I think sometimes we have taken this quality and reliability a bit too far and come down a little hard on the MB. Just like LarryBible said in the other post, some of these complaints come from vehicles like the A and V Classes, and some from the M as well. MB products, are just like any man made products, will have faults. But with all things considered, look at the MB engineering achievements. There are no other manufacturers have as much technical break throughs and engineering pattens on every model they roll off the assembly line. Go to any car forum and you will find people complainting about their beloved manufacturer. People from Rennlist grip about the quality of their Porsche jsut as much as we do here. They complaint as to why Porsche should not get into the SUV business and stay strictly in racing. Those guys in Bimmer forum have the same headaches as MB, so as Corvette. Now, back to the MB power plant. Why bother to have massive hp but cannot stop on the dime? Look at the Mustang and the Cameroach, they can go straight line like a bat out of hell. But if you take it to a nice twisties, I bet you it will be a different story. Times are changing and competition is tough. MB has to do what it takes to stay alive in the market. It cannot survive by building highly reliable cars for people like you and me (which we are a minority, not too many people would keep cars longer than 5 years nowadays). I would rather see the three point stars on the road for the next 100 years than knowing it used to built cars like the Panther but now it lives only in memory. It just my 2 cents.

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95 R129
04 Infiniti G35.5 BS
10 X204