Digital Operators Manual

[silver1011]

Blimey, Mercedes-Benz UK like to make things unnecessarily complicated.

Trying to find out where I can view the outside temperature on my (new to me) 2016 W212 E-Class.

I already failed at the first hurdle, trying to download a PDF of the owners manual from the UK Mercedes website. After setting up an account, registering my car details, Mercedes kindly offered me the W213 manual to download. Thanks for that.

A further Google search reveals the closest option is the North American W212 manual.

Looking in the contents...



Result! Straight to page 188 I go...



Argh! I don't want to sit in the car, in the cold, in the dark and faff about with the online manual.

Why can't they put this stuff in the PDF manual?

 

[James Copeland]

Did you not have a 'handover' from the dealer?

 

[silver1011]

Yes. It covered lights, wipers, window controls and most of the other basics.

Viewing the outside temperature wasn't really something I'd considered would be so elusive at the point the vehicle was handed over. Nor was reading the owners manual. Had I know that the owners manual contained almost 200 pages, the majority of which seem to refer me back to the digital operators manual, then perhaps I'd have insisted the dealer took me through each and every single setting.

After sitting in the car this morning in the works car park for 5 minutes, I discovered that the digital owners manual make reference to the 'outside temperature', but that in the UK it isn't possible to set it to being permanently displayed, instead I'm forced to have the speed in km/h displayed instead.

No mention, that I could see, on how to display it, even temporarily.

 

[grober]

I believe its down to the U.K. Construction & Use Regulations which stipulate say that the speedo must display speed in both miles and kilometers per hour, either together, or by the operation of a switch, separately. Needless to say this does not apply in countries using kilometers per hour freeing up the display for O/T. I believe it can be altered by the Star MB diagnosis system [ its just some line/s of software after all] but technically you would then be breaking the law

 

[silver1011]

Yes, I think you're right, my previous Skoda had the same digital display for km/h (due to the speedometer itself only showing mph), but crucially, it also had the ability to display the outside temperature at the same time.

With Mercedes-Benz usually being at the pinnacle of safety, I'm surprised that displaying the outside temperature isn't possible. Whilst I appreciate it's only a guide, knowing how close to freezing the ambient outside temperature is was quite useful. I just hope I'm missing something, I'll keep playing.

I might even be brave and try Mercedes UK's 'Live Chat' and give their UK customer services team a challenge

 

[markjay]

I believe its down to the U.K. Construction & Use Regulations which stipulate say that the speedo must display speed in both miles and kilometers per hour, either together, or by the operation of a switch, separately. Needless to say this does not apply in countries using kilometers per hour freeing up the display for O/T. I believe it can be altered by the Star MB diagnosis system [ its just some line/s of software after all] but technically you would then be breaking the law

There's a reason Mercedes implemented the UK instrument cluster display, with the speed in Km replacing the outside temperature display.

In principle the standard (non-UK) instrument cluster meets the UK legal requirements, because you can change the instrument cluster from miles to Km and then bring-up the digital speed display which will show the speed in Km, thus meeting the legal requirement.

But if you do that (e.g. when driving in the continent), then you can no longer use any of the instrument cluster's menus because it will remove the digital speed display from view.

So rather than selling to the UK market a car whose instrument cluster menus can not be used while driving in Europe, MB chose to add permanent Km display.

But if you changed the instrument cluster back to the standard display (aka 'UK delete mod), then the car will still remain UK road legal.

 

[silver1011]

Yep, I know why they've done it.

It's just taking me some getting used to. The same issues Mercedes faced for the UK, applies to many other manufacturers too, including my previous Skoda.

They were able to overcome this by designing their display to be able to simultaneously display both the km/h and the outside temperature at the same time.