ASR Warning Light-W140
 

Yesterday for the first time in a long time, I took a long trip in my '95 S500. I wanted to give the engine a work out so I had D2 gear engaged. I noticed, at times, that if felt like the engine was missing when I would accelerate in and out of traffic (3000-4000+ RPM's, 65-85+ mph). At one point, the ASR failure light came on and the engine shut down to an idle and would not rev. I pulled of the road and turned the car off and then restarted. It was fine after that.

Would the ASR failure light engage from this hi-revving driving???

Spirited driving alone will not cause the ASR light to light nor cause you to go into "limp home" mode (which is why your accelerator felt funny and you could not accelerate normally).

Do a search on "ASR light" and you'll get some useful info. The punch line, though, is that the codes need to be retreived to track down a problem like this.

In CA, putting a W140 w/ ASD on the. . .
 

dynomotor, is an interesting experience. This is done to pass smog tests but W140s (92 thru 95) are not tested this way since the ASR light and 'limp' mode is activated. But it's a kick to try it: my smog man let me do it for grins!

You can activate the ASR and limp mode but the circumstances have to be "right" or should I say "wrong"!

I've seen my car's ASR 'flash' so that's normal and an expected result. So the suggestion of looking at the DTC may be warranted in your case. It certainly won't hurt especially if you have (or can borrow) a scanner.

But the fact that after restart, everythjing was ok, would indicate that it was probably the 'operators' finesse that caused this.

Good points, Jim! I always learn something from you. Probably is premature to get the codes, since the fault would have to occur at least 3 times to set a code, no?