wireless200

Anyone got a build date on their 2012 C-Class?

Are they built in South Africa?

newyorktoLA

Mine was built in July...scheduled to arrive on Sept. 2nd and will be available for sale on Oct. 15th. My car was scheduled to be built in SA, but that means shipping from Africa would delay the car by another month. Dealer put in code 07P in order and it was labeled "Germany." So, the car was built in Germany because they input code 07P.

daniel1113

I have a build date of September 3 with an October 1 delivery for my C350.

Meltdown1029@gm

My C300 4MATIC is built in Germany and will be in Baltimore's port on 8/22. It will be ready for pick up at end of this month.

Dgershon

I have a build date of July with an September 1 delivery for my C350.

Jim K

I understand the 2012 C350 is being built in SA. At least for now. Mine should be in California in late September, early October. Goes SA to Germany to Baltimore thru Panama Canal to M-B Long Beach delivery center, then by truck to SF Bay Area. Meanwhile driving 2008 C350 which has been the proverbial silver bullet for three+ years. Great car.

wireless200

Did you ask about he 07P option? I figure a car built in the homeland would have less chance of a defect.

Dgershon

I got the VIN number of my 2012 C350 and it is built in Germany. I never herd of the C class being built in South Africa. I am in Canada. The VIN number starts with WDDGF8JB0C.

ucfbeta92

Mine's built in South Africa. I'd always thought each geographical region only catered to a specific continent / zone but I guess that's not necessarily the case.

According to Wikipedia, the W204 is assembled at these locations:

Pune, Maharashtra, India
Santiago Tianguistenco, Mexico
Toluca, Mexico
6th of October City, Egypt
Bogor, Indonesia
Bremen, Germany
East London, South Africa
Juiz de Fora, Brazil
Sindelfingen, Germany
Thonburi, Thailand
Pekan, Malaysia

nlpamg

C250 Coupe, build date 9/5, delivery in Germany on 9/15.

dcjwlee

I am jealous of this thread...

jctevere

Lol, I feel you dcj... GenBenz has informed me that the rest of the 2012 refreshes should be at dealer lots in the U.S. by Sept. (C-class sedan & coupe, ML).

I think that the c-class (at least for U.S. deliveries) is being moved in entirety to the United States for the 2014 model year update. Here is an excerpt from a news article in late July about them getting approved for $100 million in tax incentives to bring the entire c-class operations to Alabama:

"The German automaker is spending $290 million to outfit its Tuscaloosa County factory to build the sedan [c-class], which will be launched in 2014. Work started on July 1, and the project is expected to create 1,000 jobs.
That investment is part of an overall investment of about $2 billion that Mercedes is currently spending to upgrade and expand the facility, including the C-Class work and other projects."

I believe that this is the current site where the M-Class, the R-Class, and the GL-Class are built.

I guess say goodbye to German built c-class (at least if you live in the United States). Personally, I think this is a great thing, will certainly lower transportation costs, will probably lower labor costs too with the way the economy has been going here lately (you can find skilled labor down south for about $12/hour...) and at least it gives some americans more jobs!

Jim K

M-B has sold 1 million + c class model 204 around the world. They are largely built by robots regardless of factory location. I've made inquiries of key people with no axe to grind and the quality is the same regardless of factory location.

nigellin

I ordered a 2012 C350 and asked for 07P option. I orded it on Sep 02. My sales originally told me it should be no later than the end of Nov, 2011 for delivery. But yesterday he told me that it should be the first week of Feb, 2012. Is this right? Will it really take this long?
I noticed that some of you have the built date and delivery date. May I ask how you get that information?
I bought a C300 last year, and it was built in South Africa. There are many problems with it so I had MBUSA to buy back the car. I was very unlucky.

wireless200

I ordered mine about a month ago and the salesperson told me it was slated to be built the first "decade" or first 10 days of October with first-half November delivery.

It was initially ordered and was supposed to come from S. Africa but, thanks to someone in this forum letting me know about the 07P option I ask to change it and they did and said it was coming from Germany now. I believe it will be a chance of being put together better by Germans. I lived in Germany for almost 3 years and I know how the Germans do things. The repair a crack in the sidewalk perfectly. I lived there late 80s so things may have loosened up a bit.

I just don't picture the same kind of work quality in other places. My friend visited S. Africa several times. In the morning when they need laborers they pull up to the labor pool (group of people on the street) in a pickup and start driving away. The last two left still running get the job for the day and jump on the truck.

Manual labor is still called on when assembling the car. In my mind it could make a lot of difference, if not during warranty, then five or ten years down the road.

I hope they're wrong about your February delivery. That's a rough wait man. My wife's VW Passat is barely hanging on so I hope nothing's happened that will change our delivery date.

Kaewen

I got mine last week, and its from Germany.
It has a large "Made in Germany" printed on the shipping mark that is stuck on the window with the Vin number and other details. (usually removed before pre-delivery inspection)

Jim K

Kaewen, where are you located and what model of the 2012 C Class did you get? C250?

Jim K

First, our contributor from North Carolina may have inadvertently given the wrong impression about day laborers. I live in one of the most affluent parts of the U.S. and day laborers here stand at certain locations to do construction, gardening, roofing, etc. The day laborers in South Africa are NOT plant workers for Mercedes-Benz. The East London, South Africa plant has built over 100,000 C Class sedans. Sorry, Wireless200 about your bad C300 experience. Luck is the right word. I'm sure they make an occasional lemon there, just as they do in Sindelfingen, Bremen, or China. Check the forums on this site and you'll see all kinds of problems with all models, regardless of where the car is built. I understand the C250s coming to the U.S. are mostly being built in Germany. The C350s coming to the U.S. are mostly being built in South Africa --- for now. Mercedes changes this as it sees fit -- demand and supply, as always. These cars are built by amazingly complicated robots with humans mostly at the very end of the assembly line. Lasers are checking all the time re: body thickness, gaps, etc. Bottom line, after M-B's quality problems in 1999-2002 the company would be insane to mess with the quality of its biggest seller (over 1 million C class produced). In any event, in two years or so the C class for the U.S. will be built in Alabama. Here is a July, 2011 article re: J.D. Power's assessment of factory performance that may be interesting:

J.D. Power Gold Plant Quality Award
Mercedes-Benz wins award for best passenger car production plants in Europe and AfricaStuttgart/Bremen/Germay/East London/South Africa, July 12, 2011
•J.D. Power Gold Plant Quality Award for Mercedes-Benz plants in Bremen and East London, South Africa
•GLK and E-Class Coupé and Cabriolet from Bremen voted best vehicles in their respective segments
The Mercedes-Benz plants in Bremen and East London, South Africa, have been voted the best passenger car production plants in Europe and Africa by renowned market research institute J.D. Power and Associates.
Both plants received a Gold Award in the regional category for Europe/Africa as part of the latest J.D. Power IQS ("Initial Quality Study") quality study, which surveyed US customers about delivery quality for 2011 model year vehicles after 90 days of ownership.
Products from the Mercedes-Benz plant in Bremen, in the form of the GLK and the E-Class Coupé and Cabriolet, also confirmed their leading position in their respective segments.
The plant in East London was already honoured with the J.D. Power Platinum Award for the world's best plant last year, in addition to picking up a Gold Award back in 2009 too.
About the Mercedes-Benz plant in Bremen
Since the start of Mercedes-Benz passenger car production in 1978 to the present day, almost 6 million vehicles have already rolled off the production line in Bremen. The plant's 12,400 employees currently produce eight models: the C-Class Saloon, Estate and – since June of this year – Coupé, the E-Class Coupé and Cabriolet, and the SLK, SL and GLK. In 2010 more than 257,000 vehicles were produced. At the end of March 2011, the works management and works council decided to create 350 new permanent jobs this year. The site will also play an important role in the global Mercedes-Benz production network in the future too: with the next generation of the C-Class, the plant is scheduled to become the centre of excellence for this high-volume model series.
About the Mercedes-Benz plant in East London, South Africa
Mercedes-Benz has had a presence in South Africa since 1954, and in 1984 acquired the majority holding in the East London plant. The current C-Class is already the third vehicle generation to be produced on the Eastern Cape of South Africa. The plant has exported saloons to right-hand-drive markets since the year 2000, and since the start of production of the new C-Class in 2007 has also produced left-hand-drive vehicles for export to the USA. In 2010 the plant's staff of around 2300 employees produced more than 52,000 vehicles. From 2014, the East London plant – as one of the four sites in the world besides the C-Class centre of excellence in Bremen, the US plant in Tuscaloosa/Alabama and the Chinese production site of Beijing Benz Automotive Co., Ltd. (BBAC) – will also produce the successor generation to the current C-Class.

wireless200

I checked mine ordered Aug 15th and scheduled to be delivered first of November. They say it is still on schedule.

I asked about your situation and they said you probably just missed the window where it would have been completed just before the factory shutdown in December but instead slipped passed the shutdown into next year. Actually the first thing she said was you should have ordered it from them.

nigellin

Is yours made in German? Did you put 07P option? You are lucky if you did. My sales told me the same thing when I first met him and signed the deal. He said no later than the end of Nov, but now he said because I want it from German that's why I have to wait until next Feb.

wireless200

Yes, mine is 07P option for Germany.

JaCe88

That may be correct, but it doesn't mean they are all exported for international markets. I'm pretty sure Thailand and Malaysian assembly lines are for local consumption (i.e. CKD).

ps. My 2011 Australian delivered C250 CDI (i.e. the "MY2012" design in the US) is made in Sindelfingen, Germany (as it has an "A").

wireless200

Dealer sent me the build sheet today. It was built this week in Germany. Waiting for it to get here.

RLE

Your idea that MB picks up casual day laborers to work in their plant, or ANY plant is absolute nonsense. I wonder if you have ever visited any assembly plant for anything.

Nobody works like that because every job takes training and plenty of it.

wireless200

Who knows, they might build the cars better over there. Surely the workers must thank their lucky stars they work for MB and work very hard to keep their jobs. Somehow I don't think labor security is quite the same over there.