Frankie's 2008 Mercedes GL320 CDI 4MATIC Adventures

[SWbySWesty]

Here. We. Go!

We posted about it, and got a few mixed reviews from people. After searching all over the US and watching many YouTube videos and reading good reviews, we got ourselves a 2008 Mercedes GL320 CDI 4MATIC. It doesn't have the offroad package with locking diffs, but so far so good! Let's go camping!

 

[SWbySWesty]

Here's a little water crossing from the weekend

And our camping trip with my buddy Andy in his Jeep.


Andy got stuck, and I apparently didn't have the eyebolt that Mercedes uses to pull the car onto trailers from the front and rear so I couldn't help him. We called in reinforcements!

So far, it's been a good ride!

 

[otiswesty]

Sweet rig, cool dog, awesome engine choice.
Cheers

 

[aequitas3]

Careful... Sometimes the trails bite. http://youtu.be/xd4Ldh53cnA


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[SWbySWesty]

There are a few things that stand out to me in that video!
1. It looks like the Mercedes has a tow hitch; why didn't they use that?
2. Where DID they attach the tow rope? Looks like it's underneath the vehicle somewhere...
3. OOPS!

 

[calicamper]

Been eyeing the 320 my self. The deal killer I think is going to be the bad seal design on the turbo and the second seal issue on the cooler. Was yours done on the Mercedes recall? I really like that 3.2 L diesel and the size of the GL. But not crazy about the oil seal issues. Did you dig into that?

 

[chsu74]

Swirl motor, oil cooler seals, airmatic suspension etc.. Sprinters have a different intake manifold design and also not stressed as high as ML and GL with better cooling which may attribute to better reliability.

 

[SWbySWesty]

Been eyeing the 320 my self. The deal killer I think is going to be the bad seal design on the turbo and the second seal issue on the cooler. Was yours done on the Mercedes recall? I really like that 3.2 L diesel and the size of the GL. But not crazy about the oil seal issues. Did you dig into that?

It's a one owner truck so it's had everything done. This truck is amazing to drive and gets 24-25mpg highway from Santa Barbara to LA! Great for how large and heavy it is.

 

[calicamper]

Agreed the MB 3.2 is nice. Just came down to SD on Sunday. The 2.5L 2010 Subaru was showing 31mpg at 420 miles when I took toll road 73. It has some steep canyons. I realized a blutech GL was passing. I was doing a gental 75 that CVT is really shines in the hill country. I was able to hang with the Bluetec at 85 pushing 3800-4000 rpm till our second canyon climb. Then he just whipped it and left me sitting there pegged at 5k 85mph like I was anchored to the pavement. LOL

We arrived in SD showing 29mpg.. But yes Id love to find me a mercedes Diesel. The Sequoia I have is nice but its not a road trip machine.

 

[sonk_76]

I love seeing someone take the GL off the road. I thought at some point in time the GL was designed to be a replacement for the G class, which makes me believe that it would have at least some off-road chops (I realize they chose to keep the G-class around for a reason, given it's more single minded off-road roots).

Look forward to hearing about your experience. The diesel option with the long range is such an awesome value! It's crazy that so many of the so called "hard core" off road choices--G-class, Land Cruiser, Wrangler, etc.--don't have a diesel anywhere in their option list in this country!

 

[otiswesty]

My son just missed out on a ML320cdi. Picked up a super nice ML500 instead. The fuel economy of the diesel would have been nice, but having dad familiar with the m113 motor was a plus for him.

 

[SWbySWesty]

Yeah, I look under the engine cover but it doesn't look like rocket science to do the basics. I'm going to buy a 5-year. 100,000 mile warranty for the GL as a precaution.

 

[SWbySWesty]

Quick non-adventure update: I got a warranty from an aftermarket company. 5-year, 100,000 mile powertrain warranty which also covers seals and gaskets, turbo, air conditioning and some other electronic bits. They had another move coverage option to basically have a factory warranty, but it was way too expensive. I paid $2,500 for this 5-year warranty and feel good that any driveline issues will be covered.

 

[SWbySWesty]

Not much still, but just got some cross bars for the roof rack to put some pelican box storage up top. Two dogs take a lot of space inside!
I had to get new sway bar end links after a rattle showed up.
I'm happy to report that I'm getting an average of 660 to almost 700 miles of travel per tank of diesel (26-28 gallons). This beast is a road trip machine! That's about 22-23 mpg of mixed driving with full loads of 7 passengers or 4+gear. Highway fully loaded at 70mph sees 23mpg. My Tacoma got 15 once loaded. We prefer driving this over her Honda Civic for road trips even though the Honda gets 40mpg.
It's so roomy and comfy! We're headed to Monache Meadows for the holiday weekend.

 

[SWbySWesty]

Beep beep from the back country!



And a few thoughts: It is a road trip mobile which is exactly what I was looking for with good enough off road capability. It's no rock crawler, but it'll go where I tend to go and save the tough stuff for the dirtbike. The airbag suspension is very smooth on the dirt roads and rocky terrain. It's got the Airmatic system to lift it 3" for some additional clearance. It's nice to cruise down the highway fully loaded with two boxes on the roof and still pull 23mpg. The diesel pulls like a champ through anything so far. I'll see if it gets stuck in the sand on the beach in Baja. It's easy to clean since it has a leather interior.
A trailer hitch comes this week which I'll install after Baja and other than that, I'll find a place for my HAM radio, portable solar for my fridge, and maybe larger roof rack system. I've been itching to get back into a trailer after I sold my offroad teardrop, so I'll likely be going back to a little trailer. For my style of camping, and now with two dogs, it's going to be the sure way to go.