“No Mercedes, Volvo, Fiat, Saab, Peugot, Mini, BMW or VW on that list...”
My wife has a 323i BMW Convertible. At 75k miles, on a hot day, the plastic radiator failed stranding her in the middle of the freeway. It cost just about $1000 to replace the radiator, water pump, belts and tensioners. The shop that did the repair said that we were extremely lucky that the overheating didn’t trash the cylinder head too ( seems they tend to crack between the center two cylinders) because that would have been another 3 grand. He also told us to “routinely” replace the radiator at 60k to 70k because “they all fail.” He said that Mercedes is just the same. The euros are in love with car parts that are “recyclable,” hence the plastic radiators. BMW’s are wonderful cars to drive, but they are a maintenance headache in our experience. Every time we need to have something done to our car, the shop’s standard response is “they all do it!”
Wow...that must have been some kind of failure.
Aluminum heads are a tricky animal...we had a ‘97 Olds Cutlass that developed a head gasket leak around 72k, I didn’t wait to repair it...cost me about $400 for all of the gaskets, head bolts and other stuff I did...
I replaced the radiator on a Mercury Sable some years back...about $150.
But then, I’ve read that Euro autos are notoriously expensive when it comes to parts...which is why they aren’t on my shopping list even though they make some nice looking and performing cars.