I have a 2000 CL500. It is an awesome car, however, I think the crew that built it had stayed out too late the night before drinking beer and eating too much of der weinerschniztel.

There are 3 items on my car that need to be taken care of and frankly, I am worried about having the dealership work on the car considering that it is so new. Here are the items that need to be addressed.

1. The chrome trim at the very top of the drivers door, where it meets the bottom of the window on the exterior as popped up. You can see under it and see that a couple clips have popped off. The problem is, they will need to remove the whole interior door section to remove the glass and then refasten the trim correctly. Since this is a pillarless coupe, I am concerned about them getting the window back in correctly, and also since the whole interior door section is leather and capped off so nicely with polished chrome, I am worried that it will be screwed up as well, leading to marks and possible rattles. How easy is it for this interior section to be removed and then replaced correctly?

2. The passenger seat belt. When the car is on and the seat belt is fastened, and you lean forward, and then back, the seatbelt mechanism makes a ratchety sound as it is spooling the excess seatbelt back in. When the car is off, it functions without any noise, so I am assuming that when started, something is engaging. I was told that they will have to remove the seat back and who knows what else to replace the whole thing as they do not work on the part. They just replace the whole thing. Again, I am worried/concerned about the leather and trim getting marked up. Yes, I am very anal retentive about my cars.

3. The speedometer. When you set the cruise control, it is supposed to blank out the speedometer sections below your set speed. However, on my car, the 40 - 60 (consisting of two sections) stay lit and are always brighter than the other sections. I did notice on the 2001 that they use different style sections. How difficult is it to remove this assembly for replacement?

Thanks for your help..

Signed, Eternally Anal Retentive.. :-)

#2 item; the seat belt is straight forward & shouldn't cause any problem.
#3 Instrument cluster isn't a problem as long as they are careful. Sounds like operation is correcr of lighting segments. NO technicians like chrome trim repairs as many times the new part won't fit as well as original. VERY hard to ship w/o damage!

[Edited by M.B.DOC on 01-04-2001 at 05:57 PM]

CL500 Questions
 

MB Doc, thanks very much for your reply. I feel a little better about having those two items taken care of.

For the trim problem, I am of course concerned about any possible damage to the interior, but also as the windows auto-lower when you open the door, and are thus pretty sensitive, I worry that it will turn out to be an adjustment nightmare. Even the Service Advisor (granted he isn't technical) suggested that I hold off after he had problems when they replaced all the windows on his MB which was also pillarless when new a few years back.

There is no need to remove the interior door panel and the window glass as you fear to correct the loose trim on the door. The mirror can be removed and the trim lifted up .revealing the clips , which can be secured or replaced as required to properly hold the trim.