Mercedes M156 6.2L AMG V8 Blown Engine Teardown. Oh The Devastation! 

The AMG M156 was the first engine fully designed and developed by AMG in house. It’s a truly wonderful NA engine, one of the best in the world in my opinion and the opinion of many others. It revs out so nice and sounds as only a big NA motor can. It’s actually quite American in the way it makes power, big displacement, big lunged, high RPM, NA engine unlike most of its contemporaries at the time that were downsized with forced induction. The 159 was a hot rodded variant used in the SLS and was the most powerful per cubic inch NA engine ever produced for passenger cars, I’m not sure if it still holds that title. As for the damage you found, anyone who knows the engine knows what most likely happened. First the worn through cam bucket is not an unheard of problem. AMG had issues with some of the buckets not being properly hardened which is why some engines have one bucket worn, other have more then one and still others will have no issues at all. AMG did have a fix but it was expensive. If you had an engine with worn buckets then you would need to replace all 4 cams and all 32 buckets. The cams were specific to this engine and would not work in any other engine, not even the 159. Occasionally the 156 suffered from head bolts that would stretch and break and AMG did release improved bolts. They’re also had some issues with intake manifold leaks and some PCV issues that could result in an annoying whistle sound or a check engine light or both. Despite all this though this is still an amazing engine that to few people ever got the chance to experience. It’s also a pleasure to work on and is very simple in its construction. Not all 156 engines would suffer from these faults and proper maintenance, as always, would greatly reduce the issues with the cam buckets. I can say with a good deal of certainty that this engine was not properly maintained. The worn cam bucket got to the point that the cam knocked the valve out of the head and it fell into the combustion chamber and the rest is history. That worn cam bucket made a lot of noise starting off as a very minimal tap mainly heard on cold starts, and slowly progressed to an extremely loud tap. The owner of this engine was either deaf or willfully ignored the noise. This engine was likely very high mileage as the cam bucket wear never showed up in low mileage engines. Proper maintenance might not have prevented the cam bucket wear but if the owner wanted to maintain the engine they would have fixed it long before it got to that point. Sad to see the fate that befell that engine.

It is my understanding that worn cam lobes and tappets are the main reliability issue that these 6.2 AMG V8 engines suffer, hence the value of the camshafts. This engine almost definitley succumbed to this failure, the cam lobe wore through the top of the tappet, then beat up the valve stem and retainer until they could no longer retain the spring, leading to a dropped intake valve. The dropped valve then made unwelcome acquaintances with the piston, breaking the head of the valve off. With the head of the intake valve now wreaking havoc in the number 5 cylinder, the heads of both exhaust valves broke off, the combustion chamber and spark plug were destroyed and the hypereutectic piston disintegrated. Given how intact the #5 rod and wrist pin still were most of the damage to the oil pump and crankcase were likely a result of piston debris becoming wedged between some of the still moving parts. Having said all that, this engine was shut off very quickly after the initial failure, however the valvetrain was likely making a ticking noise for some time before it blew.

Send it to the poor bloke who put his name on the engine. Make it a full circle.

"I'll send you the destroyed Mercedes engine parts" don't make your problems my problems buddy.

Imagine the person who assembled this in the factory watching this video...... shedding a tear or two

Former M156 owner. Great vid. Early M156 engines suffered from cam and lifter wear. They also suffered from headbolt failure. This car definitely had the cam wear through the lifter, eventually causing catastrophic engine failure. I had an early engine but replaced the lifters and headbolts with updated parts to prevent a failure.

Dude, that block is TOTALLY salvageable! Just cut off those last two bores, and call it a V6.

"Why are they always shaped like this?" What other natural shape can you think of that moves fluid that well in a controlled fashion?

"I've been browsing RU-vid a long time, I should take a break. Oh look, a new teardown video!"

I wish there was a youtube video just before he nailed the throttle and said, "dude, watch what this car can do!" and right after his buddy saying, "dude, you dad is going to be pissed!"

I think it would be pretty cool to get the box, in my younger years I used to own and build SEVERAL euro engines. On deployment I even got to got to the Mercedes assembly plant and see those engines be assembled. BY HAND. It was amazing

Never before has the phrase "the engine ate itself" been more of an accurate statement.

This engine reminds me of myself at 2:30 am Saturday night after epic pub crawl...piston broke.

A guy in northern Germany is a Mercedes expert and he has a very good youtube channel "Motoren Zimmer". He shows his shop and explains on customers cars their faults and how to prevent them. He numerously showed this type of motor (V8 6.1 AMG and similar) heaving problems with the hydraulic lifters. The lifters get a dent and the cam lobes are rounded. I can't remember the reason for the dent, but in the end the cam lobes get as round as shown here and groove out the lifters. Here, most likely, the lifter surface wore down and broke apart, then the cam lobe directly pushed on the valve. At this stage you would have heard a bad sound from the engine. Then, by running it, the top of the valve got worn down, until the spring retainers from the valve popped out and the valve fell into the cylinder, braking off and destroying the other two exhaust valves as well as the piston. You can see from the good journals that this probably was not an oiling issue. I believe Mr. Zimmer always says that it comes from too few oil changes, but I would have to check on that.

Hans the engine builder was crying when you pulled that oil pan!

This is one of those rare engines with the piston delete option for fuel savings.

Son: Daaaaad, the Mercedes is making a strange noise. Dad: What did you do? Son: Nothing

so glad you found the valves...was worried you'd have to junk the engine

I'd really like to hear what one of these sounds like when they self-destruct. I know when the connecting rod in my lawn mower came apart, it made some interesting clanking and banging. Having an entire piston being broken into little pieces must sound... intense, lol...

The wear on the cam and bucket tell me that the cam wore through the bucket and released the valve into the piston and destroyed everything from there.

I feel like Alex from Legitstreetcars would appreciate this.

Just got done with the gnarliest day at work. This is helping me come down from that. Thanks buddy 👍

"The best, or nothing" - Mercedes Motto. In this case, nothing would be better!

never seen an AMG engine this destroyed, amazing

I would be willing to bet money that this was from an over-rev. Likely some doofus tried to force a down shift when the rpm's were too high. Valve floated, keepers let go, and the rest followed to destruction. I will say I am impressed myself with how the destruction was contained to just the front.

Since you're out of space on your counter, how about a giant aquarium? With fish. Clean up the parts real well and use them to "furnish" the aquarium. Along with regular colorful rock too of course. Would be neat to see some fish swimming around, say, a crank (or part of one), maybe with some rods and pistons still attached; around an intake manifold, etc.

I wonder if the person who built this engine is screaming "why must you destroy my engines!" In german somewhere.

That looks like some high quality blunderbuss ammo

Thanks for taking the time to edit all you do. I like that you show the disassembly mostly in full and speed up the repetitive parts. I’m sure it would be much easier to just say, “now we’re going to remove the exhaust manifold” and either leave it unedited or just cut to, “now that that’s out of the way”. Even the camera positioning that lets us see while you work is probably a pain. So just wanted to say thanks for the extra effort.

I'd always wondered what the Star Wars "Pew, Pew, Pew" (18:15) special-effects would sound like if I switched the audio track to Dolby "AMG German". ;D

I know it’s bad for your business but maaaaan I love the carnage.

But it’s German, I’m pretty sure those broken parts need to come with an ecu!

Knowing what goes into these engines just makes me sad seeing it in such a state. An engine builder put some serious time and energy into making it.

We have a 2008 S63 in the shop that has the exact failure, but far less collateral damage. We sourced a low mile replacement engine from a 2015 C63 "507". In tearing that down for the swap over of chassis specific parts, we think we have come to understand WHY this happens. The lifters in the '15 engine had started to loose the plating on the top of the bucket. Once that chrome is gone, the base metal is less noble than the cam metal, and the cam just takes the material thickness awaya and the compensator element in the lifter fatigues, and breaks away.

Mercedes hard-parts huddle together when they get spooked. Typically in the oilpan. Like livestock.

oh yeah, something different! And a benz! Awesome!!!

I would like to have some broken Parts of it, because i could show it to my friend, who is a big Merc-Fanboy...

The best part about that is the engine as is will still be worth more than half of our cars as a whole.

Thanks for the offer of a load of shrapnel but I have plenty of my own I made earlier.

Of all the engines I've seen you tear down this one the word shrapnel applies the most.

Can you do a video on on how you organize all the usable parts for resale? Seems like an impossible task.

Oh yes I’ve been waiting a long time for this video👍🏻

I’m surprised AMG doesn’t require or at least encourage failed motors to get returned directly to the factory for research purposes

I like the sped up sound of the impact

Could always sell it as an amg 10,000 piece jigsaw puzzle, bad luck mate. Keep up the good work, love your vids

I don't think I need someone else's broken engine parts... I've broken enough on my own I've already got a museum of broken connecting rods, bent and broken valves and pistons that have experienced all sorts of mayhem. My best piece is a connecting rod from a running 7.3 idi, it's bent in 2 places and the engine had a bad misfire but still ran and did not make angry sounds though the piston definitely had made friends with the crank at some point!

This is why you should always change the oil on these, a lot, and sometimes maybe check for things not working right.

Mercedes engineers thought HLA stood for "Hella Loud Annihilation"

I owned an 07 e63. My motor did the same thing, through research I found out that allegedly, this was the first “all AMG” motor, designed and built my AMG , hence they used more racing parts. The suspected flaw was in the use of extremely high tensile strength head bolts in combination with an aluminum block and heads. The bolts will almost always back out at around 100K miles. I believe The fix was to install ARP head bolts, if you were lucky enough to catch it.

"my hopes of getting a lot of parts of this are pretty much gone" oh idk, a lot of USEFUL parts, but it looks like whatever happened in that engine made damn well sure you had TONS of *parts.* *bits,* even.

Great video! Bet someone’s foot was down to the floor for the sheer joy of brutally expensive acceleration - then blam!

That was epic 😂 I believe the term “grenade” fits this particular engine lmao

Ey awesome finally we can see the insides of a Mercedes AMG V8 and how do they make their magic.

“I’m pretty sure this block is going in the aluminum bin. I can’t think of anything else it would be good for.” Sounds like a candidate for an AMG 4.7L V6.

I literally said aloud "oh fuckin hell yes" when i saw this in my feed just now

Top notch tear down 👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍

In the words of Jeremy Clarkson “speed and power”

I bought two of the cummins piston/rods, i'd like to have a mercedes souvenir also! :D

Looks like cylinder #5 took that rod harder than my ex.

That has to be the most carnage I’ve seen yet! I thought the broken valves in the head were bad enough, then you pulled the oil pan and showed the literal creek bed of metal in there………..at one time might have been 3 valves and a piston.

That block would make a good coffee table.

That piston has left the building

Piston delete and adjustable rods, what will those crazy Germans think of next?

You know Sir, I just subscribed to your channel yesterday; I'm very impressed by the way you present your videos. Don't change a thing new listener from N.E. Ohio.

The definition of “catastrophic failure “!! The M113 motors don’t do that..

Great video on the M156 tear down, just came across this video tonight .great job

Free busted M156 parts? Don't tempt me with a good time, buddy.

I'm no expert on my these particular engines, but I think it's seriously exploded!! Lol. Valves don't compress very well

It's raining piston... someone was showing off their AMG and ended up with a blown motor getting towed to the shop. Ruined his day but makes for great entertainment watching you take it apart. Love these videos

Hey guys. That was me who built that engine by hand. I'm a master AMG specialist, built hundreds of AMG motors for AMG, etc... We put in some shitty quality parts. Cut backs. Y'all know everyone is cutting back and saving on cost. After warranty it ain't our problems. Buy BMW everyone. BMW is superior.

Looks like the piston came up and high-fived the valve into that spring hat! World's most expensive hole punch.

Piston bits and valve heads, all part of a balanced breakfast!

Hey man, just found your channel with this video. No frills repairs and diagnostics and is some good asmr shit. Great stuff to watch someone do what they do when I have no idea what is happening. 🤙

“There’s nothing to gap” 🤣🤣👌🏻

AMG - A Mortified German, aka the guy that assembled the engine who's name shall not be pronounced

Excellent Video Man 😀🤤😀👍🏼 Loved it Like All The Rest 😎😶‍🌫️😵‍💫

This engine is like Detroit--- the Pistons are terrible.

Imagine the sound and noise when this thing let go? And the sinking feeling you just destroyed an AMG.

9:18 once you see it you can never un-see it

allow me to be here to support the development of this channel... hopefully more famous and growing.. waiting for the next video.. greetings from bali..

I wanted a C63 AMG for a very long time. I had read about the lifter problem and it is actually a somewhat common failure on these. Shame, because otherwise it is such an awesome motor. Some pretty serious carnage in an otherwise well taken care of motor.

more than likely the fuel injector stuck open and cause the internal damage. 16yr Mercedes master tech here. this was a major issue when the M156 came out in 2007. We were replacing engines like crazy for this when they first came out.

So it blew a hole through the HLA cap, which then allowed the cap to press the spring cap rather than the end of the valve stem. The retainers fell out, and the valve got it's meet and greet with the piston. Similar to the FE 390 in my profile pic.

That connecting rod did pretty well!

Honest, Dad, it just started knocking. I just finished picking up Becky-Sue from school. I pulled out onto the freeway, and merged into traffic, then it started making that noise !

This is where monkey meme fits perfectly.... Where piston 5?

Please don't like this comment, I don't want to get a bunch of broken engine parts, lol. Somebody: Why not? Me: Because I already have too many non-running motors laying about! 3 or 4 in 1 bedroom and about 2 or so in parts in the shed... (yes those motors in the bedroom sleep well, thanks for askin!)

They're current model so it may be a while before you see one, but I'd really like to see a teardown of an Audi EA839. (This is the 3.0 TFSI with the hot V turbo)

I think a cam follower failure caused the piston failure. When it dropped that intake valve.

“Wall of Shame” winner

A scared AMG engine would make a good coffee table.

The origin of the Engine failure was to 99% a faulty hydraulic tappet, which started the process of mass destruction inside the engine. It’s a known problem, that’s why you should check them or just straight replace them after 100k-120k km

The m156 is honestly an impressive engine even in this shattered state

Fantastic channel Eric! Keep it up.

Gotta love those blown up engines!!!

First time watching you. Man o man. I was just lusting over a G wagon. Dude who owned it is a sandblaster. I need to switch professions

That's how Autozone sells us parts anyway😁Send the box please👍

Mercedes found the fix for lost 10mm sockets by using stupid torx heads !

It reminds me of the Honda engine you did a couple months ago, completely blown up. Looks like this Mercedes was pushed every day to its full 500 hp

On the bright side, you could just chop off the part of the block that is busted and you will have a nice V6.