Mercedes Benz not under warranty will eat you alive financially (as will BMW from my experience) especially if you are not prepared to get dirty or have a good friend who will. Just that simple...these things are very simple to repair, the parts are not cheap, but very easily exploited from the diagnoses/labor side to the unsuspecting and/or inexperienced owner...it's a shame but a fact of life...I always felt that was the point and value of sites such as this....back in the day when I was learning we didn't have such advantages...we had to learn the old fashioned way...manuals and failure...

 

Cliff,
It has most definitely changed things for the better-these boards. Most car marques, especially the more expensive ones, have tricks of the trade that are not always logical. Taking those front door panels off for example, unless I had read that Wiki tutorial first, I would have broken most everything. Seems the Germans don't like to pull panels out with pry tools, but up/down/over and the like.

Then I do the right door panel and see that it's a virgin, which means my left door panel by comparison, was broken to sh&% by the guy before me, along with the plastic strip that hides the screws on the dash speaker. My guess is that the "Clarion" installer tried to replace the speakers on the drivers side, broke many things and gave up. I see no evidence of his "magic' anywhere else.

Sometimes, the worst things about these cars are what the nimrod did before you.[:@] And more to your point, MB's aren't shade tree friendly cars. Not because they are too complicated, but because the MB network doesn't support owners working on their own cars. Volvo certainly did the year I bought this car. I've actually had to leave the parts counter, walk back to service and nail a MB tech to tell me what a part # is, because it's not always so simple as to pull up a microfiche diagram ( I guess they're not microfiche anymore, but computer). A lot of the members here even bite the bullet and defect to the stealer for most repairs. That's OK (actually they should try a good indie over the stealer) for some, but I'm not funneling thousands every year into the Mercedes mystic. I was thinking of giving myself a Xmas present though......after I get all the work done to the wagon, taking it over to a good indie in Seattle and letting him tune it on the best diagnostic machines out there. I'm probably going to get it to run so sweet that that scenario will be moot-here's hoping.

So in conclusion, except for the young males seeking AMG clones and territorial braggin' rights, the marque just doesn't draw hordes of DIYers. Older deisels have more DIYers than the other models I think mostly due to their incredible longevity.

Kevin

 

Thousands of diy'rs and more each day.They contact me from 30 miles south in Seattle all the way to Australia,New caledonia,borneo,UAE africa and all over the USA.Members diy on newer 05 and 06's lots of old amg and W210 and c class guys of all ages.
Visit mbworld.org or benzworld.org forums not just the w210 but the c and amg lots of diy and lots of performance mods being done by owners.
ohlord

 

I agree ohlord...my 1990 300TE often reminds me of Augusta National Golf Club,with the carb like air filter and other esoteric like featuressuch as real clock on the dash and the drivers side non-powered rear view mirror, yet the passenger side mirror is power, obviously geared towards the more 'elderly' driver. Like Augusta National my particular version appears toattempt to be 'traditional' yet 'modern' at the same time...interesting to me.....cliff

 

I don't agree with the #'s, ohlord. You're not getting the full picture, that is, comparing owners who work on say Dodge cars (or Chevy, Ford-even Toyoto) versus people who work on MB's. The owners who work on MB's are minuscule compared to other, more popular marques. Even if you compared apples to apples; the ratio of owners who work on their own cars (of other marques), versus the ratio of owners who work on their MB's.

You're also skewed by the Pacific corridor: from Seattle all the way down to LA, MB's are in if there is any way folks can afford them-universal status symbol for the nouveau riche. If you look at the overall breadth of the entire USA, MB's are still not a 'common' car to see on the road.

However, I'll take any assistance I can find in the way of support for my car.....forums, clubs, other owners in real life etc. It's all good.[sm=smiley20.gif]

Kevin

 

I gotta say, I have absolutely NO IDEA how to work on US made cars...they make no sense to me and I live in the US.
I have tried to help friends change spark plugs on Corvettes, a total joke, my son had a Z-28 Camaro, piece of junk, I could go on and on but I won't...American Cars are junk, they just are...cliff

 

heck, my brother in law has a crystler where you have to remove the front right wheelto remove the rear spark plug...from underneath the car...nice enginering there