Paid $200 for this including delivery.

It is an M271.980, same as what’s in my car. 200,000km old, blown head gasket.

I grabbed it because I figured it would pay for itself pretty quickly if I need a coil pack or sensor or anything.

Pulled the head off to see if the block or head were obviously junk.

It is suffering from the common worn cam sprocket problem. This is the inlet cam - the exhaust isn’t a bad.

Interestingly, the cam chain doesn’t appear to be worn.

Generally, it came apart really nicely, the only hassle being that every single exhaust stud came out...

Wonder how long this O-ring had been there? Wonder whether it happened at the factory or afterward?

This had me stumped for a while. The guide pin has to come out to access the E-torx bolt underneath, but I couldn’t work out how to remove the pin.

Eventually I went to google. Seems like lots of people do timing chain & sprocket replacement without replacing the chain guides - including those who upload how-to videos...

I finally found someone asking, who was given the correct answer. The pin has a M6 internal thread, so you screw a bolt in, and then wind the nut down and extract the pin.

Totally unremarkable once I got the head off. Minimal bore wear, no sign of a BHG, no corrosion in either the head or the block.

So unremarkable that I didn’t even think to take a photo.

I am now assuming that the coolant got into the water through the oil-water heat exchanger failing - will need to confirm this if I ever use the head/block/heat exchanger.

These motors (and cars) were from Mercedes’ Chrysler era - Merc people complain about them in much the same way Volvo people complain about Ford-era Volvos, but overall it seems to be well engineered.

The bottom end with no accessories certainly weighs more than I would expect.