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.

Mercedes takes their cylinder deactivation technology VERY seriously.

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

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.

"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

That's a pretty cool giveaway idea. Only thing is UPS FedEx USPS might be a little jealous that it was already broken before they got their hands on it to throw it 😁

"non original inspection port". I laughed out loud, best description yet.

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

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

At first I was a little concerned that there wouldn't be any pew pew in this teardown. I'm satisfied now.

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've seen AMG 63's for sale that make hellacious tapping noises. Some owners say "it's normal". It's not. They make noise when one or more tappets wear. The solution is to buy a set of SLS tappets, and if the engine has the early head bolts, replace those while the cams are our for the tappet swap. In this case, the tappet wore and started making noise LONG before this engine came apart. The noise was ignored until the fix went from moderately expensive, to "it's time to part out the car".

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.

Gotta love that " hand crafted" nomenclature on a blown engine

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.

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

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

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

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

Precision transmission : check Ron Pratt : check Matt's off road recovery : check I do cars : CHECK ! Great way to start the weekend 👍

Anybody else hearing an AMG tech sobbing and rocking back and forth watching this?

It’s amazing to see such highly engineered engines working at their peak capacity. It’s equally amazing to see what happens when they choose to stop working.

You said oil consumption was fine. But it seems to have a slight increase in piston consumption.

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

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

As a GM and all-around American car manufacturer enthusiast, I don't care much for german engineering but that engine teardown was quite entertaining and a learning experience. Can't wait for another Mercedes engine teardown.

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

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

“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've got this engine in both my 2009 W219 CLS63 AMG and my 2010 W212 E63 AMG and I absolutely love it ! It sounds so brutal when you rev it ! - The M156 has got to be the nicest and best engine Mercedes ever made (with the help of AMG)

dang -- I can't imagine how that engine sounded b4 it finally gave up. Hurts to look at. I'll get over it -- tnx for sharing.

Not sure if my comment will get any likes or not. I sure would love to have those Mercedes parts! I really enjoy watching your videos. It’s fun watching how you attack new and different engines that you haven’t worked on before. I was really excited to watch the Mercedes teardown. I’ve got a Mercedes E550 Coupe, but mine is babied and will never end up like that one! It’s always amazing how such an expensive and well-made engine can be blown apart. I feel sorry for the owner; unless his foot was in it or he (she) was doing something he shouldn’t have been doing! Hopefully no one or nothing was harmed when the engine blew!

I feel like I should be paying something for the entertainment and educational value of these videos.

Never seen an engine with such damage being contained like that. Usually that would set up more of a catastrophic cascade resulting in inspection ports everywhere! A testament to Mercedes craftsmanship and engineering

I know you were bummed, but thank you for these intriguing videos!!!

I feel like Alex from Legitstreetcars would appreciate this.

It would be great if at the end of every video you could show a pile of salvageable parts vs a pile of scrap for meltdown. Loving the teardowns and detective work.

"Non original inspection port" is gold. Thank you!

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.

This is a beast of an engine, up there with the LS7 and F22C as the swan song of NA engines.

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...

That was Brutal but nice to see that it mostly held together. Been enjoying the teardowns keep up the good work.

That looks like some high quality blunderbuss ammo

Great video man. Thanks for showing what happens when you ignore the M156 ticking, and how improper oil change intervals can cause irreversible damage!

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

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

I look forward to these videos every week! Thanks for sharing another engine tear down!

I keep forgetting this channel is so small. You're going places here man.

I’m speechless that someone could treat an engine like this, especially one which was more than the price of an average car. The wrong people are rewarded in life.

That engine was engineered phenomenal. The cool part is that it was contained and did not spread to the other cylinders

I'm sorry, but I laughed so hard at your funny comments - what really keeps me hanging and enjoy all your videos. AND getting educated of course.

"Hi, we've been trying to get in touch with you about your cars extended warranty."

It's the very first free valve Mercedes engine! 🤣

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

That engine went mercedes boom !!!!!!!!!!!!!

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

You mentioned "why are water pumps always shaped like this?" Are you referring to the head, shaft, or the balls of the water pump?

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

"non-original inspection port"....gold!

It appear that Mercedes VVT is more of a variable valve trimming

"My Dad is a Television Repairman, He has the ultimate set of tools".

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.

never seen an AMG engine this destroyed, amazing

It's my birthday! I want an engine part!

"Why are they always shaped like this?" Just most vehicle engineers putting a bit of their personality into their projects!

When your mechanic buddy describes a engine with the term " Grenaded " this is exactly what he means!!

Just discovered this channel and I am really liking it Subscribed and will continue to watch

You should try to contact the guy that built that engine and say, "C'mon man " .

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

Obviously, an excellent demonstration why mercedes actually ended up in the 90-s. Saying that as an owner of W140 S500 95' with 500k km on a cardan.

These are intriguing videos!😁. Addictive!

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

I swear i could see how Scotty Kilmer would be about to burst a vessel screaming ENDLESS MONEYPIT while watching this Merc engine lol

Another great video, thanks Eric, much appreciated.

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.

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

Known issue, camshaft and lifter interface wears, lifter stops rotating, accelerated wear occurs, eventually hydraulic element gets stuck sideways, valve stays open, interference occurs. Rest is history. A cascading failure.

It's like all these engines are all the same , but still they are all different from each other . Enjoy looking at you taking these apart . Thanks

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.

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

“Hold my beer. I’ve got this”

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. 🤙

Oh look. It's my favorite show - Cruel Brutal Damage!!! :)

“Piston delete” becomes “engine delete!!” “… let’s see if that guy can do 88 - in SECOND gear!”

Other you tubers: I'm giving away a free car I Do Cars: I'll send you useless obliterated parts. Nobody:

These engine tear down vids are very cool, you got a subscriber!

Dude this is some pretty cool work! Definitely wanting to get more into engine tear-downs and the works. I'd love to come by your shop sometime and watch you do an engine tear down, I'm also in the St. Louis area

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

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

Top notch tear down 👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍

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

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

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

I dont know a thing about cars let alone engines, but this is interesting to watch.

Fantastic channel Eric! Keep it up.

The timing chains look a decent size...

Ah, so that's how a Mercedes bends.

"Piston delete, on the fly" 😂😂 You were really inspired for this one! Lol. I think 500# bombs have less shrapnel - and I'll refrain from the expected German joke.

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