i find all of my benzes to be the best vehicles on the road. and i have found the good service directors at honorable dealerships and my indy to be the best car guys that i have even encountered.

in fact, today i drove 60 miles to put my 1997 c140 into the hands of the newest dealership in town with the service director i first met on the day that intercontinental motors opened in 1976[some starmark issues that the autonation store closer to home prefers to duck]. that was the day i initiated a relationship for my family's fleet[2 450sel's, 1 240d, 1 220] so as to escape the only other game in town, Norman " i am selling you a new battery no matter what" Scott.

he, in conjunction with the owners, have created a great shop. the location is horrible in sugarland, texas. but daryl has hired most of his pre-autonation crew from m-b houston north[formerly intercontinental motors]. i had stopped doing business with daryl in 1999-2000 because the owners[schnitzers and autonation in a continuing ownership shuffle] started to energetically screw their service customers. he told me to go find a good indy because the service department was no longer under his direction. i followed his advice.

do you think that other car dealer personnel ever establish these kinds of relationships with their customers?

anyhoo, perhaps because i am an engineer who manufactures parts for recips, i was given an entree into intercontinental motors from its opening day that few customers ever had. i knew most of the mechanics and other service personnel. i was allowed to access the shop when my cars were being worked on.

i shall probably never own another new benz[hold that, now the e320cdi is scheduled for the usa, i may acquire one - it is a great car]. and this c140 with 23,000 miles will only see even this friendly dealer for starmark issues.

but m-b sugarland will be the reason that i even think to stay in the benz fold - and that is because of the individuals working there. had this dealership not opened and hired the right people, i would feel out in the cold.

i had it too good in the past. those standards continue to be my standards. i am not getting into the mud to deal with an autonation dealership.

we do a lot of driving in texas. until i moved here, i didn't care much about cars. doing lots of high speed miles on back roads traversing the oil patch reconfigured me. my experience has been that the benzes have been the most dependable, most fun to drive cars that i have ever encountered.

my 4 cents.

these are what i own and operate today:

1979 6.9[52,000]
1986 560sel[254,000]
1987 560sec[93,000]
1995 e320cab[13,000]
1997 s500c[23,000]