Nuvolari

No clear shots of the finished car but here is a short video of the W204 under development testing:

http://carscoop.blogspot.com/2006/12...-official.html

AndrewAZ

Does anyone have a definite date on the new C class? My dealer is saying possibly in February. I have read other places that it wont come till next october... I am thinking about leasing a current C230 for 27month and dont mind driving the old body style for a year but I dont want to get a C230 then have it change in 2 months. Anyways I have until the 31st to decide on either the C230, G35, or A4.

Buellwinkle

Trust me, I've owned several new MBs, never buy a new model from MB the first year or two. They are horrible. I bought one of the first shipment of W201, they did a lemon law buyback, gave me a new one, that one needed a tranny, horn, radio in the first 2 weeks. I bought a W203 coupe the first month it came out, 17 times in the shop the first year. The current E was horrible the first year or two, lots of problems. Get a 2007 and drive the heck out of it for 27 months and then get a nice deal on a 2009 or 2010 and you'll be much happier, yet less trendier.

AndrewAZ

I guess you are right. Thats good advice. I remember the early E's and especially the MLs that never seemed to improve over the years.

Pashap5

I agree with buell, I had the same experience..with my Coupe and my W202..have to wait a few years for the model to prove itself..

mkaresh

With enough cars signed up, I'll have initial reliability results on the new car 4-6 months after it goes on sale. Bit of an "if" with Mercedes, as I'm not collecting data on any Mercedes models yet.

My suspicion is that people who care about reliability info don't buy Mercedes. Audi owners aren't much different. People on an Audi forum even told me, "If you care about reliability, don't buy an Audi."

BMW owners are more interested. There are already 44 2006 3-Series in the panel. Most I have for any C-Class are 17, for the 2005.

GDawgC220

Every car maker has some bad ones that come off the assembly line, can't let some people on an enthusiast forum change your mind. I'd recommend Audi, mine has been great for the 2 years and 54k miles I've had it so far. The current A4 body will expire probably late '07 early '08 as the B8 chassis comes out but the current body has proven itself.

white_w203

they just changed the look on the g35. the front end looks like a cls. i dont really like the new look for audi....you minus well get a volkswagen for cheaper.

GDawgC220

difference between a VW and Audi are much different now than in the past...Audi is worlds better than VWs now. But I guess that'll always be up for debate...

MB-JIM

The W204's should be the most relieble cars ever for Mercedes right out of the block. Motor Trend said:

"Mercedes recognizes that its image as a builder of trustworthy and long-lived velicles has taken a knock, so the new car has done more test mileage than any Mercedes model before it, according to the automaker. Some 280 prototypes covered a total of 140 million test miles worldwide."

I would have no hesitancy to buy a W204 as soon as they are availabe. My 2006 C350 is the most reliable car I have ever owned.

mkaresh

That averages out to 500,000 miles per prototype. Let's say they averaged 50 MPH, which is a stretch. This would be 10,000 hours per car. You'd have to drive the car around the clock for over a year to rack up that many miles. Simply impossible, even for a single car.

And they supposedly did this with 280 cars? For a total of at least 2.8 million hours? No way.

Aside from the time, the cost would be astronomical. It costs at least $100 per hour to support a German engineer. So we'd be talking $280 million just to pay people to conduct durability testing.

That number must be off by at least a factor of ten.

No fault on your part. It is in Motor Trend here:

http://www.motortrend.com/features/a...s_benz_c_class

Sorry, but this is

Author is Paul Horrell. Clearly quality control isn't his strength, even when discussing quality.

Your car is near the end of the current generation. I hope it's reliable. One thing I've noticed even with unreliable models, though, is that many of their owners can have zero problems. The average problem rate is that low these days.

GPI

I agree with you mb-jim. I'm really waiting for it to be released.

METC240

I must admit my C240 has done nothing wrong. I am coming from an 01 GTI VR6 that in the first 4 months saw more time in the shop than my wifes expedition.
Almost had it declared a lemon until the dealer found the issue to be related to a bad wires leading to ECU... from then on it was a great ride.

Point is every manufacture goes through this with any changes in a popular line up. Look at BMW and the redesign of the 740... nothing but electrical issue with the center console. took one year to fix and educate how to use a "joystick / Mouse"

If it was not for the third kid coming I would jump into a 204 but instead am looking at 211.... no if I can Just get my wife to agree

mkaresh

I use a trick or two to make three kids in the back of a compact very doable. In fact, I do it nearly every day.

One thing that's far from obvious on forums like this one is that even for relatively unreliable models most owners have few or even no problems. The average is so low these days that it doesn't take much to be "much worse than average." With any car you're odds of having no problems at all are much higher than people think.

That's why I'm focusing on absolute rather than relative reliability stats in my own research. That way, people might see that even if the car they want isn't the most reliable we're just talking about an extra trip or two to the shop the whole time they'll own it.

pmb600

There are some new spyshots of the front end of the 204 C-Class and several with the headlights revealed! Check out this website:
http://jesmb.de/indexie.htm

Click on W204 under the news section.

I have to say I think I like the front end much better than I originally thought I would.

And so it begins...I'm sure by the official reveal date I will be completely in love with the car...

Pashap5

in one of the pics of the rear it looks like that it is going to finally have LED turn signals and back up lamps...not too sure...but if you enlarge the pic you will know what i mean..

yeuchau

i agree
don't get the first year car
even though all the issues will be covered, but you just don't want to bring the car to dealer all the time

pmb600

Yes thats what I thought too. But I think I read somewhere that only the "avantguard" will be getting LEDs, also known as the sport sedan in the US. Like with the 2007 E-Class, sport package models get LEDs and non-sport get regular lights.

I also saw a short thing in Automobile mag yesterday about the C-Class it said it will get Keyless Go, Panorama roof, among tech options.

maguzma

This month's car and driver magazine has the latest picture of the new W204. It caption states that the new c-class will be in showrooms floors this summer.

NYR99

Headlights look fantastic. I'm all but sold.

15 days and counting....

Translated text from jesmb:

NYR99

More pics....less camo, but still covered up. Last pic is the best one:

http://www.autoblog.nl/images/wp/Mer...ts%2012-06.jpg

http://www.autoblog.nl/images/wp/Mer...%20%286%29.jpg

http://www.autoblog.nl/images/wp/Mer...%20%285%29.jpg

http://www.autoblog.nl/images/wp/Mer...%20%281%29.jpg

Also, pulled this from CarSpyShots:

Mr. Vanos

Took these this morning on the N 605 Fwy in SoCal with my handy Blackjack phone. I believe it's the new W204 C-Class. They certainly don't like you taking pics of them...he tried to get away but eventually gave in. Couldn't get a clear front shot. Enjoy...

washoor

Still don't like it, why they are making it bigger?

rodngun762

Very cool! (the pics that is, still not sure on the design )

Thanks for posting.

Saprissa

good spy work Mr. V

should come work with me !!