Really hope I havent got a lemon....

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CLK Man

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Feb 26, 2005
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OK picked up the w209 in osbedian black from the stealership the other day, well yesterday to be exact, it had 17 delivery miles on the clock, (pic of my car in the showroom before they opened the doors and I was off. The car is kitted out it has command and every ....tronic possible so I was really looking forward to it arriving and the 18 weeks delivery time was a killer. But I manager to get 53 personal miles out of it before the helpfull little digital display in the dash decided to inform that that I had ESP failure and to detour to a workshop immediatly which I did, command was usefull and told me where the nearest workshop is in POI and directed me to it, met with chuckles from the service guys and comments such as havent had that long then mate, and looks like we will be seeing a lot of you didnt really fill me with confidence that I made the right manufacturer choice I was expecting pure professionals, I am hoping it was just that dealer as my own was pretty good, anyway they diagnosed the car, it has two faults and requires a drivers door module and a module in the steering column, so 50 miles and two failures..... as to how they effect ESP I dont know but apparantly thats whats up with it.... Hopefully I am off to a shaky start but will enjoy years of happy trouple free motoring afterwards.... please re-assure me, or does it look as though I have a lemon !! And since I need a phone cradle for the armrest as it only comes wire prep'd is it cheeky to ask the dealer for it free for the inconvenieve and since the car is in the workshop on 50 miles ?
 

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yikes .

Just teathing problems ;) will all be better soon.

whats the suppling dealer doing about it ? must be worth at least an E class courtesy car till its sorted.
 
CLK Man said:
met with chuckles from the service guys and comments such as havent had that long then mate, and looks like we will be seeing a lot of you

I must be on something.. I found that funny. :D

Seriously though, a car is most likley to suffer silly niggles when first run as it's the first time anything has a proper test.

I'm sure things will settle down and the dealer will fix your car Ok.

I've had a lot of new cars and only one has made it past the first two weeks without a failure, some pretty major.

Ps. Lovely looking car.
 
welcome to the world of Mercedes ownership :D

I suspect that its just a few teething troubles, so hopefully nothing to worry about.
 
Nice looking car, sorry to hear of your problems. At the moment old seems best:(
 
No,you havent got a lemon-theyre all like that now.......
 
CLK Man said:
And since I need a phone cradle for the armrest as it only comes wire prep'd is it cheeky to ask the dealer for it free for the inconvenieve and since the car is in the workshop on 50 miles ?

It's annoying that there is not a way that all the accessories can be checked thoroughly before the new owner takes delivery. It certainly takes some of the pleasure out of buying a new vehicle having to go back to the dealership after such a short period.

Looking for re-assurance is understandable but undeliverable. The dealer has a duty to look after you and make sure that your experience is as painless as possible. I ordered the pre-wiring on the E-class and that came with a cradle. I simply dropped my telephone into it, and hey presto.

Good luck with your car and fingers crosssed that you will not have further problems.

Regards,
John
 
CLK Man said:
OK picked up the w209 in osbedian black from the stealership the other day, well yesterday to be exact, it had 17 delivery miles on the clock, (pic of my car in the showroom before they opened the doors and I was off. The car is kitted out it has command and every ....tronic possible so I was really looking forward to it arriving and the 18 weeks delivery time was a killer. But I manager to get 53 personal miles out of it before the helpfull little digital display in the dash decided to inform that that I had ESP failure and to detour to a workshop immediatly which I did, command was usefull and told me where the nearest workshop is in POI and directed me to it, met with chuckles from the service guys and comments such as havent had that long then mate, and looks like we will be seeing a lot of you didnt really fill me with confidence that I made the right manufacturer choice I was expecting pure professionals, I am hoping it was just that dealer as my own was pretty good, anyway they diagnosed the car, it has two faults and requires a drivers door module and a module in the steering column, so 50 miles and two failures..... as to how they effect ESP I dont know but apparantly thats whats up with it.... Hopefully I am off to a shaky start but will enjoy years of happy trouple free motoring afterwards.... please re-assure me, or does it look as though I have a lemon !! And since I need a phone cradle for the armrest as it only comes wire prep'd is it cheeky to ask the dealer for it free for the inconvenieve and since the car is in the workshop on 50 miles ?

swap ?
 
The W209 CLK steering columns had a bad batch of steering angle sensors. That triggered an immediate ESP fault after taking a few turns. They sure didnt last long.

The door controller is just one of those things that can be faulty. I have had one in my car when it was new.

Neither of these faults can be detected on the floor - they need some actual usage to be screened out.
 
Lovely car... (we were to at first going to get one like urs but in the end have now got a BMW 645I Cab which we picked up last Sat).

On a postitive note at least thr Stealer has diagnosed the problem for you and hoepfully all shall be well. At least the servcie guys were not unhelpful/rude/stuck up and had a laugh and joke with you.

My W203 was delivered with a faulty sensors and some other eletrical problems/glitches from the factory too (but eventually they have all now been sorted out).

I'm sure you'll enjoy the car once parts have been replaced.

Flash
 
Teething problems - just hang in there. It happened to me 3 times with my new E class, in fact when I went to pick the car up it failed its PDI, and after waiting for 2 hours for the computer to reset the car's error messages I was told to come back in a few days as it needed a part. Kids were crying, and I was fuming

Went back days later and same thing happened!

Then, one wet Wednesday afternoon I was called to say the car was ready and I went a got it myself - so much for wanting to drive cerimonially out of the showroom with the family in tow................

£1000 cheque, flowers and champagne and it bacame a distant memory..............jsut

Bear in mind that this was a brand new car - so it does happen - you are not alone - and don't let it worry you.

Read Portzy's link - now thats a leveller

Marc

ps cracking looking car by the way
 
Well, from the sounds of these new MB owner experiences, the reviews and rumours are correct - there certainly are question marks over the quality of these modern Mercs. I feel sorry for CLKman that this is his first experience of his new car.

Still, in my personal experience it doesn't matter how bullet-proof the marque you're buying is - these days there's unfortunately a fair chance it'll go wrong.

I've moved to old Merc ownership after a long period of serial-Porsche ownership (personal circumstances having changed, and old Mercs offer a lot of quality car for not much money).

I had five 911's, and all the three newest ones (spanning the 964, 993 and 996 models when each was the current model) ended up being trailered back to the dealerships due to various faults. And in the case of the most recent - the 996 (which I ordered new for £72000 inc. options) - on delivery day there was no-one at the dealership expecting us, and so no handing-over 'ceremony' whatsoever. They went and got the keys, gave them to us, opened the showroom doors and we drove off. Didn't even get a bunch of flowers for my wife.

I've had it with the expensive stuff - whether I get back into a position to be able to afford it or not. It's Ebay for motoring for me from now on! (Picking up the 230TE mentioned in my sig on Saturday - looks like a great buy for £620!)
 
cars

my dad picked up a brand new Chrysler sunbeam y reg when the letter was at the beginning...wound down the window to shake the managers hand and ended up giving him the handle as it broke off mid wind and not his hand :eek:
 
CLK Man said:
...met with chuckles from the service guys and comments such as havent had that long then mate, and looks like we will be seeing a lot of you didnt really fill me with confidence...

This proves that the mechanics at $tealerships have a sense of humour ;)
Les
 
glojo said:
It's annoying that there is not a way that all the accessories can be checked thoroughly before the new owner takes delivery. It certainly takes some of the pleasure out of buying a new vehicle having to go back to the dealership after such a short period.
The only way to really test this is for the car to be driven for a few hundred miles. Not everyone would be happy with up to 1000 "delivery" miles though...

A car is more likely to develop faults or break down during it's first 3 months than at any other time in it's life.
 
i think i would be happier if they did drive it for 100 miles or so... Its absolutely terrible to collect 40K's worth of car to have it break down before ure even out of the forecourt.....

Imagine if this happened on your factory collection, I would be seriously annoyed!
 
glojo said:
It's annoying that there is not a way that all the accessories can be checked thoroughly before the new owner takes delivery. It certainly takes some of the pleasure out of buying a new vehicle having to go back to the dealership after such a short period.
Regards,
John

John other companies do test this stuff.
My 96 Renault Meagan 2.0 Cabrio came out the show room and I did 10,000 untroubled miles before I was banned :( (full electrics including hood)

My 1997 Honda Accord Came straight out the garage and never had a single fault in 90,000 miles :cool: This car had full electrics abs traction auto gearbox etc

My 1999 Saab 93 Cabrio came out of City Saab and didn't go back for 12,000 miles. That car had Full electrics(including the hood), on board computer, abs, traction etc 1 real fault in 50K

My 2002 MR2 never had any faults when I picked it up although most of it was replaced under warrenty In what I can only say was the most gruelling 70K of all my driving to date :) and it was thrashed like I stole it so I am happy with its performance

And last year I bought my otherhalf an 04 Honda CVR Premier with all the toys including sat nav and DVD players etc. Thats done almost a whole year and 10,000 miles no faults to report. So its not true to say that cars cant be manufactured to work out the box :)
 
Actually, further to my grumbles about new cars a few posts back, there is a good point in the last couple of posts. My wife has a 2002 Honda Civic 'Executive' spec with all the bits, that we bought with 4000 miles on the clock, and it has worked faultlessly since we got it. I've little doubt it had done so flawlessly from mile 0, as things just don't seem to go wrong with Jap vehicles. (We've had two Isuzu Troopers in the past and nothing ever went wrong with them either.)
 
n0bby said:
things just don't seem to go wrong with Jap vehicles.

Thyat's because they use quality components like Nippon Denso electrics.
 
On the subject of new car faults, a friend of mine used to be a Skoda dealer. One day he sold one to a family and did the decent thing of giving the buyer's wife a bunch of flowers. Off the man drove, with wife in front seat and the 3 children in the back seat. About 10 minutes later, they returned to complain that the children could not get out of the car. My friend was about to make a funny remark until he noticed that there were no interior door handles in the back of the car. The factory had forgotten to fit them ( or maybe they were out of stock) !
 

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