I just bought a 2001 S600 with the distronic. I know this is a new system but I thought I would ask here anyway. On my drive home with the car the distronic would dis-engage and the display would say "external malfunction". Most of the time it functioned flawlessly. When the "malfunction" would occur it was always with nothing in front of the car for a great distance. Dealer inspection revealed no stored fault codes. I was just wondering if anybody out there has had a similar experience.

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1995 G320
1984 280GE
1971 Unimog 416

I also have a 2001 CL600 which has developed the same problem

I have driven over 5000 miles since getting the car (now on 47000 miles) and it has just started displaying the "Distronic - External Malfunction PLease Reactive" fault warning.

The manual says that this may be due to external radiation?

Did you manage to get this fixed - if so how - my car's UK warranty ran out two months ago!

Ben

Things I've heard about with distronic.

Dirty senders, clean 'em up, the CL has the weird looking plastic insert in the grille and bugs.... yes bugs will cause 'em to freak out.

Vibration of the senders, I have no idea what solution they came up with on that one. Maybe the went to a mount like the old 119 air filter housings.

Rain, see bugs

Certian types of radar and other r/f type noise causing radar echo's. Same thing that causes shadows and false positives on weather doppler.



Joe

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Project Smoker, '87 603 powered wagon
Hauler, 96 CTD can you say torque?
Toy 73 Cougar xr7 convertible
Acme Automotive Inc.
Raleigh NC
919-881-0364

Thanks for this - I've checked for bugs (of the flying variety) - none there
Not quite sure what you mean by "vibration of the senders"
I guess if it is external r/f noise it is beyond my control - but I wouldn't have thought that it would be a problem all over the distances I have covered over the last two weeks

Called the dealer - they seemed baffled - not sure it is something they have run into before. They said they would have to plug it in to see if any fault codes had been registered - loathed to find the time to go in - certainly it has not logged any malfunctions in the display in the dashboard

Anyone else had a similar problem with their distronic?

Ben