Navigation Problem
 

2001 S500. Navigation screen went blank. Then came back on after restarting car. Had mechanic pull the unit to get repaired in LA. Repaired unit reinstalled. Mechanic turned navigation on and saw a single vertical line on the screen. Unit sent back to LA. Anyone had this happen? Other than the obvious, does the vertical line have any other significance? :kid:

The COMAND screen going blank and the line in the display are probably two separate issues. There were numerous software issues in the early 220 COMAND systems. There are a few old DTB's which may apply to your system. Updating the software is the quickest, cheapest, easiest, and usually, most successful repair option.

cdplayer
 

Thanks for your input. Very helpful. My mechanic is as frustrated with this model as I have become. But I plan to stick it out. May have to refinance the house again if repairs for faulty equipment do not settle down soon.
This is my fourth Benz and my second S. Just waiting for another navigation unit to come from LA. Then hopefully I'll get to bring her home.
I have owned the W220 for 12 weeks now. However it has been in the shop for 11 of those weeks. Collapsed suspension, new struts and pump,new ignition switch,new gear selector box, spark plugs, oil change, filters, passenger headlight ignitor module, and of course, the navigation update and repair.
A ruff guess would put the bill at about $8,000.
My $3,400 extended warrenty (Interstate) has covered only $1700 of that stating everything else is pre-existing. Claims denied.:silly:

Sorry for the rant....but thanks for your time.
I plan to contact MBUSA when I get all the paperwork finalized with my mechanic.

cdplayer
 

Hey guys, after nearly three months in the shop, I finally got to bring her home.
Navigation problem fixed. Curious though, with the new navigation unit I have noticed several other things about the car that are different than before.
I am getting status messages on the instrument cluster that I could not get before. The passenger rear view mirror angles down so you can see the tires when backing, and the rear head rests lower when backing too.
These did not work before the repair of the Nav unit.
Plus the best news for me is the 6 disc CD player works flawlessly. Before the repair the Nav screen would tell me "no CD magazine".
Just thought this info would be helpful to those experiencing issues similar:kid:

Hmmm, very interesting. The "new" features you have are instrument cluster settings. Did you have the IC replaced along with the COMAND head unit?

cdplayer
 

No. But early in the investigation of the codes first found (with the old shift control unit) the mechanic had noticed in the instrument cluster the position of the gear selector was not illuminated. This was another intermitten thing:dizzy2: I looked back in all the printouts I made during my shopping for this model, I also noticed some models were fully illuminated and a few were not.

Only after replacing a circuit board that controls this feature, did the gear indicator illuminate. No problems since.
My mechanic had the car, as I may have stated earlier, about two months.
During this time he put 178 miles on it.
The VMI report shows warrenty work for "Instrument cluster,electrical, was performed at 9/25/2003.
Also taken from Mercedes updated programming service, he discovered issues with the transmission control module caused by fluid debris falling into the selector box.
The first box was faulty. He had installed a new ignition switch too, but could not get the car started everythime. He said after 20 or 30 successful starts the car would not start.
After replacing the box, and doing another code search, he reported codes that had not been seen before the box change. As if the car was not able to report codes due to gummed up sensors or something.:kid: