When I am slowing down to a red light and once I come to a full stop I get this vibration from the engine like a strain on the engine. It only happens once I have come to a full stop, and almost feels like a rough idle, but when I throw the car in neutral it goes away. Its like a strain on the engine when the car is in drive but not moving, is this normal anyone else experience this?

The same thing will happen if I'm in park and I put the car in drive but keep my foot on the brake, I would feel the vibration.

Also, if I am in park on pavement, and I turn the steering wheel I get a engine vibration, shake or what feels like strain on the engine.

Its almost like I have a weak engine What could be the solution? a new fuel filter air filter


Update April 2018: The solution for my 2008 C300 4matic was engine mounts and transmission mount. Cost about $900 at my independent mechanic - for me well worth the night and day difference. Good luck.

 

check engine oil level

 

Given your "drive" symptoms, I would check the tranny, maybe the mounts or something is causing the vibrations.

 

why are you putting your car into neutral at every stop light? Its an auto your supposed to simply put your foot on the brake. Yes your RPM will drop a bit when you do that as the car either grabs or releases engagement to the engine.

Also when you refer to steering, the PS pump is being used and also will cause momentary draw on the car, much like the a/c ect...its pretty standard, in fact every car I've known may surge or lower in rpm at low speed steering or when coming to a light.

If you really feel there is an issue, your best to get it into a shop so some one can look at it. if anything maybe the transfluids low

 

What mileage? Does the engine ever stumble when you pull away. It could be anything from engine & rear transmission mountings to dirty MAF or Throttle Body to O2 sensors starting to cycle too slowly. Is the car storing any codes?

 

The only reason I put the car in neutral is when I'm testing to see if the vibration will stop. I will check the oil level just for the hell of it, but I am pretty on top of it.

The car now has 51,000 on it, I took it in when it was under 50,000 and after my complaint the dealer kind of put words in my mouth saying the "Idle is dipping" and I said ya that makes sense. They found nothing after checking codes and test driving.

The one thing I noticed is that it only happens when the car is warm, because the warm car at idle will go down to 500-600 rpms where a cold car at a stop will stay up to 700-900 and it seems there the engine is running fast enough to stop the vibration. If I am at the stop light with the warm engine vibrating and I keep my foot on the brake and tap the gas to get the rpms up a bit, the vibration goes away. In the end it almost feels like the car has a rough idle at 500-600, that only happens in drive.

As far as the power steering, same thing if the car is cold or the rpms are a little higher at idle, than its fine, but when the car is warm it happens. thats possibly why the dealer never found anything as they may of test driven the car when it was cold. So it could be normal, in fact I am a part time valet parker while in school, and one night I parked three C300s, two where fine with the steering, but one 09 was like mine with the shaky shudder that I felt through the wheel. I would agree that its normal but it just seems excessive.

I have to get the transmission fluid changed and will take it to a private shop, the guy really knows his stuff and we trust him, my dad has known him for years, he changed my dads S550 trans fluid for $300, while I am there I will try to get this stuff looked at. It really seems the rough idle and steering shudder are related.

Thanks for your responses, happy thanksgiving!

edit: and Glyn, no it never stumbles.

 

I have the same prob my car has only done 30,000 miles

 

The steering or the stopping problem?

 

The stopping prom I can some times feel the vibrations through the brake pedal had it looked it to many times but Merc could not locate the fault

 

Sounds as if the idle RPM is too low.

What could cause this? Auxilliary load ? eg faulyA/C

 

The car seems stable under enriched mixture open loop conditions. Once in closed loop it does not like any loading at idle. Too early for O2 sensors & no stumble. The ECU should maintain constant idle RPM under load from A/C or PS. I think dirty MAF or throttle body are likely or a TB actuator not behaving. Either the throttle is not opening sufficiently when load is applied or she is a little lean at idle. This is predicated on none of the accessories overloading anything due to an imminent failure. I would expect some sign of this at higher RPM.

Clean MAF & TB. If the car does a lot of short trips it might be plugs not getting into the self cleaning range often enough. I would expect a 300 & 301 to 306 codes if she had the odd misfire. They might be stored codes & insufficient to trigger a CEL. A plug change might help.

 

Its amazing how much you know.

Here is a video I put together of some of the two things I described, overall its a video of me driving around so look in the description of the video to be able to click on the specific time points where I specify vibration occurs, you can clearly hear the steering vibration at the beginning of the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ct4ameEo2Yw

After my test drive today and paying closer attention I realized that the vibration when stopping doesn't really last, it happens for maybe two seconds and from then on the car just idles a little rough, but the heavy vibration isn't there.

Thank you for being able to come up with ideas so quickly they will be very helpful in finding this problem. One thing though, would you know if any of the things you suggested would bring up codes, not just ones that trigger the CEL, any codes? The reason I ask is because the dealer checked the codes and found nothing. Any of the ideas that put out codes such as the spark plug misfire could probably be eliminated.

One other thing-
I hate to admit but for the first month or two of having the car I was putting regular (87 octane) in the car, now I use 93 after a fuel treatment. Could this be a cause in anyway? The car has been running off 93 for a couple months now and the problem still persists.

 

I hear a sympathetic buzz on the video as though the vibration is exciting a piece of plastic somewhere. Does your steering make a noise at full lock on either side? Can you feel this vibration through any of the controls?

Anyway - some further suggestions. Ensure PS fluid is up to the correct level. These steerings are very level sensitive & if they aerate the fluid they then get noisy as the air passes through the pressure relief valves. PS reservoir is under the RHS air intake pipe when standing in front of the car. Pull the pipe off to access.

You might have a vacuum leak. Check all vacuum pipes & breathers.

Also check that the air cleaner housing is pushed down properly & sealing over the MAF inlet. Pull it out of it's clips & reseat it.

Good luck!

 

Did you ever resolve your vibration problem? I am going through the same thing with my car. I have a 2009 C230 4MATIC (Canadian Model) , with 37K. Since new, the vehicle has exhibited noticeable vibration in the steering wheel, seat, and cabin area when braked at a set of lights. The vibration disappears when the car is put into neutral. There is a wave of vibration pulsing across the seat and floor pans (almost as if the air conditioner were to be turned on).

Dealer recently replaced motor mounts, which seemed to 'soften' the vibration, but did not eliminate it. Car does not vibrate when driving. When I am braking and the idle drops to its lowest point 500rpm, the vibration is at its worst. Dealer has looked at this and no codes ever show up. I am wondering if the transmission mounts could be the problem? I am running out of ideas, and find this quite frustrating. Anyone on here with a similar vehicle/problem , who has actually figured out the problem? Help appreciated .

 

Pretty much my exact problem, when you brake to a halt do you get a pulse of vibration for about 2 seconds as the needle levels out at 500, then while your sitting at a stop it sort of vibrates less but still feels like a rough idle. When I turn the wheel at parking speeds or no speeds on pavement, I get lots of vibration as I turn the wheel, more or less at different positions.

No I haven't figured it out, but I am planning to take the car to my mechanic with some of Glyn's ideas, thanks again Glyn!

I really hope its not the mounts as that sounds very like a very costly repair, I'm hoping it's something small my mechanic can clean or replace in the engine.

Let me ask you
Have you ever put 87 octane in it or do your air filters need to be replaced? (just asking to see if we have common circumstances, I don't think it is a solution.)

 

I actually had my car in the shop yesterday, as the vehicle is still under full warranty. The motor mounts were changed under full warranty (did not cost me anything), but also did not resolve the idle vibration problem. Last night I spent 1/2 hour talking to one of the shop foremen at one of the local dealers. He said that they went over the car with a fine tooth comb and did not see any issues. He said that they had looked at the transmission mounts and these were fine. He asked me what type of gas I used in the car, I told him I used the high octane 93. He asked at which dealers I purchased the gas, I told him that I bought it where I bought groceries. He suggested that I try buying a better type of gas, as in North America the refinement process is not as good as in Europe. He told me to buy from Esso or Shell. I usually buy from Costco or Safeway. I am not convinced that this is the issue, but I will give it a try anyway. The car is always maintained according to the warranty requirement, and therefore all the filters have been changed in my fall service (1 month ago).

Anyone out there notice gas affecting their idle?

 

Bump..

I have the exact same symptoms as the OP. I come from the world of lifted land rovers so I'm pretty familiar with driveline vibration, but this one is odd.

OP did you ever get it resolved?

 

Nope. You have both the steering vibrations and the stopping vibrations? Guess it's time to just consider it part of my car's personality...

 

When stopped and turning the wheel lock to lock i get some normal type vibration/ noise when i get close to max turn angle.


The real problem of mine is less than 5% of the time when i am stopped, i get an abnormal strong vibration coming from the torque converter/ transmission. When I put the car in nuetral and unload the trans the vibration goes away. If I place the car back into drive the vibration continues. As soon as i start accelerating and moving the problem seems to go away.


There must be an issue with what gear the car may be stuck in or an issue with the torque converter and trying to apply excess power to the wheels even when stopped. I am hesitant to bring it to the dealer just to have them test drive it when there is no issue whatsoever.

BTW this is not an accessory issue as the problem persists when my a/c is shut off and the steering wheel is not in motion. Also, my vehicle is AWD.

 

are you sure its not 6%?

 

good one!

 

Mercedes mechanic looked at my car and found that the left front axel shaft had movement in the joint which was causing vibration when at a stop. He said this is a common problem with the 4-matics. The axel shaft/ drive shaft were replaced and the problem is now fixed.

 

Every post I've seen about this issue is from a 4-Matic owner. Nice to see a Mercedes mechanic that finally has a clue. I'll look into this. Appreciate you replying.
Curious why they replaced the driveshaft and axle. They aren't exactly related.

Was your repair under warranty? Any idea what the tab came to? If you wouldn't mind posting some details from the service invoice that would help us all out greatly.

 

Fortunately, the repairs were under warranty...unfortunately, I dont know how much they would cost out of pocket.

The "axel shaft" was replaced...

"drive shaft" also appeared in the invoice so i thought they were the same and i included that name.

it states repeatedly that the "axel shaft" was the issue and thats the part that was put in.

hope this helps

 

Maybe Glyn M Ruck can chime back in on what would make sense now we have an area to focus on. I'm a little baffled at what he replaced and the relation. The axle is doing nothing at idle.

I could see there possibly being load from the Transfer Case to the diff causing the vibration, but at idle the axle shaft to diff is doing nothing. Not doubting that was the fix, just trying to work out exactly what it was so I can do the same without throwing to much money away.