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Old 09-21-2004, 01:29 PM
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LOCHS 2 LOCHS 2 is offline
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Clarendon Hills, IL
Posts: 12
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Gilly
Yeah I'd tend to agree the shifter "may" be worn out. That's all I can gather because the description of what's going on is totally whacked (don't try to describe it again, it only makes it worse), as is the habit of shifting it to neutral on the stops, and I see no connection to "big guy" with doing this. If you got something going on in traffic and you have to move "like right now" here you are stabbing it into drive to get it going. Plus then you say you just do this "on the level", so I suppose you are guessing it's level enough you aren't going to roll away if you aren't paying attention. What if you get rear ended? Might be nice to have a little extra rolling resistance (I assume you are taking your foot off the brake and this is the advantage to putting it in neutral, this is the only possible connection I can make to doing this and you being a big guy). Also then you're sitting there without the brake lights on at a stop light, sometime people coming up behind you LIKE to know if you have the brakes applied, that's why the lights are there.
The trim on the bottom of the seat, usually it breaks off at the rear and can't really be repaired to any grade of dependablity. You can replace just the broken side though. Tough part is up front where it engages into the front piece. Usually it's a better repair to remove the seat and remove all 3 sides of the trim to be able to engage the side trim to the front.
If they broke the tabs off of the trim around the shifter (the black piece of trim) you can get that seperately.
Another possible problem based on "what I can decipher" from your shifter ramblings is that maybe a bushing on the shifter rod is worn out? That could be caused by you tormenting your shifter as you've described. Knock it off!
Gilly
Thanks for the reply Gilly. I actually only shift into neutral once I see the car behind me is already stopped or there isn't much traffic and no one is coming up behind me. Like most people I'm on the same roads all the time and at the same stoplights each day. It's a habit and it is because my leg does get tired with all the stop and go traffic I deal with here in crowded old DuPage County! To be honest when I have the seat in perfect position for the pedals then I'm sitting too low and honestly I cannot get the seats to adjust to a comfortable position. Sure it's partly because I'm 5'10" 250 LBS. but I've seen other threads regarding seat adjustment issues in early MLs. When I drive the new ML350 loaners the perfect seat position is simple for me to get too..plus the nice side bolster support is great. I suppose I'll wear out my seat motor prematurely and perhaps investing in new seats might make sense because I plan to keep her for another three years at least.

I had a feeling the seat repair would not be a peice of cake. I'll leave it alone since it does not make noise while driving and cosmetically no one will know about it because they won't see it!
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