Old Merc estate as a weekend car?

I don’t have a car anymore, I don’t need one….with the exception of getting to races.
At the mo I use the missus Punto which swallows my bike/bikes.

Looking at 2003/4 C200 diesel estates. They seem too cheap and to clean? ideal for Sunday morning trips to races.
There must be drawbacks.

Pfft. 10 years. I’d consider that a new car.

Never really looked at Mercs in particular, but big old barges tend to sell for next to nothing. Especially the big petrol motors. Cost a bit more to run, but ideal for weekends biking.

Prone to rusting like mad underneeth the early 2000s mercs – c and e class

Same time vitos /sprinters rusted like hell

At the time merc was being run by accountants

Think that may fall foul of the Merc Rules
Old skooool = Awesome
Mid skool =Awful
New = excellent again

Merc C and E’s of that age – rust, rust, rust and some dodgy electrics thrown in. Find a fairly rust free one and it should OK.

So, ( as a very rough guide/ rule of thumb)
Which years are best avoided in Merc land ?

check Volvo as well, V70, 2.4 petrol with a manual box for mucho value. Fully galvanised and built like a tank underneath.

Wife has a much abused example and its been brilliant.

My 1994 e300D estate (W124 body) has one small patch of rust. Just coming up to 200000 miles. Getting rare these days, the engine bay wiring looms usually do for them (they bio-degrade in the car).

You get get a FS bike in the back without removing the wheels !

Avoid the early (1997-2003) W210 E class (one with round headlights) for sure. My mate’s 1998 E280 (w210 body) is held together with duck tape, rust everywhere. Better after 2003 I believe. Don’t know about C-class though.

As others have said above, avoid the early 2000’s Merc’s. They were pretty poor as reliability went, older or newer were much better.

If you get a decent W124 estate, you’ll not go far wrong. Regular servicing and it’ll run forever.
Awesome cars.

Check honest john for the poor yrs. Tends to be when the european union forced car manufacturers to switch from two pack paints to water based paints for environmental reasons. Merc got it very wrong for many yrs around 2000 to 2004/5. Why not try a petrol mondeo mk3 circa 2004 ish. Big reliable bus. That 2.0 is a great petrol engine.

It’s only cool if you get one of these;

Mercedes so the story goes, in the late nineties bought a huge consignment of steel which was used for the c and e class cars, that Fiat had already rejected it as substandard tells you all you need to know about their cars of that era. S class aside of course but that’s a different thread altogether.

As Merak says – nothing beats a super cool Beirut Taxi!! however, i’d struggle to put a filthy bike in the boot

I’ve had an 1982 S-class – 3.8 V8 – the best car i ever owned

I also had a 1993 190D – brilliant, if not very slow – had to sell to buy an estate car

Currently got a ’97 Audi A4 estate – 30,000 miles in 2 years with no issues – £700 – very pleased

I’m also very tempted to get a Fiat Multipla – the perfect biking car

I would check the movement of the seats if you want to carry stuff about. From my experience of trying to get bikes into mercs the seats don’t tend to move forward/recline much – too many electric motors.
I’d be looking at a mondeo ST estate

It’s only cool if you get one of these;

W123 FTW!*

Super cool. Cooler than a penguin’s pantry, in fact. W123s are all of teh orsumnezz!

* I wish I could get that as a plate to go on mine! 😀

Why don’t you buy another Punto if it’s doing the trick?

Try an A Class form the same era. I’ve owned 2, a 51 plate and an 04 plate, a 140 and 160 respectively.
Ok, the 140 was a bit of a money pit to own, but then Merc did a lot of recalls and offered helping hands with some of the suspension issues and starter motors going boink. The discs also were a bit chocolate..
But on the whole they both drove really well, had three bikes in the back and either took the rear seats out of folded them.
Stuck 90k on the 140 and 80k on the 160.

I really like them and would buy another, provided it had a service history… 😉