an excerpt from MB problems....enjoy!
"E320 Year: 1997 VIN: N/A
Problem: I had quite a few problems with this piece of junk. I am glad that I found this web site to get out my angerand to let people know that Mercedes-Benz makes cars that has real bad reliability. Here are some of them in chronological order: First, after 2 weeks I bought the car, the EC button (Economy Mode) on the air conditioning would not disengage. Second, the service department of any dealer in the Bay Area was very slow in term of making appointment. In many cases, I usually have to wait for about a week before I can get my car serviced because so many cars require servicing. Third, the audio system is a piece of junk. AM/FM antenna embedded in rear window is useless. I get poor reception for many radio stations that have very strong signal. In addition, most of the time, I don't get stereo sound for many of the station. Also, the forward seek button doesn't work about 30% of the time; the system would seek for the next song. Once it found the next song, instead of playing the song, it would start rewind for no particular reason. Fourth, the engine makes abnormal noises while accelerating gently between 29 MPH & 31 MPH, 39 MPH & 41 MPH (it sounded like two piece of metal colliding with each other). Fifth, the exhaust system was making rattling noises due to some nut that was loose at 20,000 miles. Sixth, 2 of the instrument panel light bulb were burned out, also around 20,000 miles.
Problem Resolved: No
Resolution: Action to the 1st problem: The dealer replaced the A/C unit with another one. Right before I left the dealership, the replaced A/C unit exhibits a problem. The driver side's lower temperature button would get stuck once I pressed it. I inoformed the dealer, and they finally replace it with a working one. Action to the 2nd problem: None. It seemed that after a year of ownership, I would still have to wait about a week to get my car serviced. Action the 3rd problem: None. Dealer said that the poor reception is "normal" (even though I told them that I get a better reception on my Camry's cheap radio when I park right next to the Benz. For the forward search problem, the dealer blamed it on the tapes that I hav. Also, for this problem, customer service was terrible; the service technician treated me like I am some music fanatic who is out there trying to get them. Action to the 4th problem: None. It seemed that they were not able to re-create the problem even though I was able to re-create it right after I drove off from the dealer's lot. I finally just gave up. Action to the 5th problem: Replaced a nut near the catalyst converter under warranty. Action to the 6th problem: Replace all the instrumental light bulbs under warranty.
Owner: Steven Huang
email address:
[email protected]