SL55 AMG...new young owner with a few issues

[tbrown21]

Hi guys and gals...first post here and have just bought my first Merc.

I know these cars are notorious for a few issues but i just had to have one- my previous cars have consisted of:

1995 MX5 1.8is
2003 Winning Blue RX-8 231ps High Power.
1988 E30 BMW 325i Convertible
1993 Porsche 944 Turbo Convertible
2002 Porsche Boxster S
2002 BMW E46 M3
1996 S14a Nissan 200SX 320bhp
2004 VW Touraeg 5.0 V10 TDI

This one i will definately be keeping a while though.

2003 SL55 AMG, Silver with Dark grey, 36,000 miles, full spec inc pan roof, keyless, massage air conditioned seats, special cruise control, 18" Turbine wheels, full benz history etc

Anyway...my SL has the following:

1) Consumer electronics offline (in the mornings) just needs a new battery- Merc want £150 which is not too bad right?
2) Tyre sensor light on- £80 a corner i believe
3) Keyless go not working and very short range on central locking- merc says very big and expensive job despite replacing keyless module last year and now its not working. They claim is a different problem and the 2 year warranty dosen't cover it?
4) Apparently i need all new roof seals as there is a leak somewhere- i cant find it but they want £4500. The boot seals were done in 2008.

Other than that, i love it- just needs a remap from either DMS or im thinking about Paramount performance. Also having the resonators removed as have just done that to my BMW 540i and it sounds the nuts!

If anyone has any tips or can recommend a specialist in the Bristol/ Bournemouth/ Southampton area that would be great.


Thanks in advance

Tom

Edited by tbrown21 on Monday 7th February 03:12

Edited by tbrown21 on Monday 7th February 21:21

[r129sl]

You mention that the car has a two year warranty. I would read it carefully. I can see no obvious reason why you should not be able to make a claim under the warranty in respect of all of the issues you describe. Obviously it depends on the terms of the warranty and any exclusions. At the risk of teaching granny to suck eggs, it's important to understand how a warranrty works: it is essentially a contract of insurance under which the warranty company agrees to indemnify you for the cost of work which is carried out by a third party.

If you bought the car from a trade seller in ignorance of the issues you describe, again I can see no reason why you should not be able to claim the cost of repairs as damages for breach of the implied term that the vehicle will be of satisfactory quality and reasonably fit for purpose.

I think I'd focus my efforts (and expenditure) on getting it fixed before getting it tuned.

[Carlton Banks]

I would say that if the Seals were only done in 2008, then there should certainly be some sort of goodwill to have those rectified - providing this was done by Mercedes....

I would be frank with the dealership - if you pay another £4500 now, do you want to be contacting them in another 3 years to get them fixed again? Probably not.

[tbrown21]

Exactly what i have said to them with regards to the roof seals. When i mentioned the warranty though, i meant the work carried out by mercedes carries a 2 year parts and labour warranty....not actually having an annual warranty in place.
I also bought the car at trade price so am not covered by anything there. To be honest, none of the mercedes dealers want to know about it (i have phoned 3 including the dealership which carried out the work for the past 5 years).
Will give them another call now.

[Carlton Banks]

tbrown21 said:

Exactly what i have said to them with regards to the roof seals. When i mentioned the warranty though, i meant the work carried out by mercedes carries a 2 year parts and labour warranty....not actually having an annual warranty in place.
I also bought the car at trade price so am not covered by anything there. To be honest, none of the mercedes dealers want to know about it (i have phoned 3 including the dealership which carried out the work for the past 5 years).
Will give them another call now.

Best bet, turn up at the dealership of your choice and ask to speak to the Service manager. I find that speaking to someone in person always helps. Also, the dealership has a chance to obtain future work if you decide to retain the MBSH.

Its obviously worth his while is some way to carry out some work for you as Goodwill still pays the dealership, albeit at a lower labour cost per hour.

The 2 year labour/ parts warranty is one thing that they stand by but you do not expect the seals to need replacing again so soon, thats laughable, quite frankly.

[tbrown21]

Thanks for your help here mr banks. Trouble is, i have already been the dealership to get the keyless fixed under warranty and this is where they drew up a nice qoutation suggesting £5,385 of work to be done.
They essentially charged £100, took the car apart, corrected nothing and then said they needed to investigate further which could be upto 10 hours labour.

Edited by tbrown21 on Monday 7th February 11:31

[Carlton Banks]

How does 10 hours equate to that?

My friends old dear had her seals replaced and it cost £1k I am sure.....

I would approach it from the angle that the initial job should have easily lasted more than 3 years....

[okgo]

Why are you trying to make such a point of the fact you're young and have bought a nice car?

Very odd message to try and portray.

[chris333]

okgo said:

Why are you trying to make such a point of the fact you're young and have bought a nice car?

Very odd message to try and portray.

that was my first thought too!

my second thought was with a list of cars owned like that, together with the inevitable insurance costs, finding the £5k to sort the SL shouldn't be too much trouble.

[benzito]

if you do find that MB are not willing to cover anything on previous warranty and still need to do both jobs (keyless go issue and seals) then you must take the car to an independent specialist - the prices you've been quoted are ridiculous,

call MB and check but e.g the actual price of roof seals if you bought direct from them are only about 400+VAT, I'm sure an indy can fit them for you for only 100-200 max. You must research these issues. Also have you noticed any water leaking yourself - how bad is it?

At trade price my guess is the car only cost approx 21k for you to buy. They are quoting another 10k for the two relatively less serious issues which they may not be able to resolve!

With regards to mods you can make changes to exhaust and remap/pulley upgrades relatively cheap. I say 'cheap' because you will get more for your money with this being a forced induction car, e.g. removing resonators and replacing with two straight pipes can be done for 100 pounds, removing the resonators and sec cats and replacing with X-pipe which is what I did cost 250 pounds, but you must research all mods in detail and be willing to take the risk as if anything goes wrong then a new amg engine can set you back 25k!

[tali1]

21? -what about insurance -who, why , when , where , how?
Me no understand
You not a Prem footballer?

[tbrown21]

okgo said:

Why are you trying to make such a point of the fact you're young and have bought a nice car?

Very odd message to try and portray.

Sorry, didn't mean to offend or annoy. Was just introducing myself...but i can see the point your making, didn't think about that when i created the topic.

[tbrown21]

benzito said:

if you do find that MB are not willing to cover anything on previous warranty and still need to do both jobs (keyless go issue and seals) then you must take the car to an independent specialist - the prices you've been quoted are ridiculous,

call MB and check but e.g the actual price of roof seals if you bought direct from them are only about 400+VAT, I'm sure an indy can fit them for you for only 100-200 max. You must research these issues. Also have you noticed any water leaking yourself - how bad is it?

At trade price my guess is the car only cost approx 21k for you to buy. They are quoting another 10k for the two relatively less serious issues which they may not be able to resolve!

With regards to mods you can make changes to exhaust and remap/pulley upgrades relatively cheap. I say 'cheap' because you will get more for your money with this being a forced induction car, e.g. removing resonators and replacing with two straight pipes can be done for 100 pounds, removing the resonators and sec cats and replacing with X-pipe which is what I did cost 250 pounds, but you must research all mods in detail and be willing to take the risk as if anything goes wrong then a new amg engine can set you back 25k!

Hi Benzito, im banging my head against the wall now- have spoken to Mercedes who did all the previous work and the only time they can give me a courtesy car and get my car booked in isnt until the 10th March. It will take them a few days and i cant afford to be without a car.

I also phoned the other dealership who gave the diagnosis and qoute for the work but unfortunately the technician who dealt with my car is on holiday for a week and no one else can help with any information what so ever.

I'm not too worried about the roof and boot seals, genuinely think they are chatting out there ar*e here. But the keyless and i would like to have working and no specialist can sort it as it is MB main dealer only.

Think im going to have paramount performance do a remap (£320+ vat) as this smoothens out the power delivery and removes torque limiters etc. Small power gain though of about 15bhp.
Resonators will be off soon, have been told £150 to do this from a custom exhaust place in bristol.

[jvince]

I expect it was meant to emphasise the naive element. Or been filling in lonely heart ads and it has become a habit. Kiddin ya

[mikearwas]

tbrown21 said:

Hi Benzito, im banging my head against the wall now- have spoken to Mercedes who did all the previous work and the only time they can give me a courtesy car and get my car booked in isnt until the 10th March. It will take them a few days and i cant afford to be without a car.

I also phoned the other dealership who gave the diagnosis and qoute for the work but unfortunately the technician who dealt with my car is on holiday for a week and no one else can help with any information what so ever.

I'm not too worried about the roof and boot seals, genuinely think they are chatting out there ar*e here. But the keyless and i would like to have working and no specialist can sort it as it is MB main dealer only.

Think im going to have paramount performance do a remap (£320+ vat) as this smoothens out the power delivery and removes torque limiters etc. Small power gain though of about 15bhp.
Resonators will be off soon, have been told £150 to do this from a custom exhaust place in bristol.

Why would you want to smoothen the power delivery man!? The great think about amg mercs is how brutal they are.