Jay J

Hi folks, I'm looking for a bit of advice and am hopeful that I'll find it here.

I've got a 2005 C230K SS with less than 4,000 miles on it, and have noticed that it tends to drift to the right while driving, it's noticeable at both at low and high speeds.
I keep a pretty close watch on tire pressures so I don’t think that the problem but am worried about excessive tire wear.

I brought the car in to the dealership for it’s free 3000 mile inspection and asked them to check the alignment as I assumed that with the rough roads/road construction here in Dallas that it was simply out of alignment. They adjusted it slightly but it still pulled to the right.

I brought it back after driving it off the lot and had my service advisor bring the technician out to take another look.
We went for a test drive together and he informed me that Mercedes are designed to drift to the right on purpose, so that if you were to fall asleep at the wheel or whatnot, that you wouldn’t drift into oncoming traffic.

He said he could adjust the alignment further if I wanted him to, but that it would cause excessive wear on the tires if he did so.

I unhappily agreed to keep the car as is and live with the drift issue, but since then (about a month ago) it seems like the tendency to drift to the right, especially at slow speeds has become more pronounced.

Perhaps it’s just my imagination, but the more I think about their answer and the way the car drifts, I’m feeling less and less convinced that what the technician told me is the truth.

Has anyone else experienced this problem, and received this “pat” answer from MB that the car is intended to drift to the right for safety reasons?

Thanks in advance for the help!

Jay J

Sailorlite

I don't think the car is designed to drift to the right - but on a crowned road it is normal. On a flat road, it's not normal.

Most roads are constructed so that the center part is higher than the edges. So to drive straight on these roads requires just a little left steering wheel, or else you will drift slightly to the right (even with perfect wheel alignment). But not excessively!!??

But some roads are quite flat, and on these your car should go straight without steering corrections.

If you're drifting slightly to the right (or left) on flat roads, then I would ask the dealer to swap the front tires side to side. I bet you'll notice a difference. (I assume your tires are not "directional"). Tires themselves often cause this "drift" and in some instances it's the rear tires instead of the fronts (again assuming correct alignment).

Jay J

Thanks for that advice, I didn't think about swapping the tires left for right, I know I can not rotate them due to the different tire sizes rear to front but didn't think about swapping them from one rim to the other.

As for the crown in the road, I should have mentioned that I experience this on flat and crowned roads. Heck even on crowned roads, when driving on the wrong (left hand) side of the road it will still tend to drift slightly to the right.

razorfish228

I've heard about this in another thread somewhere. What you could do is to have them show you the alignment on the screen when they put your car on the alignment machine and show you the readings. Usually they are off a tiny bit and I had this problem with my Nissan Maxima before which I complained so many times that the guy showed me the readings on the screen and I had him adjust it to a certain degree. They can be off by factory specs and its experience on the alignment machine that also comes into play.

allen_7

This is BS. Have them look at your tires.

I had similar issue with my previous Lexus when it had about 9k miles. Took it to the dealer and they checked the alignment and everything and finally determined the Goodyear tires it had on are defective. They replaced all five tires (4 + 1 full size spare) under warranty and the problem went away.

Sailorlite

By swapping tires, I meant swapping the entire wheel/tire assembly - not removing the tires from the wheels and then remounting them on the other wheels. Shouldn't be more than about a 5-10 min. job.

If this corrects the drifting, I don't really know whether you'd call the tires "defective". But if in the future the left tire starts wearing more than the right, or v.v., you wouldn't want to swap them again to compensate or you'd be back to the drifting.

Jay J

I'm pretty sure that the Michelin's on my sports sedan are uni-directional, so I'd need to move them from rim to rim (left to right) I'm afraid.

The tires are Michelin Pilot Primacy 225/45 R 17's on the front and 245/40 R 17's on the rear, in case anyone knows for sure?

Sailorlite

I have the same Michelins. They're NOT uni-directional. But they are asymmetric, which means that they each have an Inside and an Outside tread pattern. And therefore there would be no point in remounting them on the other wheels - you'd still want the Outside out. But if one of your tires is responsible for the drift right, then swapping the present wheel/tire assemblies right-left (not just the tires) might very well correct the drift.

Or, suppose it's not the tires but is instead a slightly bent wheel. Again, the same right-left swap might correct it.

mleskovar

I had the same problem but it drifted to the left. MB installed different spec camber bolts (that's how the camber is adjusted) and it solved the problem and made the car feel like it was on rails. The difference in tracking was like night and day. I believe the alignment is warranted for the first year.
Don't settle for anything less than complete satisfaction.

czachari

03 C230K SS. Took it back to the dealer one week after I bought it. They performed an alignment and they said car within specs. Car still drifted to the right. I replaced the wheels&tires and the drift went away. I had the original 17 inch from MBZ and I replaced them with the AMG setup.

CZ

RBMBC32

Ok... So I bring my car into to the dealer because I hit a pothole which bent my rear rim and bubbled my front tire. I bought rim insurance ($500) about two months ago, so the tire was covered but since the rear rim still held air they wouldn't repair it. Ok fine... So I ask the service person to do an alignment on the car. She said thats going to cost $130. Fine. The dealer calls me back 30 minutes before I'm suppose to pick it up. They're calling to tell me they have to install camber bolts because the alignment is really off and they can't put it back to factory spec without the bolts. Ok fine.. So whats the problem. They want to charge me $150 for the camber bolts!! So tomorrow I'm going to have a little chat with the service manager because this car is still under warranty.

Has anyone else had to pay for these bolts? This seems like a design flaw to me. I've never had to install parts on a new car to keep it in spec. This sounds like a band aid fix to me!! Why isn't this covered under warranty??

Sorry for the rant.. But if this keeps up, this maybe my first and last MB.

Jay J

If your car is less than 1 year old you should not have to pay for an allingment or the camber bolts, if it's over 12 months, I can't say, but I know they did that same work for me for free, and that is how my service advisor explained it.

1sikbenz

I brought my car in for that also a few times (05' C230K S.S.), they said that it drifted to the right because I had lowered it & had different rims on it, so then I say...so why do all the loaner cars I borrow from you also drift to the right? Didn't have anything to say....

No-one can diagnose anything anymore, if the factory doesent have an explanation for it then they throw their hands up.

Luxury cars my ***, we pay 30K for a p.o.s. that can't even stay in a straight line! If I didn't like the way it looked & the fact that it's a Euro there's no way in hell I'd drive an overpriced Benz!

Cars aint what they used to be & people keep getting dumber & breeding dumber people.

aecasasus

Take it back to the dealer. It's not normal for a car to pull to either side. The car needs to run freely to the front without drifting either way. You might have an alignment/suspension problem, brake problem or tire problem.

Have them make it right. Your car is brand new!!!

Good Luck!!!

mleskovar

Once you damage your car (hit pothole) or change a part to non standard (lowering car) the warranty is void to the affected parts if they can prove the non MB part caused the problem. I would argue that hitting the pot hole had nothing to do with needing camber bolts. Unless you bent something your alignment should be under warranty if it needs camber bolts. Incidentally, changing my camber bolts solved the drifting problem but caused another problem....uneven tire wear due to positive camber. It's very slight but noticeable. I think it's worth the trade off though.

bnzct

All cars (including mine) drift to the right because the roads are not flat (all of them) and rain water drains to the right (And the storm drains are at your right).

On (very) few roads (with divided lanes), where you can see the rain drains on the left, my car would pull to the left.

So my advice is to find a road where you see the storm drains on your left. If your car keeps pulling to the right, then you have a problem.

mctwin2kman

Never buy a car with low profile tires if you do not want to experience some slight pull here or there due to imperfections in the road. There is no such thing as a flat level road in the USA! Sorry but they all crown somewhat. Some more than others. If you want pull go drive a Vette or Viper with those big wide low profile tires on it. I notice more and more of these threads since the SS went to a staggered setup. The staggered setups make the tramiling and pulling even worse.

On a side note, how much of a pull is it anyway, are we talking making you have to put undue pressure on the steering wheel to hold the car straight? Are we talking a slow drift when you are going straight and let go of the wheel? If you can drive straight with a finger tip on the wheel and stop the pull then there is most likely nothing wrong. If you have to have a tight grip on the wheel then I feel for you and something is indeed wrong.

coin

$150 is definitely overprice !!
I was quoted $30 for a set of 2 chamber bolts ..

patrick_y

I might be repeating what someone has said already but there are some factors to why you might be drifting to the right.

The roads are made so that the middle of the road is higher so the right side is lower for water draining.

Secondly, the driving position of the C230K SS, I own one myself and sometimes I'm not exactly centered on the seat, I'm closer to the middle of the car. I'm a skinny guy (125 pounds) so that's probably why I have so much wiggle room on the seat.

Thus, check your roads and then check your driving position. Then go back to the dealership if you have any problems. We also have terrible road conditions here.

Good luck.

rome191

I have the same problem with my 2005 E320. Took it to the dealer 3 times. Purchased caster adjustment kit, had alignment done - nothing helped. Dealer blames it all on Dallas "road crowning". Most of Dallas roads are really angled quite noticeably to the right for draining purposes. But interesting enough, most other cars don't experience this problem. I was also offered to adjust the alignment to “out of specs” settings to compensate the crowning, but that would make tires wear unevenly and null the warranty on them.
I don't know if my tires have anything to do with it. Thread is pretty low, so I will have to replace them within a few months. I didn't notice this problem when tires were better, or at least it wasn’t as bad. So it could be a tire pull after all. I rotated the tires, but it helped only slightly. I will post an update after I replace tires with the new ones.
By the way, 2007 C230 that I got as a loaner was affected much less, than E320. And 2008 C300 doesn’t seem to have this problem at all. Its suspension is much sturdier, than its predecessor’s and it doesn’t drift to the right at all despite road crowning.