I didn't make a bad purchasing decision. I bought a car that, based on its REPUTATION, ....SHOULD.... last longer before causing such problems. Go ahead and chide those "cheaply made tin cans", but facts are facts. I'll bet Jap cars require HALF the repairs as MB's. That's a lot. Said another way, MB's require TWICE the repairs as their Jap counterparts.

Face it, MB has made bad a/c systems .... FOR NEARLY THIRTY YEARS!! You'd have thought they'd figure out by now how to make a good one. That huge, glaring achille's heel aside, their cars aren't that bad, but for a leading manufacturer, could be better. There's no excuse that a simple $10 gasket should cost a consumer $500 to fix, but these are issues that MB causes their customers. On my '88 300CE, at just 10 years old there were 3 separate gaskets, transmission and upper and lower oil gaskets, that cost $500, and $600 for the upper and lower to fix. That's $1100 in case you don't have a calculator. The cost of the actual gasket is about $10 to MB, $20 to the consumer. The a/c's cost thousands to fix. What I'm saying is, there's no EXCUSE for this from what is considered a top-flight car company. I'm betting a Jap car of the same year and mileage, other than normal maintenence costs, would have ZERO in repairs at this point.

If the repairs for all this is no big deal as you say, then step up to the plate and pay my repair bills.

jeff
1991 300d, 93k