jstaneff

Bright sunlight, temps in the mid-upper 80s.
Drive into shade.
Look at instrument panels.
See the center dial all lit up with trip display.
No see other dials, too dark.

Had to think about this a bit. The shade wasn't sufficient to turn on the lights (set on Automatic), so the dash stayed "normal". The only thing visible on the dash was what was lit up.

Could certainly be an issue with eyes needing more time to adjust, but for a second there I thought my lights had burned out!

451/443=EW

I dont think its a flaw, the car is gona have some limitations to how sensitive the auto light sensor can be. I think you will find this problem in any car. But it might not be a bad idea to let MB know so they may add this to feature cars.
After all MB is always looking to make the cars better.

chilledbenz

At least the speedo is still visible in all lights, try driving a new Honda Civic, the speedo is digital and disappears in the sunlight.

As for a design flaw...how about the horn button placement..or lack there of. Had someone pull out in front of me just the other day and I couldn't find the dang horn. They leave two very small spots on each side that in the event of an actual emergency in which you would need to use them you can't ha ha.

webada

HA! my thoughts exactly, i have road rage, can't help it driving around in nyc with those nasty yellow cabs. on my bimmer, i can just slam the center, its almost like stress/anger relief... i remember on my old legend, the horns were framed buttons on either side... boy, those are hard to find....

jstaneff

Hah! I can't seem to stop hitting the dang horn. Turns out that on the sport model, the single spoke below the airbag extends too far onto the wheel. Light pressure here sounds the horn.

Typically when backing up, or making a sharp low-speed turn, the heel of my hand hits this spoke and the horn sounds!