I Nearly Bought a Mercedes CL600 Yesterday..

"Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW." (aya-yu)
03/24/2015 at 15:40 • Filed to: None

I nearly buy it, i even bring the check to paid it, but the problem is, the car feels sketchy as hell. It's a Purple 2004 CL600, with (claimed) 19,000km on the clock, but there's a few things that makes me finally walk away from the car.

First off, it has exactly 19,000km. No more, no less. I'm afraid the odometer is tampered in some kind or another, since how often you saw a car with exactly 19,000km on it?

Plus it didn't have service records. Plus the temprerature sensor is broken, basically it's shows that it's 0 degrees out there despite i live in Indonesia where it's summer everyday. I'm affraid it'll cook the engine in no time if i took it on a long drive.

A shame though, since it was perfect. It's purple, it's a 2004 model so it has more power than you'll ever needed, and it feels and sounds superb. It looks just like the one i put up there. Still, would you pay for a cheaper car that feels a bit sketchy or to try to find another example?

And oh, is there any way to see if the Odometer on that CL is really has been tampered?

DISCUSSION (28)

505Turbeaux > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 15:44

which temp sensor, ambient or coolant temp? Both are easy fixes, the ambient more than the other. Ambient will only affect the readout and HVAC functions, the coolant might just feed the gauge or the gauge and ECU(s), I forget if it is multi function on those.

Beyond that, nice color, great profile

Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 15:46

What was the asking price?

duurtlang > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 15:46

I'd pass too.

An expensive vehicle like that usually comes with some service history. Service history with odometer readings.

Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW. > Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo
03/24/2015 at 15:47

Less than a base model Nissan Versa.

Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW. > duurtlang
03/24/2015 at 15:48

Yeah, that's what i think. I mean, in Indonesia this car used to retail for 330k USD. Why there's no service record whatsoever?

Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW. > 505Turbeaux
03/24/2015 at 15:48

I think it was the ambient one. I thought it'll effect the engine in some way.

SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie > 505Turbeaux
03/24/2015 at 15:49

Considering that coolant temperature feeds the ECU in Charlie, it definitely feeds the ECU in this.

505Turbeaux > SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie
03/24/2015 at 15:50

yeah I thought it did, but couldn't pull it off the top of my brains

SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 15:50

Are you able to do a VIN search like in the US and Europe or is that less supported there?

505Turbeaux > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 15:50

not at all, just wont crank the A/C up to FULL high to adjust for the ambient temp. Easy to replace, under the front air dam on the drivers side IIRC

duurtlang > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 15:51

Because the owner wants to hide something. Something very significant. I wouldn't even want to find out what 's in the trunk . Well, maybe out of curiosity, but that's it.

Walk away.

SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 15:51

If it was showing 0 degrees outside , it definitely was ambient and would have no bearing on your engine. It's not even HVAC. It's purely informational for the driver.

Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW. > SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie
03/24/2015 at 15:56

Sort of, but the VIN search will only tell you that if it's stolen or not.

Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW. > duurtlang
03/24/2015 at 15:58

Well, i've seen the trunk and it's looks just like normal mercedes trunk. No bodies found.

jariten1781 > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 15:58

I haven't run into a tampered odo in a long...long time, but the old standby check from back when it was common was to take a look at the pads on the pedals. They should have nearly no wear at 19k km. If they're worn smooth it's almost certainly been rolled back.

SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 15:58

Might be fun to go back with an OBDII reader just for shits and giggles to see how many codes are being thrown with the CEL unplugged.

Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW. > SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie
03/24/2015 at 16:00

I think it was the outside one since it runs fine. The car's engine temperature didn't rise or drops in a scary way.

Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW. > SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie
03/24/2015 at 16:05

Yeah :D

Seriously, i want that thing tough. I really do.

Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW. > jariten1781
03/24/2015 at 16:08

Well, the pedals looks good, but in my mind they might be already replaced.

rotundapig > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 16:08

I have an unhealthy want for one of those. I've been looking around for a while, but I finally decided that all the ones worth owning were out of my price range and all the ones in my price range were guaranteed to have at least one of the expensive things break.

The other issue is the reason I wanted one was because I do a lot of highway driving and was thinking it would be a great car to eat up the miles, but the more a read about them, the more I realized that no one put tons of miles on any of them because they were too unreliable and expensive to service.

Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW. > rotundapig
03/24/2015 at 16:12

Me too.

I mean, if i own one of these, 600 miles trip from my home to my parent's home will be a very leisurely drive. I do have other cars, the LS400, but the LS400 is not as relaxing or powerful as the merc.

JGrabowMSt > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 16:15

I believe, and I can't quite be held accountable for this, but if you were to unplug either the speed sensor or the cruise control sensor (maybe both), the odometer kind of somehow forgets the car is moving.

In some cars, which may more many not be built in Germany with a fancy circular hood ornament. YMMV though, it's not a guarantee for everything.

Oh, but there's a catch! The ECU will still record some form of mileage in most cases.

RallyWrench > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 16:23

Not a cheap car to care for.

The outside air temp sensor is not associated with engine temp, that's separate and is read from a sensor on the thermostat housing, so if it's the OAT, you're in no danger of overheating. If the outside air temp reads under about 40F, the AC will be disabled, as Mercedes-Benz thoughtfully does not wish to freeze its drivers.

The instrument clusters are well known for failure, so it may well have been replaced or remanufactured, at which point the mileage could be changed. Records are the only way to verify this, or if it was done at a Mercedes center they should have record of it by the VIN.

Budget $5k/year to run it. An '04 should have the later M275 5.5L twin turbo SOHC V8, much harder to work on than the previous M137. 24 plugs, with 2 $1300 coil cassettes. The ABC system is problematic, as is the AirMatic suspension. Other issues include the auto-close features of doors & trunk (often bad latches), wiring harness failure to the doors, water intrusion into the the trunk damaging the various electrical components located there, antenna problems (integrated into the rear window), COMAND head unit failures, seat control problems, and more. The transmission electrical connector often leaks, inducing transmission & EGS/TCM problems, and the trans valve body conductor plate is failure prone, often causing speed sensor faults which will then cause the trans to enter limp mode.

In summary: unless you can easily afford the repairs of a $100k car, or are very handy with diagnostics and repairs yourself, run away.

jariten1781 > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 16:28

Yeah, that was the first place to look and sometimes the unscrupulous seller would be smart enough to replace the pads since it's cheap and easy. Other things to check were wear on the window switches/door handles, the e-brake handle, signs that bolts had been removed from the alternator/starter (scratches/dings in the general area), accumulation in the wheel wells, pull up the floormats and check for wear on the underlying carpet, etc. Any one of them can be covered up to look like new, but it's unlikely that a tamperer would have fixed all of them.

Luc - The Acadian Oppo > JGrabowMSt
03/24/2015 at 16:32

I've seen this in Ram trucks. If you pull out the ABS fuse it turns off the odometer(and speedo). The only issue is the ECU keeps reading the proper mileage. so you eventually end up with an ODO that says one thing and an ecu that says something completely different.

KatzManDu > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 16:59

I'd be more worried about it being stolen than having the odometer tampered with. Even if your local VIN check comes up OK, it may have been stolen from Europe or the USA, which is why the price is so cheap.

Admittedly, all over the world these cars have depreciated like rocks.

Also, it is an 11-12 year old car. There will be some wear-and-tear, but by doing things like checking pedals, weather stripping, and looking at things like the spare tire tags and placards you can tell how "used" the car is.

It's possible that the car is "clean" (not stolen, no odometer fraud) but it was in some kind of a wreck. Someone got it at an auction and put it together in their backyard, on their own time as a pet project and is now selling it. That could be part of why it is so cheap.

If you have your heart set on it, take it to a mechanic for an independent inspection. Getting underneath it to look at the wear-n-tear on tie-rod ends, bushings, and hanging parts (suspension, exhaust) can be big clues, too. Imagine you get underneath and find that the control arms on one side of the car have been replaced, but haven't been on the other— that's the sign of some kind of accident or damage (usually.)

AMGtech - now with more recalls! > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
03/24/2015 at 19:57

Do you have a dealer or specialist independent Mercedes shop that could check it out? They could pull up dealer service history (if it has any) and check to see if the odometer has been tampered with.

mcseanerson > Aya, Almost Has A Cosmo With Toyota Engine Owned by a BMW.
07/01/2015 at 17:11

Sure enough I do a google image search for CL600 and the first one that shows the car proper with all the windows down is from Oppo.