Genuine Parts

[ss201]

I bought three genuine (blue) oil filters from the dealer for my W201. Half the size of the black Mann filters I used to get from GSF. My indie (ex M-B for 15 years) was doing some work on my W201 so I asked him to do an oil & filter change at the same time. Gave him the M-B filter - "er I don't use those, I only use the Mann filters. When I worked at M-B we only used these blue ones for the first 1000 miles from new and then threw them away and fitted Mann filters.....

.........Get your next ones from GSF".

Mind you, fitting pattern dizzy caps to a car with an M103 engine is asking for bother, and I speak from experience. I would only ever use a genuine M-B one in future.

So, there's no hard & fast rule in my experience. If using OEM parts, I look for names like Bilstein, Sachs, Lemforder, Beru, Bosch and I happily use anything with the febi name on it - even though I'm well aware that febi only actually manufacture a small percentage of the products they sell.

If I have any doubt, I get my replacement parts from Brendan at Wunderpartz. He only deals with German manufacturers and everything he sells is of a very high quality.

 

[219]

Mind you, fitting pattern dizzy caps to a car with an M103 engine is asking for bother, and I speak from experience. I would only ever use a genuine M-B one in future.

yep - been there .

I once bought these from ECP and got 'Bremi' items which just didn't last .

Always made sure I got Bosch after that (not neccessarily from MB) and they were fine .

 

[CRASH67]

Yes it was a MB course and i was skeptical to but we had samples. Its intrested me a great deal, im not here to convince people jus a bit reserch, i would like to be able to buy a couple filters and cut them open myself to cut out the unbiased MB approach, but as mainly posted here and other forums for opinions on it.

 

[grober]

Found that with the screw on oil cartridge filters for my 190s. The Knecht filters from ECP were made in Germany whereas the MB filters [made by Knecht also] were made in Slovakia. On the face of it they looked the same and possibly the internal materials were similar but you could see the cost saving in the quality of construction/machining of the threaded base on the Slovakian one.

 

[Smiley]

Very interesting.
Although maybe the explanation is that Knecht moved their production from Germany to Slovakia - and ECP had an older German one vs the newer Slovakia one. Or maybe MB screwed the price down too far?

 

[marcus.hopkins]

I have just learnt the hard way. I had all fluids and filters replaced on my w210 E55 recently, the car was fine for a few weeks but then started misbehaving when starting a warm engine. Diagnostics returned no errors so followed the common faults related to this symptom. I replaced the crank sensor with no improvement, replaced the cam sensor again with no improvement. I then thought i would check the fuel pressure. When i cranked the engine the fuel reached 55psi, when it stopped cranking the fuel dropped to zero. The fuel pressure regulator is in the fuel filter on this model. It turned out that a cheap Fram filter had been fitted which was sub standard. In turn costing me near £200 in sensors i did not need. I purchased a genuine mb fuel filter and the car has functioned correctly ever since. The filter cost an extortionate £88 but at least it works.

 

[kth286]

Personally I find that really hard to believe. MB do not deisgn filters - they buy filters in to a certain spec - same with lots of parts like electrric motors etc. If the part has a Bosch p/n on it and an equivalent MB p/n then those two items will be the same quality.
I think you may have been misled by whoever gave you the course - it wasn't a MB course by any chance was it?

What tosh.

So you think that for the the SLS, Merc/AMG went to filter manufacturers and asked what they had on the shelf suitable for this new desigh car ?

Of course not.

Merc/AMG will have come up with the spec required for the new car and work with a chosen manufacturer to produce the specific part for this car.

Any other filter manufacturer will not be able to produce or sell the same filter as an aftermarket part because they will not be privy to the spec of the filter. That spec filter will only be produced by the firm the contract is awarded to.

For any other manufacturer it will be guess work.

 

[grober]

Folks might be interested in this thread posted "in the other place" to use House of Commons parlance. No More Genuine Mercedes Parts?! [Archive] - Mercedes-Benz Owners' Forums

A FEW EXCERPTS FROM THE THREAD POSTS- can't swear to its veracity but its worth a read:_



As an on line retailer we have been told by MB that we will no longer be supplied with Genuine Parts from our normal suppler (a local dealer), under their ‘Prohibited sales’ ruling.
The supply of Genuine Mercedes parts is prohibited to every body other than retail customers, and official repairers.
Have any of the other Independants heard about this?

Yes I had to sign a document a few weeks ago stating all parts supplied to me are for workshop and not retail, so the parts I order I have to fit and not sell on.

I asked so what if I dont sign the doc, answer we wont supply to you. So they are happy to lose £20k pa are they.

I just had to go through a right ball ache of a time to order a chassis coded part for a SL though. Turns out now that if you dont own a star machine that is rented from MBUk with online SCN coding capability then they wont supply any chassis coded parts. I enquired about the cost of this.....£8500 per year. I'll stick with my de-authorised version for now me thinks.

 

[219]

What tosh.

So you think that for the the SLS, Merc/AMG went to filter manufacturers and asked what they had on the shelf suitable for this new desigh car ?

Of course not.

Merc/AMG will have come up with the spec required for the new car and work with a chosen manufacturer to produce the specific part for this car.

Any other filter manufacturer will not be able to produce or sell the same filter as an aftermarket part because they will not be privy to the spec of the filter. That spec filter will only be produced by the firm the contract is awarded to.

For any other manufacturer it will be guess work.

While what you say is not untrue , it is quite common for competitors to buy finished products and 'reverse engineer' them : this happens with complete cars as well as components .

 

[Deleted member 37751]

Grober,
I've Just read that full thread that you've posted.

From what I can gather, Mercedes are trying to stop independents buying Mercedes products at trade price and then selling at a profit?

 

[Sp!ke]

Not that long ago when one bought certain spare parts at ECP or GSF they often came in original MB boxes complete with holograms.

Now, the same parts come in plain packaging and even have the mercedes logo ground off the part, despite being clearly genuine parts.

I think like many manufacturers, Mercedes make more money from after sales than they do from the cars themselves and are simply trying to protect their interests by attempting to put this spin on the parts quality.


I really cant see it probable the likes of Bosch having two production lines for the same part? One line production destined for Mercedes packaging and the other for ECP with double the tooling and production costs....

Really?

 

[grober]

Grober,
I've Just read that full thread that you've posted.

From what I can gather, Mercedes are trying to stop independents buying Mercedes products at trade price and then selling at a profit?

Yep that's the gist of it. However one assumes that in order to sell said parts the "independent sellers" would have to retail them to their customers at a counter price that still undercuts the official retail price Mercedes charge considerably.

ps I would distinguish independent suppliers who only deal in parts----- from Mercedes independent workshops who repair/service cars and supply parts to do so---- as apparently does Mercedes.

 

[grober]

What tosh.

So you think that for the the SLS, Merc/AMG went to filter manufacturers and asked what they had on the shelf suitable for this new desigh car ?

Of course not.

Merc/AMG will have come up with the spec required for the new car and work with a chosen manufacturer to produce the specific part for this car.

Any other filter manufacturer will not be able to produce or sell the same filter as an aftermarket part because they will not be privy to the spec of the filter. That spec filter will only be produced by the firm the contract is awarded to.

For any other manufacturer it will be guess work.

In reply to kth286 I would offer the following.

In my youth I shared accommodation with a bunch of engineers [ never learned so many jokes in my life- but that's another story ] One evening I was looking over the shoulder on one guy working on a tutorial question concerning the design of a triangular steel bracket to re-inforce a joint between 2 girders on a bridge. He had to submit a worked example using vector analysis to demonstrate the forces involved and strength of materials information to design the bracket . I commented that this would come in handy some day if he was ever to design a bridge. His reply was ------------- Nope - what you would do would be to go a good bracket manufacturers catalogue ---look at the specification tables for all the brackets they make and pick out the one you need. They have worked it all out for you. -------- I think that's how Mercedes engineers do it too.

 

[DITTRICH]

Certainly in East London, the parts department at the dealership have a big sign - no discount unless paying by company credit / debit card. The parts department will never give me a discount as a private customer but if I use the servicing department and get alot of work done at the same time, I can often get large discounts, both on labour and parts. It is much easier to negotiate on larger bills. For critical mechanical and electrical items, I would always go for an official part. Lesser items = cosmetic = breakers yard.

 

[franey]

I visited the Sachs factory in Germany, saw a production line of shock absorbers, the conveyor divided into two lanes, the tour 'uberguide' explained that one lane was for putting into BMW packaging, the other was for aftermarket packaging.
Common sense suggests that to purposely manufacture parts of two different qualities for different outlets but for the same application would be not cost efficient.

I sell pollen filters for some of the Merc W220's they are from the same manufacturer for MB, same part different box.

What annoys me is that normally when you take a car for service to any main dealer you are charged full money for the parts. Yet the same dealers offer the parts heavily discounted via the internet. If you try to get the parts for the discounted price on a service you are met with glazed expressions and disbelief that you would even dare to ask!!

As for gen v non gen, as long as you purchase the parts from a reputable source and the parts are branded and carry a sensible guarantee then you are safe. If genuine parts were so fantastic then they would never wear out or need replacing!

 

[Deleted member 37751]

Yep that's the gist of it. However one assumes that in order to sell said parts the "independent sellers" would have to retail them to their customers at a counter price that still undercuts the official retail price Mercedes charge considerably.

ps I would distinguish independent suppliers who only deal in parts----- from Mercedes independent workshops who repair/service cars and supply parts to do so---- as apparently does Mercedes.

I can't really see the problem then.

If it was my business, why would I sell my product at a trade price to a competitor who then sells my product but undercuts my price?

 

[jaymanek]

I use Bosch from ECP for most of my cars. There are some parts that ECP dont supply in Bosch or Beru (for example) so i get these from the dealer - auto trans filter for example, im sure they would get oem for me but tried to palm me off with some cheapo make.

The price difference is staggering sometimes. I ordered Dizzie cap and rotor arm from MB for my pagoda.. both came to around £70... then this last service i ordered them from ECP.. Bosch Box, exactly the same item in every way, £24 for both inc vat!
Coil pack for the same car, approx £80 from dealer, ECP Beru OEM part £16.

It pays to shop around!

 

[nick mercedes]

I can't really see the problem then.

If it was my business, why would I sell my product at a trade price to a competitor who then sells my product but undercuts my price?

It's more about cross boarder sales of parts, and trying to do something about all the people using fake Stars (you can see their point there).

Parts depts are happy to sell parts at cost as they get big a big bonus for shifting stock.