I love the car but hate the company. I recently aqquired a copy of WIS and after reading article after article there seems to be a reoccuring theme. Almost every artilce has the statement "check production date of "X" part". Then it goes on to tell you the updated part and yada yada. The fact that they sold me the incorrectly engineered product the first time for such a high price then to sell me the correctly engineered product at even a more inflated price REALLY PISSES ME OFF! The least they can do is give a discount on the part if the core is returned. (being a pre-updated part, of course) Anyways...I just had to rant a little. I'm done.

A friend of mine has an S500. Virtually every part on it he has had replaced has been described as "that's been superceded by an IMPROVED part...". Sheesh. Or, maybe other mfr's don't give a sh__ once the car has been sold unless the gov't makes them.

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86 560SL
With homebrew first gear start!
85 380SL
Daily Driver Project

http://juliepalooza.8m.com/sl/mercedes.htm

Diamler got American Engineering Disease in the 90s-- you have to be first or your dinkus falls off in public.

The result was, of course, that parts fall off those cars in public because the engineering didn't get done before hand. The W140, W202, and W210s appear to be the worst, don't know about newer ones.

This is NOT true of the older cars (although sometimes only because a badly designed part got used forever -- window regulators in the W108/109 chassis is a perfect example).

Don't forget, as automotive companies go, Benz was a very small outfit up till the 80s -- cars were not assembled on an assembly line until the W123 chassis, and all the W107s were hand built. Running changes are a Benz tradition, since they tend to make a chassis for a number of years (typically 8 or more), and when hand assembled, the actual parts used were what was available, and with a number of suppliers, you need the chassis number (serial number, actually) to get the right one sometimes.

Some things do improve with time, though -- the new links for the rear suspension are much better than the originals, and I'm glad to change them for better parts once they are worn out.

Peter

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1972 220D ?? miles
1988 300E 200,012
1987 300D Turbo killed 9/25/07, 275,000 miles
1985 Volvo 740 GLE Turobodiesel 218,000
1972 280 SE 4.5 165, 000 - It runs!

I have found a large number of parts for my W126's have been updated or changed. Frankly I like it, some of these updates happened years after the W126 was out of production. Would Honda update a part on a car that hasn't been made in 5 years? Heck you would be lucky to get parts.

MB has many faults but you really can't fault them for their parts support.

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1999 SL500
1969 280SE
2023 Ram 1500
2007 Tiara 3200