Third Time's a German! - C180 Kompressor

MaleCortana · August 25

Hellooo, I arrived at AutoLanka as a wee late teens lad with a Starlet, I grew into the reliable and loving arms of a Camry and now in my mid 20s, I seek excitement (in the guise of financial ruin), so what better time to grab an old German lady to treat me (or punish me, might be a kink);

Introducing Beatrice;

She is a 2010 MFD, 2011 Registered C180 Kompressor specced in Obsidian Black Metallic, specced with some standard options such as Cruise Control and some non-standards like the AMG seats. She is just shy of 100k kms and has 2 extensive files of records since the first owner, I am the fourth. Just finished doing it's service at Merc Labs (when did doing a service cost a 100k?!), will be replacing the pulley related components this Wednesday

I still have the Camry around (sitting at 240k kms) which will be picked up by its new owner in the coming few days and I'll do a proper send off post when that happens!

john cooper · August 26

Congratulations on the new purchase and welcome to the Merc club!

Feel free to share more details about the car later, but Beatrice sounded like she came from the UK 😀and is stunning in her skin colour.
Beatrice will be a bit expensive to maintain, but that's how they are; they like to be ridden hard, so don't worry about revving up to the red line. Trust me, they love it.

Did you particularly want to buy the Kompressor model, not the CGI?

Edited August 26 by john cooper

Hyaenidae · August 26

Congratulations! Love the black interior.

sathyajithj99 · August 26

Congratulations 🎊

matroska · August 26

Nice - Beatrice looks fine for her age. A mature German in black - clearly some Freudian analysis needs to be done here

iRage · August 26

COngratulations !

Beatrice sounds like an old lady in her 60s. Is there something we should know about you

Gummybr · August 26

Congratulations! These are nice cars, yes they maybe expensive to maintain but to offset that you need to use them rather than keep them garaged.

On the servicing front if you were to do the normal service it shouldn't cost you 100k. I know they use synthetic oil and specific oil brands but not 100k. But hey you will service the car every 10,000kms or one year compared to your Camry.

Some of those had trouble with balancing shaft dampers by the time they hit around 100,000kms. But people love these cars.

Things to look out for - the switches with paint peeling off (window, AC switches) but those should be easy to find.

On the spec that is a fairly standard spec, cruise control came standard with the automatic. And those are the Avantgarde model specific seats with leather on the sides and the fabric in the middle.

The Elegance model had the full synthetic leather and the classical merc grille.

MaleCortana · August 27

@john cooper Hey, no not really it was a bit of an impulse purchase, I was looking at W211s extensively and they started moving from around the 7-9 mil range to 10+ range I just said f**k it and bought this. There weren't really a discussion on the Kompressor vs the CGI, I just wanted a black car

@Hyaenidae @sathyajithj99 Thank you for the wishes!

@matroska @iRage Hey guys long time no chat! Hahahaha no I wanted to keep up the tradition of naming cars from B (Camry was Bess, Startlet was Becky), this is where I landed [*thinks to self* almost got exposed there for having a mommy kink]

@Gummybr No the oil itself was incredibly expensive (almost 70k)? I wanted to get the service done at a decent big name place, since those records matter in value, I'll probably visit my normal mechanic for the other podi podi repairs

MaleCortana · August 27

Thank you for the insight @Gummybr I'm not super educated on the specs since this is my first German after all

iRage · August 29

On 8/27/2025 at 3:14 PM, MaleCortana said:

*thinks to self* ~~almost~~ got exposed there for having a mommy kink

There..fixed that thought for you. "almost" was not needed.

So how is the old gal doing? What are your intentions with her?

Gummybr · August 29

On 8/27/2025 at 4:14 PM, MaleCortana said:

@Gummybr No the oil itself was incredibly expensive (almost 70k)? I wanted to get the service done at a decent big name place, since those records matter in value, I'll probably visit my normal mechanic for the other podi podi repairs

What was the oil you used? From memory the agents use Mobil/Castrol, but there are cheaper alternatives. I know for a fact that BMW uses Shell but they opened upto Liqui Moli two years ago as customers were saying too expensive. You need to get the correct spec though. It was almost half the price. Shell used to be around that 70k mark but LM was about 40k.

Edited August 29 by Gummybr

john cooper · September 1

@GummybrAs long as the oil meets the MB grade manufacturer has specified for the engine model, I believe it should be okay. (Correct me if I am wrong)

I use mb 229.51 or mb 229.52 grade oil for my GLC250d OM651 engine, so whatever deal we have at the time of the service, I buy the cheapest 6L pack😉
The latest deal was for Valvoline, which is 50% off, so I have stacked a few packs.

Gummybr · September 2

On 9/1/2025 at 1:06 PM, john cooper said:

@GummybrAs long as the oil meets the MB grade manufacturer has specified for the engine model, I believe it should be okay. (Correct me if I am wrong)

I use mb 229.51 or mb 229.52 grade oil for my GLC250d OM651 engine, so whatever deal we have at the time of the service, I buy the cheapest 6L pack😉
The latest deal was for Valvoline, which is 50% off, so I have stacked a few packs.

Yup correct, in MaleCortana's case the car is older so he can use any oil that the owners manual recommend. He should take a leaf out of your book.

MaleCortana · September 10

On 8/29/2025 at 8:29 AM, iRage said:

There..fixed that thought for you. "almost" was not needed.

So how is the old gal doing? What are your intentions with her?

Bess, is sold!, 240k kms and that story is over! (Poddak sellers remorse, Beatrices low profile tires and tighter suspension means the ride is more uncomfortable but sportier)

MaleCortana · September 10

Front Right Wheel Sensor Decided it was time, was scared to start the car to see multiple ABS, TCS warnings, with Cruise Control disabled, simple fix of replacing it and everything back to normal, did a lovely Colombo To Kandy roundtrip short-thereafter. Before I headed on a long trip decided to also change the pulleys and belts just in case