W211 - key not working/steering wheel locked/ESP warning message

[Marty280]

Good morning everyone on this hopefully lovely bh weekend, hope you are all well! This is my first post and I'm being in a bit of a dilemma here and need your input. Here is what happened yesterday:
Drove 13mls to work in the morning, moved the car at lunch to the local Russian mafia car wash next door and when I came back two hours later I was able to unlock the doors but that was it - once the key was in the ignition barrel nothing happened. It didn't unlock the steering wheel, I was able to turn the key but like millions of error messages were displayed - esp deactivated, sbc not working etc. All the time the cooling fan was literally screaming. I locked the car and came back an hour later - everything tutti, no issues at all. Car started, no warning messages, drove home 15 miles, no issues at all. All I noticed was the engine temp was up already just over 80 Celsius when I managed to start it and I realised that the cleaning guys must have had the aircon on as it was on max cold for both sides, looks like they had it on full power with the car idling while they cleaned the interior. Note I had the camshaft sensor replaced last week.
From what I've read it could hint at the ECU - any thoughts on that?
I am grateful for any hints or help, I'm going to see my indie in Ealing on Tuesday but would love to get your few cents ...
Martin

 

[Coruscator]

I'm no columbo but could it be they spilt / pressure washed water somewhere? Then they paniced and whacked your heaters on in an attempt to dry it out?

Having water on any electronics as you probably know will cause all sorts of problems.

We get this a lot in work. I work as an engineer in the food industry and eash night we have cleaners come in to wash all surfaces and machinery down. The trouble is they use pressure washers and have no regard for where they point their hoses.

It really is a pain in the ****.

Ive opened up electrical control panels on some of our (really expensive) machinery, only to see water pouring out of the back of it.

Even ip65 rated equipment cannot defend itself against the uneducated armed with a high pressure hose. If there's dirt on a surface and it doesnt come off they move the nozzle of the hose nearer to it, they repeat this process until the nozzle is almost touching it. At this distance it will remove paint!

My money is on this.

You should be lucky and theres no permanant damage, best to let it dry out before you use it again.

Water nearly always leaves a slight stain when it dries out see if you can see this around your electrics/electronics, lights, fuse boxes etc.

 

[Marty280]

Morning Coruscator, looks like you were right - left the car alone and everything works, no problems at all. Thanks for your response, appreciate it!