RE-Agent

I’ve been reading this forum for about a month. I have found it to be many things: Informative, helpful, humorous, and sometimes ridiculous, tedious, lame. Most of all it is just entertaining. Instead of replying to a dozen different posts with my thoughts and comments I figured I would just lay it all out here.

Sirius Antenna: First of all I would like to thank you guys for alerting me to the horrible Sirius antenna. I ordered a 230K with Sirius and I happened to see the pics and comments here before my car was delivered. I called my dealer and he was able to cancel the Sirius installation at the vehicle-processing center (with just a day to spare). Again, thank you, thank you, thank you! Likewise, the anti-rattle post was great- I hope I don’t need it.

Speed: Some of you should stop obsessing about fractions of seconds for these cars. They aren’t racecars. While they are well engineered, quick and definitely the best-looking $30-40K car on the market they aren’t all that fast. Just about any turbo Subaru will rip them a new one. Including a soccer mom in a Turbo Forester that can do 0-60 in 5.3 seconds. And remember, just because your car is fast it doesn’t always mean that you can drive worth a crap…

-Stone chips: 500 miles on busy Maryland roads and not a mark on the front end leads me to believe that you guys tailgate way too much. I did too. Then I turned 30.

-Problems: After having a bunch of Acuras and Subarus I decided to get a Benz (I am a real estate agent after all). I was worried about reliability with a German car. So far I had only had one problem (at 300 miles-not cool) with the expensive Navigation System/HK stereo- just static from eleven speakers. It corrected itself when I turned the car on and off. I hope this isn’t the shape of things to come.

-Paint Colors: I hear a bunch of you *****ing about swirl marks, paint matching and finish quality. White is the best for a couple a reasons. It reflects light (unlike black, which absorbs light) so it shows fewer swirls and looks better over time. Look at a well-maintained white car after a few years compared to a dark one. The white car will look better. As for paint matching, body shops can match flat paints because they don’t have to deal with the way that a metal-flake lays down on a repaint. We’ve all seen cars with a panel that doesn’t match and 99% of the time you will notice it on a metallic car.

-And last of all: Some of you should stop obsessing over your mods and pay more attention girlfriends (or get one). After all, don’t most of you want nice cars just to get chicks in the first place?

KnowalotaboutMB

Congrats and enjoy your benz. German cars compared to Asian cars are alot nicer. Good luck and have fun!

I get to Maryland every once in a while. Being in the first state or Florida most of the time, I'm not too far from it.

My girl, Carla, works at Long and Foster in MD. If Subaru's designs were upgraded to something like a benz, I would own one. I like the turbo engines and the fact that they are mostly all wheel drive.

Jim Banville

By "first state", do you mean "Delaware"? Funny, that's where banned user nicedeboy/lookinforbenzpart/rockintunes23 was from. The average IQ in that place must be scraping the bottom of the barrell

KnowalotaboutMB

Grow up. And talk about being banned, You are a clear example of someone who should be BANNED. You are harassing me, and that is something that is banned on this board.

benzset

Yeah Jim needs to be banned

RE-Agent

Yeah, Subarus are great but the new 250hp all-wheel drive Legacy looks so much like a Ford Taurus it is embarrassing. On the other hand, I do think that the C-Class Sport design is about perfect inside and out. From the exterior angles to the font MB chose for the instrumentation; the styling is spot-on. In fact, after having it only a few weeks I think that I should buy a ’06 C350 put my ’05 wheels on it, get a 100K extended warranty and drive it forever.
I have a problem with the way that most manufacturers are raising the windowsill height on modern cars (this is especially evident on the new MB CLS and it looks like the 07 C could go this direction too.) It makes it very hard to put your arm on the window and drive. I’m over six feet tall and I feel like a child in a bathtub when I am sitting in these new cars with the small side windows. Note to manufacturers: Driving should be interactive. Seeing the world outside the car is a good thing! Yes, I know that it helps with safety and body stiffness but it also causes accidents as drivers become detached from driving.

jan ken po

You'll revise this statement around the 8k-10k mark.

mick1

nah, that doesn't mean that we are tailgating other cars, it means the roads in Maryland are in fantastic condition.

Outland

You must be looking at a different subie then. It looks asian, no doubt...but its more stylish than the Acuras that it seems to draw its cues from. What truly sinks this car is driving it. The interior is very low rent, and the body structure is not something to brag about. OTOH, it goes like hell.

X72

My theory on this is that the auto manufacturers are intentionally making it uncomfortable for the driver to rest his/her arm on the windowsill. It probably is not a good idea to have your arm on the windowsill when the curtain air bag and side air bag deploy.
William
2003 E320

mbny

actually this guy may have just come to a solution. since i sometimes can literally see the pebbles or road debris start skipping toward my car from the car in front of me, i'm thinking that tailgating will put less chips on my car. since most of my chips are on the hood of the car, perhaps tailgating will put more toward the bottom of the front bumper or miss it altogether and go under the car

skahung

I agree, I use to tailgate and never had chips. We need to be right behind their azzes.

delbomber

400 miles on my car...a few stone chips already. A few pits in the rims as well. No tailgating. You've been lucky.

For cleanliness swirl/scratch hiding, silver is even better than white. White will show dirt and road residue from driving in the rain, silver hides it to the point where it should have been washed anyway, not to mention pollen. A California Duster will keep silver looking sparkling, even through rain, for two weeks+. Silver isn't always the best fit for a car (although for the C I think it is), and it's also the most common, but definitely is the cleanest.

Welcome to the board!

Jakpro1

Re-Agent

You have been very direct and I ask for the same courtesy on one point as their are just too many to address.

Some of us use the modding of our cars as a hobby. You have to understand the times we are in my friend. If the internet was around during the first HP war in the late 60's-1970, you would have found the same type of talk on forums around the world.

This is an incredible time to own a car, with many pushing 500hp and some over 600hp. There are even rumors of a twin turb 650-700hp Benz coming soon for the E. Not all of us are "crusing the strips" looking for chicks...some of us have successful businesses, lovely wifes, and enough money to have a hobby of moddin our expensive cars.

We all know that this may not last forever as the cars of the late 70's and 80's taught us. For now, we are enjoying every last drop of HP the automakers are giving us......and LOVING every moment of it.

Welcome to the forum.

AMGfan

Well stated and very true. Welcome to the forum Re-Agent

ctC230K

best advice i've read in weeks!!!

I spent 3 hours Sunday afternoon installing my Sirius antenna properly while everyone else was out at picnics having hamburgers and beers.

I got so sick of the signal dropping out whenever I would go under a big tree with lots of leaves or when I would be too close to a building so finally I installed it under the windshield washer nozzle grill like i've seen a few other people on here do... man that firewall was a royal b!tch to get the big antenna connector and wire through but now I get perfect reception.
I'm gonna post the pictures tonight if I can.

RE-Agent

Thanks for the warm welcome everyone (as opposed to a flame). I agree that compared to most states Maryland does have some pretty good road conditions (unlike Pennsylvania where the "truck retread" must be the state flower). Even so, we do have our share of road construction and dumptrucks full of crap. I hope that I can keep the stones to a minimum. Currently you guys have me putting four car lengths between my front end and the car I'm following.
As for reliability, I had an 1991 Acura Integra that I redlined daily (really), drove for 181K miles (over 9 years), skipped the recommended service at 90K, 120K, 150K and 180K. Really, no tune-ups, no second timing belt, I just changed the oil every 5K. The car didn't smoke, idle rough, stall or burn oil. Just three sets of tires and one set of brake pads. That amazing car had one unscheduled repair for $92.00. I know that if a Benz did this I would be in a national ad. If I can get 70K miles out of the out of the 230WZ (while doing the maintenence) without problems I'll be fairly happy.
As for why I beat the hell out of the Acura: I was paying more attention to my Honda VFR motorcycle and my out of state girlfriend to be bothered with maintaining the Integra. If I could buy a new '91 Integra today I would. BTW, my wife's '03 Subaru Forester has 25K without a single issue. As I mentioned, I made it to 300 miles before something kooky happened with the 230's sound system. This should be interesting. Where MB hooks you is that these cars are so damn good looking and handle so well you don't care. Yet...

bradeer

It's been some some time since I last posted but after reading what RE-Agent had to say, he basically summed up this entire board. I completely agree that "WE" all have too much time and apparantly money on our hands to spend our free time talking about a car!!!! But what a car we all have, and how could we possibly consider anything else... with all it's glitches, and a/c problems, catylitic converters, swirl marks, production delays, and navigation issues. I wouldn't trade it for anything.... Let's keep being total Geeks!!!!

nukblazi

The thing that has brought all of us here is that we are enthusiastic about, or interested in our Mercedes Benz vehicles. Though many of the statements herein are true, some of us find plenty of time for our girlfriend/fiances/wives and children who also participate in our adventures. My kid loves going to the track, and Jen doesn't mind because Casey enjoys it so much.

My 5 y/o can probably do a front pad swap (street to race, vice versa), faster than you could

Tom

!!!!!NJ Drive

gotta love that...i dont have any kids now, when and if i do have any i want them to enjoy my hobbies as much as i do, which was something my father never did...to this day he owns a immaculate 67 stingray who NOBODY AT ALL touches but him, I cant even touch the keys (which is in a locked glass case)