo XC70 I bought six weeks or so ago; maybe when that's done I'll start looking again for an S500. There's a jag xj12 at auction next week I sure wish I could justify right now (I can't).From what I understand the used car market is kinda bonkers right now because there are so few used cars on the market.I have to say my experiences this year exactly mirror what you say. I've been tracking vehicles at local auctions and am surprised by what people are paying OTD, especially since many bids are with no inspection at all (I only bid on what I can go touch locally, not as brave as you).
I am going to read your linked threads; interesting. I had been trying to find a 4matic of that gen S500 earlier this spring/summer. I found two that were too rough and one lovely one, but I was a day late in finding that one and missed it.
I honestly can't tell. Our market has historically been super-strong -cars way over national average price for used ones (Seattle economy). Since Covid, I've seen prices all over the place, but generally lower than pre-Covid. This is my observations from watching lots of CL ads over the years and more so recently (Selling my step-sons starter car, getting him a new one, and a ski-car for myself).
One thing is clear; the used car market is definitely in flux, and maybe ours locally is out of synch with the nation in general.
I just finished the OPs flood-damage thread, and am starting on the fire-damaged one.
What I heard was that everyone was expecting some really serious economic turmoil so in the beginning prices were low. Everyone blew through their inventory and then things never got as bad as everyone was predicting (how I have no idea with how many people were out of work). That combined with new car sales being down during the last recession meaning there are fewer new cars turning into used cars. Then you have new car production getting disrupted and here we are. Kinda fascinating thinking about how all this fits together. Especially how different parts of the country are affected.
I have to say my experiences this year exactly mirror what you say. I've been tracking vehicles at local auctions and am surprised by what people are paying OTD, especially since many bids are with no inspection at all (I only bid on what I can go touch locally, not as brave as you).
I am going to read your linked threads; interesting. I had been trying to find a 4matic of that gen S500 earlier this spring/summer. I found two that were too rough and one lovely one, but I was a day late in finding that one and missed it.
I'm not sure why you want an S500 when the next step up is the S550. I think that generation was worse for reliability than the S550 that followed it. And I'd probably skip the first generation of the S550 in the 2007-2009 range, I think the early S550 engines in 2007 had issues. I think you got more options in 2012-2013 and usually the last year of a generation is the best. I like the 2014+ S550, but if you look at the price of a 2013 and a 2014, the price really takes a jump as the 2014 was the new generation and new look. Although I like how it looks, I hate how the E and the C also look the same so that it's hard to tell if it's an S, E or a C from far away until you get closer. Prices are all over the place now, 16-20-24k depending on mileage. Maybe wait til after the car buying madness dies down.
OP's s500 may be powered by the m113, which my old man has one. I believe they went to the dual spark plug design for refinement in the form of a smoother engine without having to spend as much on engineering proper flame propagation in comparison to a single plug design. The w220 generation was known to have quite a strict engineering budget in relative comparison to the previous w140, where they went absolutely nuts.
The Ford 6.2L V8 is a twin plug engine as well as the older(90s) Ranger 2.3L engines.
AutoMechanic
Site Donor 2024
Interesting I didn’t know that.
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