Is there any difference in build quality between Germany and South Africa plants? I am trying to make a change to my order and they are telling me that I can only get a SA build, unless I want to wait until october for a germany build...?

He also said 90% of the 2009 c class will be built in SA.

are you sure that's the case ?
I heard that Mercedes C300 and 350 are all from Germany

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought I heard the Germany plant is much better run and has higher quality control than the SA plant. Think I recall something being said about the Germany plant winning some awards. Heck even my dealership made it a special point like I won an award or something when they told me my car was going to be made in the German plant.

I have an SA build. They say there's not much of a difference, but I for sure would've liked to have had a German build. A little more reassuring, perhaps? And yes, the German plant (one of them, of the few M-B plants) won a manufacturing excellence award last year. Or something like that. But I'm not sure if the C-classes are manufactured at that location.

The 2009 plan for builds may be different, but for 2008 all C300 4matic cars and all C350's were built in the Bremen Germany plant and all rear drive C300's were built in the South London Africa plant. I thought there would be a difference in build quality between the two but for the record my car came from the Bremen plant and I experienced what I would consider a major problem with build quality, so it doesn't matter which plant you get it from, theres always a chance of something going wrong. So you can't really say that one plant is better than another unless you have some figures of how many problematic cars came from each plant and I doubt Benz is going to let us know ha ha.

Mine wasn't built in Africa.....2008

Neither was mine

No. Half are from South Africa, half are built in Germany. But they use the same materials and technology so theirs no real difference anyways.

Place I work for has a manufacturing plant. Trust me, just cause the parts are the same doesn't mean things are put together the same. Different people, cleanliness, contaminants.

Thats true. I also didn't want to make the guys who bought an SA car feel bad.

Mine either.

Guess I should have been a bit more specific. Early build rear drive C300's or cars built before December of 2007 could have been built at either plant. Sometime around the first of the year the production of all C300 rear wheel drive cars was to switch to South Africa. Or at least that was the plans they announced in press releases, all things are subject to change and could be different for the 2009 model year. But the original poster's question was on build quality and not just differences between the two plants. I wanted a Bremen build myself thinking it would be a better build but as it turns out my Bremen built car experienced what I consider a major build problem. But problems can happen at any plant or with any car manufacturer for that matter.

Personally I was lucky enough to tour the plant in South Africa and it's world-class, please don't interpret it being "Africa" the quality would not be as good as "Germany". The standards are the same - they are both wholly owned and operated by Mercedes-Benz.

BMW has a major plant in South Africa (I visited that one as well) and they have a wonderful track record. I believe on the tour, the German BMW representative said that on the 3-Series they have a better kind of success (not sure of the term) than Germany.

Just wanted to clear the air...


Tee_Tz.

Mine was built in April-May 2008...in Germany. If they were gonna switch, maybe got delayed. Either way mine was the last order of 08s being made.

can someone post how to figure out if your car was built in Germany vs Africa... I assume it involves looking up a serial number or something?

Thanks in advance...

it was on the sticker as well as the contract. probably somewhere on that info sheet inside the door as well.

can you be more specific? I have my contract in my briefcase, where am I looking? There doesn't seem to be a "Built-in-so-and-so" line anywhere...

Never mind, did a search and figured it out.

My VIN starts with a W so, according to Untertürkheim it's a Germany build. WOOHOO what a relief.

its acutally the 11th letter i think that states where the car was built...mine is J and thats for SA...i cant remeber which letter is for bremen but its on this site somewhere if you search

Actually I'm pretty sure its the first letter. (The W for germany) As for american built cars they begin with a number 1 or 2 I believe and japanese cars start with a J.

this is from a different post..........the 11th digit..

A-E Sindelfingen
F-H Bremen
J Rastatt
X Graz
T Karmann
M Woking, England (SLR)


correction on my earlier post...R is SA

i could be totally wrong...

How to read a VIN

1st character- Identifies the country in which the vehicle was manufactured.
For example: U.S.A.(1or 4), Canada(2), Mexico(3), Japan(J), Korea(K), England(S), Germany(W), Italy(Z)

2nd character- Identifies the manufacturer. For example; Audi(A),
BMW(B), Buick(4), Cadillac(6), Chevrolet(1), Chrysler(C), Dodge(B),
Ford(F), GM Canada(7), General Motors(G), Honda(H), Jaquar(A), Lincoln(L), Mercedes Benz(D), Mercury(M), Nissan(N), Oldsmobile(3), Pontiac(2or5), Plymouth(P), Saturn(8), Toyota(T), VW(V), Volvo(V).

3rd character- Identifies vehicle type or manufacturing division.

4th to 8th characters- VDS - Vehicle Descriptor Section. These 5 characters occupy positions 4 through 8 of the VIN and may be used by the manufacturer to identify attributes of the vehicle. Identifies vehicle features such as body style, engine type, model, series, etc.

9th Character - The check digit "character or digit 9" in the sequence of a vehicle identification number (VIN) built beginning with model year 1981 (when the 17 character digit format was established) can best be described as identifying the VIN accuracy.

A check digit shall be part of each vin (since 1981) and shall appear in position
nine (9) of the VIN on the vehicle and on any transfer documents containing
the vin prepared by the manufacturer to be given to the first owner for purposes
other than resale. Thus, the vins of any two vehicles manufactured within a 30
year period shall not be identical. The check digit means a single number or letter
"x" used to verify the accuracy of the transcription of the vehicle identification
number.

After all other characters in the VIN have been determined by the manufacturer
the check digit is calculated by carrying out a mathematical computation
specified. This is based on vin position, sample vin, assigned value code,
weight factor and multiply assigned value times weight factors. The values are added and the total is divided by 11. The remainder is the check digit number.
The correct numeric remainder - zero through nine (0-9) will appear.
However, if the remainder is 10 the letter "X" is used to designate the check
digit value/number.


10th character- Identifies the model year. For example: 1988(J), 1989(K), 1990(L), 1991(M), 1992(N), 1993(P), 1994(R), 1995(S), 1996(T),
1997(V), 1998(W), 1999(X), 2000(Y)------2001(1), 2002(2), 2003(3)

11th character- Identifies the assembly plant for the vehicle.

12th to 17th characters- VIS - Vehicle Identifier Section. The last 8 characters of the VIN are used for the identification a of specific vehicle. The last four characters shall always be numeric. Identifies the sequence of the vehicle for production as it rolled off the manufacturers assembly line.

Yea. I knew it. The first character tells you where it was made.

Nope, the 11th ...

Consider it this way: the first character indicates the nation of origin of the manufacturer ... Mercedes is Germany, eh?

Also, check your door plate!