radiance

Hi everyone,

I've been lurking around this forum and at benzworld.org for a while now but not have made any postings. I have placed my order on a calcite white c300 4matic in Vancouver, Canada. There were two questions I have but did not get a direct answer while looking through the forum.

The first question is that I see many users post about the C mode and S mode button that changes the way the transmission shifts its gears (s = start in first gear, c = start with 2nd gear). When I went test drive the car, I did not find the button?! Am I just blind or what, or the Canadian version doesn't have it?

Second question was that IMO the 17' wheels that comes with the c300 4matic sports version doesn't look very appealing to me. I have asked the dealer to swap to the 18' AMG if possible, but the sales told me it wasn't an option for the c300 4matic, because something about the 4matic system not able to handle it or something, which I didn't quite understand.

Overall, I can't wait for my C300 4matic to come during mid December. The long wait is killing me.

Cheers,

Radiance.

PoaMike

C and S is right next to the shifter? but on the 4matic... No idea sry.

AsianML

1) I believe Canadian versions have the C/S button. Maybe, maybe not. I grabbed this picture off of an eBayMotors ad for a C300 Sport, and you can see the C/S button beneath the column of PRND.



2) The 18" wheels may be staggered, which is why the salesperson said it won't work with the 4Matic system.

peabers

The Canadian models indeed have the C/S button next to the gear selector, as AsianML has shown. And as the OP said, C starts the car in 2nd gear, selects lower shift points, and users a taller gearing for the reverse (yes there are two reverse gears, how cool is that?!).


Staggered wheels is not a problem for the 4Matic. I believe there is a LOT of misinformation about this around the dealerships. I am driving my '08 C350W4M and it came with P225/45R17 front and P245/40R17 rear tyres. It is the same size/staggering for the C300W4M WITH the Sport Package.

AsianML

Ah, looks like the 4Matic system was designed for the staggered setup. Still looks like a dead "NO" on the older 4Matic systems though like I have.

peabers

I think the W204's have the new gen of the 4Matic.

kimyoung_k

I think the wheels (rim) for 4Matic sports are the same between front and rear. it just rear has wider tire on it.

I believe Non 4Matic sports has actually wider rear wheel than front wheel

I maybe wrong though

chilledbenz

+1 on this.

I for one was misinformed as well. If you get your info from the brochure, internet, or even a salesman, you end up getting three different answers. So I made a point of checking the inventory while at the dealership this past week and all the 4matic C300 Sports had the staggered width wheels. Why the 18" AMG wheel option for $1000 isn't offered from the factory on the 300's is still a mystery.

radiance

yah, that was my main concern, why wasn't it offered from the factory. But looks like it should be OK to install the 18' setup?

anyone on the forum with a c300 4matic put any 18' on their car?

radiance

inFiniTE LooP

what size 18's ? you may have to get your speedo re-calibrated if they are much bigger than the stock 17's

radiance

I'm just thinking to stay with the stock 18' AMG rims. So I assume i don't need to recalibrate the speedo and such.

peabers

If the size of the overall diameter of wheel is similar, then you do not need to recalibrate the speedometer.

So you should go with P225/40R18 front (on 18x8) and P255/35R18 rear (on 18x9)... or P235/35R19 front (19x8) and P255/30R19 rear (19x9).

chilledbenz

I was told by my service tech that I could put any size wheel that would fit on my ML and the computer would recalibrate itself. Anyone know if this is true? I would hope he knew what he was talking about lol.

radiance

hm...I never heard of this. ==a
How would the computer recognize this if your just mounting the wheels on

chilledbenz

I'm not %100 sure on that either. In another thread it was discussed that there are sensors in the brake system that monitor the rotations of the wheels. For cars that don't have the full tire pressure monitoring systems, they are used to tell if one tire is under inflated or flat. The flat or under inflated tire would be traveling at a different speed than other tires. Could be that if all the tires are moving at a faster speed than what the computer setting says it should, it compensates for it.

At the time I was looking into putting winter tires on that were larger than the stocks and the service guy said no problem the computer would adjust. Be nice to know if anyone else knows anything about this.

430752

regarding the staggered wheels, I can only say caution. That is, it may work. And I cannot argue that the stock 4matic wheels may already be staggered, if they are. I have a c300 4 matic, so will need to see for myself. But thought (in my limited knowledge) that the problem with staggered wheels on awd cars is that staggered wheels cause a strain or burden on the awd gearing that allows one wheel to spin more or less than others, but it must assume all are the same size. I thought it was harmful since it burn out any differential or whatever it is that allows awd. Again, may work, but I for one am cautious.

Regarding the tire pressure monitoring I don't think that allows any computer to monitor tire size. Again, I could be wrong, but I think TPS has a sensor inside the tire to literally monitor pressure, not tire size due to it being uninflated or flat. So I doubt that will allow the computer to recalibrate.

Regarding the recalibration, I strongly suspect that it doesn't recalibrate at all and that minor tire size variations will merely throw off any speedo reading by such an inconsequential amount (e.g, 1-3%) that it won't matter. I've never heard of an automatic tire size recalibrator since that would be rubber dependant, not even wheel dependant since you can mount different size rubber on the same wheel. Again, you mileage may vary, but I doubt it exists.

chilledbenz

I was refering to cars that don't have the new tire pressure montoring systems.

http://www.mercedes-benz.ca/index.cfm?id=4366

(Link refers to 4matic system)

peabers

I believe a 2% variation in overall diameter is considered acceptable by SAE.