C350e owners club

[Deleted member 126969]

She also claimed to know nothing about the extended warranty though. And has also contacted Mercedes directly and state that they looked at my car as a gesture of good will.

I'm gonna fire off an email to head office to try and seek clarity on this, I know everyone talks about the extended hybrid system warranty but getting merc to accept this may be the next challenge

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May as well post the official response again, including the snotty and unhelpful sentence at the end. The link MB provided for me to obtain "the right information" led precisely nowhere beyond endless loops giving no useful information whatsoever. If anyone can find a copy of the hybrid battery warranty online, I'd love to see the link....

Clearly, they didn't like being challenged - the arrogance of the response is typical of my experience of MB. Also of note, MB took as long as they possibly could before responding to the Ombudsman - right up to the wire.

This is a direct and unmodified quote (apart from me redacting my surname) from the response I got via the Ombudsman.

"What The Business Says


Thank you for your patience whilst I have investigated Mr S’s concerns.

I can confirm that during the Plug-In Warranty Period, the Battery Certificate covers any technical malfunction of the associated plug in components (electric machine and power electronics) arising from an inherent manufacturing fault. I would advise Mr S that this information is readily accessible within the ‘Owners Area’ on our website www.mercedes-benz.co.uk, along with further information on the Mercedes-Benz Cars UK Limited Battery Certificate for Plug-In Hybrid and Electric Drive Vehicles equipped with High Voltage Batteries (also attached).

I would recommend that moving forward, the customer ensures all information sourced on his vehicle and any future purchases are sourced directly from Mercedes-Benz UK Ltd. rather than online forums or other online sources."

I also obtained formal written clarification on what "electric machine and power electronics" means - it's the actual electric drive motor, the inverter/power delivery module and the charger.

I don't know if it's freely available or not, but the Ombudsman case reference was 00047036/New Car [ ref:_00D24q5e1._5001p2OlxhV]

What really puzzled me though, the response from the Ombudsman said they couldn't find in my favour, because what I was asking had been answered.....but all the correspondence with MB leading up to my application to the Ombudsman had told a different story - initially they insisted the Hybrid warranty only covered the battery, then the power electronics and battery but would never include the 'electric machine', hence my opening the case with the Ombudsman.

Ultimately, I honestly don't know if it was a case of the folk I was talking to via the official MB support contact simply didn't know WTF they were talking about, or the case made MB change their tune on the sly and pretend it had always been covered.

For absolute clarity, the 'battery certificate' I was given makes absolutely zero mention of anything but the battery.....which was what started the whole affair, as I'd based my buying decision in part on the understanding (based on seeing the infamous 'internal document') that the entire hybrid system was covered for 6 years/63000 miles. Bear in mind, the 'internal document' was used to train sales staff, so I don't think it is at all unreasonable to expect a salesperson would then pass the information on to a potential customer to influence their purchase decision.

This whole thing just added to the bad taste associated with my purchase of this car. As before, I freely admit I didn't do my homework and should never have bought it.

 

[Darrener]

This whole thing just added to the bad taste associated with my purchase of this car. As before, I freely admit I didn't do my homework and should never have bought it.[/QUOTE]

Yes i should have done the same, but dam it is a lovely car. lets hope petrol keeps dropping in price.

 

[Dodgy]

All this talk of degradation has me worried. I can’t measure the energy directly, but I know that the longest charge over the last few weeks (@16A) was 1h15m. Oh dear. Even at 240V with no charging losses, that’s only equivalent to a 5.3kW battery capacity...

 

[Nick Harper]

To be honest, the biggest effect on range comes from whether I sit behind a lorry at 50mph on the way into work or not!

 

[Deleted member 126969]

All this talk of degradation has me worried. I can’t measure the energy directly, but I know that the longest charge over the last few weeks (@16A) was 1h15m. Oh dear. Even at 240V with no charging losses, that’s only equivalent to a 5.3kW battery capacity...

I’ve started logging charge times on mine recently and am estimating capacity to be around 6kWh at the moment.

Mine usually takes about 1:20 or so to charge at 16A. I usually charge at 8A in summer, but when I’m likely to want to pre-heat I turn it up. I’m now wondering if the losses are actually less using the faster charge rate. When the weather warms I’ll do some experiments.

That’s a crude estimate though, with no allowances for losses. The actual range doesn’t feel like it’s dropped much though. It would be nice to know exactly what 0% and 100% charge actually are.

 

[Masterstein]

I’ve started logging charge times on mine recently and am estimating capacity to be around 6kWh at the moment.

Mine usually takes about 1:20 or so to charge at 16A. I usually charge at 8A in summer, but when I’m likely to want to pre-heat I turn it up. I’m now wondering if the losses are actually less using the faster charge rate. When the weather warms I’ll do some experiments.

That’s a crude estimate though, with no allowances for losses. The actual range doesn’t feel like it’s dropped much though. It would be nice to know exactly what 0% and 100% charge actually are.

This is the 'printout' I was given from mercedes when mine was last in. Its a printed photo of a laptop.

Not sure if I said mine was 72 or 73%. Turns out it's 73 but still not great.

I've hidden the VIN for when I go to sell the car [emoji12]

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[Deleted member 126969]

Thanks for posting that - really interesting to see the 'specified value' column and values.

Do you know what the test entailed, or did they just read this straight from the car? I'd expect any BMS worthy of the name would have stored this data built up from usage TBH.

Wait until it gets to 62000 miles then take it back for another test.

 

[Nick Harper]

I have a Homepod and it gives me a report, on a day by day basis. Generally, a full charge is recorded as 4.4 or 4.5kWhr. This has always been the case and I've noticed no change over 2 years/25kmiles. I judge it so that I'm on 10% indicated when I get home. My suspicion is that, while the battery capacity is given as 6.2kWhr, Mercedes-Benz don't allow the top 20% to be used. This massively improves the life of the battery. So the top 20% and the 10% left in the tank mean that 70% of the capacity is use able, 4.34kWhr. Taking charging efficiency into account, this all adds up. I wonder if the 73% given in your Mercedes report takes the 10+20% into account? It may be that 73% means no degradation is evident.
In the 350e, we have a very small energy store. I can, on the right terrain, on a cold dark rainy night blow it in 5 or 6 miles. On different terrain, on a hot summers day with no air con, I've done 13.5 miles. My point it that when you can only carry the equivalent of 1l of petrol, you can't average over long distances so you will see huge variations from day to day. Stop worrying about it and enjoy having a car that can do 0-60 in 6s and has 275bhp but can, if required and driven in the right way, average 60mpg across 25,000 miles.

 

[Deleted member 126969]

That's always been the 'problem' for me, we have no real idea what empty and full actually mean in terms of capacity. Like you, I suspect they reserve margins top & bottom to protect the battery - they'd be MAD not to TBH.

My monitoring is a bit more crude, I can do live monitoring in terms of current and time on charge, or I can go back and look at historic records from either the Tesla Powerwall or the Solaredge inverter....maybe one day I'll spend a few hours and go back to when we first got the car and some dates in between then and now to form a picture.

The only worry as such is being left with a very expensive brick long before any of us expected to be. Some of us were even stupid enough to buy these things brand new with their own cash and now own them outright (yes, that was me). Of late, I've been wishing I'd taken out a lease - something I have never done before. I could also sell it on - even WBAC have offered over £19k for it, but I always planned on keeping it a long time, as we do so few miles - my thought was that lack of use would mitigate the risks. Only time and luck will tell.

 

[Masterstein]

This will be Mercedes [emoji23]

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[Dodgy]

Charging from 15% tonight, so I’ll report back in the morning. I’d hope for 6.2kWh * 0.85 = 5.27kWh. 240V * 16A * 0.95 efficiency = 3.65kW, which should take 90 minutes. I’m guessing it’ll be more like 65 minutes...

 

[Dodgy]

The app notifications reported 1h 25m, but according to my current electricity meter, the ramp-down started after 55 minutes, by 60 minutes it was at half power. at 65 minutes it was just over 1kW.

 

[Deleted member 126969]

The app notifications reported 1h 25m, but according to my current electricity meter, the ramp-down started after 55 minutes, by 60 minutes it was at half power. at 65 minutes it was just over 1kW.

That doesn’t sound too good does it. Barely 3.5kWh?

 

[Dodgy]

That doesn’t sound too good does it. Barely 3.5kWh?

I did an 11 mile trip today. The first 3.5 miles on battery, then 4 miles of dual carriageway with the engine on, then another 3.5 mile on battery. I’m not sure the Merc can do that on 3.5kWh. Also, the range this winter is no worse than the range 6 months after I first had it (from new). What’s going on?

 

[Deleted member 126969]

Hmmm, one thought...have you had yours serviced recently? Mine was done early December and it had 'an update' but they couldn't/wouldn't tell me what it was for, what it did or why. I could convince myself charging changed after that happened, but I could simply be mistaken. What that might mean...I've no idea!

It really is a bit frustrating that we can't know a bit more about what's going on in there, but I guess most folk simply won't care and the cynic in me suspects MB wouldn't want us to anyway.

7 miles on 3.5kWh seems reasonable - 500Wh/m is certainly way up there on usage compared to a pure EV. Heating must be at least 3kW so factor that in for journey time too.

What's going on? No clue!!

 

[Dodgy]

Hmmm, one thought...have you had yours serviced recently? Mine was done early December and it had 'an update' but they couldn't/wouldn't tell me what it was for, what it did or why. I could convince myself charging changed after that happened, but I could simply be mistaken. What that might mean...I've no idea!

It really is a bit frustrating that we can't know a bit more about what's going on in there, but I guess most folk simply won't care and the cynic in me suspects MB wouldn't want us to anyway.

7 miles on 3.5kWh seems reasonable - 500Wh/m is certainly way up there on usage compared to a pure EV. Heating must be at least 3kW so factor that in for journey time too.

What's going on? No clue!!

It was serviced in June. The list of things done was quite long, but unless they both increased the efficiency of the drivetrain and reduced the usable battery capacity, I’m at a loss to explain how the winter range is the same as it was in 2016/17.

 

[JohnC350e]

Hmmm, one thought...have you had yours serviced recently? Mine was done early December and it had 'an update' but they couldn't/wouldn't tell me what it was for, what it did or why. I could convince myself charging changed after that happened, but I could simply be mistaken. What that might mean...I've no idea!

It really is a bit frustrating that we can't know a bit more about what's going on in there, but I guess most folk simply won't care and the cynic in me suspects MB wouldn't want us to anyway.

7 miles on 3.5kWh seems reasonable - 500Wh/m is certainly way up there on usage compared to a pure EV. Heating must be at least 3kW so factor that in for journey time too.

What's going on? No clue!!

Mine had an Update done in December too; I was told it was a 'gearbox update' but couldn't glean any further information from them......

 

[Deleted member 126969]

I think the chap said “drivetrain” on mine. Suspect they have no more idea than we do TBH.

 

[Deleted member 126969]

It was serviced in June. The list of things done was quite long, but unless they both increased the efficiency of the drivetrain and reduced the usable battery capacity, I’m at a loss to explain how the winter range is the same as it was in 2016/17.

Well, despite all our measuring and werreting, we both seem to be getting similar results, in that range seems largely unchanged since we got the things, so I guess we just carry on and hope it continues!

 

[Dodgy]

Same results last night:
- charged from 10% to 100%
- app reported 1hr 28mins of charging
- electricity meter reported 3.7kW (higher than base load) for 55mins, dropping to 1kW after 70mins and completing after 90mins

In total, about 4kWh for an estimated battery size of 4.4kWh. Time to move in to something less frustrating - February has been amazingly sunny and my solar panels are brilliant. [emoji3]