Sportstick

SRF: There is an additional potential benefit to continuing to hold their loaner while they have your car. I don't know the Ontario statutes on Lemon Law, but in many US states, once a car has been in the service department 4 times for the same issue or (here's the key) out of service for 30 days, the Lemon Law may be invoked. If Ontario law has this provision and you can hang on for 30 days, MB Canada's choices become significantly limited in how to deal with you. Even if the loaner goes back, (for example, if they threaten to report it stolen), if you don't accept your unrepaired car, the clock would keep ticking.

TorontoBenz

I am from Toronto and have bleeding seats. I told my salesman of the issue on Dec 19 and he assured me Mercedes would take care of it. I saw a service advisor on Jan 13 and he ordered seat covers for all seats and headrests with the exception of the passenger seat bottom. ETA Feb 3 as they are coming from Germany. He said my car was the first one he actually saw with this problem but he said he did receive an e-mail about it so was aware of the issue. I said I really wanted to know the name of the chemical compound which is bleeding out but he did not know. He said he would ask his service manager but I have not received a response yet. He assured me that the mechanics are competent and experienced in upholstering seats as they do this when there is a problem with airbags or heating elements in the seats.
Thank you StanNH for your ongoing updates on this issue. I am anxiously awaiting to hear and see the results of your seat replacements.

DerekACS

TorontoBenz: are you dealing with one of the eight MB corporate Toronto stores or an independent MB dealership ? The level of expertise is likely to higher with the former.

TorontoBenz

Yes I'm dealing with a corporate dealership and so far they have been great.
Thanks for the reassurance!

npa201

In NJ the lemon law process is 20 days and unable to repair which theoretically this would apply to. For a new car to be considered a lemon it must "the defect must substantially impair the use, value or safety of your vehicle, or be a “serious safety defect” which is likely to cause death or serious bodily injury if the vehicle is driven." In this case I would think that an inability to replace the seats as substantially impacting the value, no?

Anyway, do you guys think I should wait until the 20 days before I ask about a replacement or should I call sooner (it would be 10 days) so that we are closer to the purchase date so I don't have to enforce a lemon law clause (which then requires me to send them a letter citing lemon law and a court hearing)? Thoughts people? Perhaps I should be talking to a lawyer. Anyway, they are basically telling me that I will wait closer to 40 days plus and even when they replace the seat covers the rear seat bottoms won't be replaced as per StanNH comments.

SRF 27

Well it's nice to know I have company here in Toronto. I took the car in today to have it cleaned and was told that the service people don't work on Saturday and the sales person was going to clean it, with some spray that she thought was the right one. Huh???? I said no don't do it, if you don't know what it is....Also, she was the one that said that I was the only one that has this problem. So I took a look around the parking lot and of course they they were 4 cars bleeding.......I brought it to her attention.

SRF 27

I am also dealing with a corporate dealership. Yes, they have been good.
We will see how good they are when they put the covers in. And hopefully not scratch anything.

BTW, some dealerships have given nice dinner certificates to our friends south of the border, for their inconvenience. I haven't seen any dinners thrown my way?????

mihaelb

If you are willing to spend the money on a C63, why not just spend the extra $2k for the leather interior, and not be (potentially-)bothered by this MBTex/Artico problem in the first place?

KLF

Well here I am (from Philadelphia) to join your Mercedes 2015 C-300 Bleeding Seats Party.

My seats are bleeding. And really bad. I can't believe a $50k would do this.

My car is at my dealership right now, but I have not heard from anyone with regard to what exactly will be done, why, and what I can be assured of long term.

See what ya think from these photos from my car.





This is what it looks like when the substance dries.














This is what it looks like when its really cold out. The oil is essentially wet and disgusting.





Went oil. You don't want to sit on this as it leaves marks on your clothes.

npa201

StanNH? You get your car back yet? Any update?

Mark's M

Wow...KLF's seats out do Stan's IMO...and anyone else's on the forum for that matter. Curious to know KLF regarding your claim that the bleeding leaves marks on your clothes. How so? This, if correct, would be contrary to MB's info and would no doubt create even more problems.

StanNH

The dealer picks it up tomorrow morning, so no word yet.

That report of damage to clothing is odd .... nothing like this has ever been reported by either owners, dealers, or MB-USA before. I've sat on the seats when they looked oily, and when they were covered in the white stuff, and have never seen it react with any clothing.

KLF

Yeah, my seats are TERRIBLE! This is an utter disgrace! Who the hell wants to sit in a car like this and have guests in a car like this? Not me or any of you.

I can't sit in the car and no one else can either. At night, when it gets really cold, the seats get all slimy and oily. This is when the oils rubs off on the clothes. Mine is so bad that oil just rubs off on my hands and fingers. But this only happens when its actually wet and learning. When its dry, it doesn't get on anything.

See the 2 pics I posted that show the seats shiny? I took those at night - in the dark. And in very cold temperature weather around 15 degrees fahrenheit. You can see how slick the seats are. When you sit on that slick oil, that crap rubs off onto your clothes. But in daytime, when the temperature heats up, all that slimy oily stuff then heats up into the white chalky crap and then its starts all over again and sometimes goes away.

Is this what is happening to some of you?

I am new to this forum. I just found it online while Googling. It seems really helpful and its helping me keep my cool while I am really pissed about this whole thing.

Here are some more pics of the damage it did to one of my duck down-feathered coats.

KLF

I have also been told by my salesman at my dealership that I am the only one with bleeding seats. I wonder if I too walked around the lot of the dealership if i would see others doing the same thing as mine. This is one of those things where you don't know what to look for until you know what to look for. And its only happening in really cold weather. We got down to 5 degrees the other week. Thats really cold for us. The seats bleed more and more when its colder.

StanNH

It is a very well known problem and MB is recovering the seats and replacing the headrests on affected cars. You have to call MB-USA tomorrow and report the problem so they can get in touch with your dealer and have the repair kit shipped to them. You are the first person to experience staining on clothing, so also report that and I'm sure you'll be reimbursed for that.

There are several threads on this forum dealing with the MB-Tex "bleeding" issue.

Mark's M

Perhaps your car has been in a polar vortex of some sort while the rest of Phily and all the other C300/400's are basking in warm sunshine?

Honestly, some of these CA's are just plain stupid. Why add insult to injury, tell customers the honest to God's truth (including what MB is doing about it) and impress them with candour, not lies. On a happy note, having one of the only C's in Philadelphia....hell, maybe in all of Pennsylvania....you'll be sure to get your replacement covers lickety split!!! Lol. Good luck, looking forward to your results.

goherdibg

I am wondering why the backs of the seats do not have any sign of the "chalking"? Do they not bleed?

I am lucky that I have not yet experienced this and am wondering why and hoping there is simply a bad batch of MB-Tex from the supplier - which would possibly be the reason the seat backs from KLF's photo do not appear to be affected. Of course the photo is small and maybe I am just not seeing it.

This is the really confusing part - I live near DC so I am getting pretty much the same weather as KLF and am not seeing anything at all. As far as I can tell, the TSB applies to all C's made prior to Jan 5th. Is that when they started using a different supplier? I would think MB could find some correlation among all of the affected vehicles and narrow down the TSB if possible. If they did, I'm sure a lot of us on here would be relieved. As it stands now, every time I walk up to my car I peer in with trepidation and it's driving me batty

Just some random thoughts.

KLF

Goherdigb, this back seat photo I took was during the day, after the very low temp hit at night and then started to warm up in the morning. If you look at the other pics I posted, I took two at night time when its been the coldest. At night night, in very low temp weather like 5 or 10 degrees the seats bleed like mad. The seats at night time literally ooze that oily substance out. To touch the seats was like touching a wet oil. Then as the temp starts to warm up in the early morning, this white chalky crap is what forms. I think this is forming when then temp hits say 25 to 30 degrees or so.

Is any one experiencing what I just explained? It sounds like mine may be the worst.

Check out this close up of one of the seats.

This was taken during the day time (mid morning) in around 25 to 30 fahrenheit degree weather.



This was taken at night in about 5 to 10 degree fahrenheit weather. The shiny stuff you are seeing is the oil leaking out. And this stuff does dry and turn into that white chalky substance when the temp outside the car starts to warm up. If you sit on this stuff while its wet and oily, it comes off on your clothes.

richardamp

Yes, what you are explaining is essentially what many others here are experiencing (only happens when it gets very cold then warms up, oily substance that turns white when it dries, etc.). You, however, are the first to report clothes being stained by the substance, and the amount of white substance on your back seats seems to be more than other users have seen (although almost every inch of my MB Tex has been oily..see pic below).

To your question about how this will be fixed, MB is replacing all seat covers with non-defective ones, but the parts are still be developed and we've gotten mixed messages about when everyone will have this issue fixed (between days and 2 months). Given the extreme nature of your case, I think it's reasonable to ask MB for some sort of tangible benefit in addition to just replacing your seat covers as this is completely unacceptable.

coladin

I asked my dealer about this issue and he is aware of it and has seen it personally. He was told that a batch of cars that were built around a certain stretch of dates was infected with subpar MB-Tex, a supply issue more than anything. Has anyone disclosed their build dates? I am curious to see if these cars affected were all built within a certain timeframe.

StanNH

All US built W205's with MB-Tex interiors, built prior to January 5th, 2015, are at risk. That information is directly from MB-USA.

In fact, MB even includes leather interiors in their notice, but no one has yet seen leather affected by this problem. Perhaps the MB-Tex used on the sides and backs of leather seats, and/or the headrests, is also at risk.

richardamp

I know we have seen build dates from both August and November mentioned here, and possibly others as well.

Rone803

I saw it walking around a dealer here in Jersey. He tried to tell me the seats were just dusty.

npa201

Which Jersey location?

KLF

Dusty? Dusty and Oily are very different. I think that guy may need to get his eyes checked. Or maybe they are being told to "not say a thing" until Mercedes Benz gets their PR plan around this issue in place. As a PR professional, this would make most sense to me.

My sales guy and another guy who works in Service Relations at my dealership told me that they had not heard of it. However, I have a good friend who works at MB Corporate and he told me that all dealers received a notice about this in NetStar (I think I am saying it right). NetStar is some sort of internal communications program that the delivers communications to the dealers from MB Corporate. Even after I shared a link to the Autoblog article about the issue with my sales guy, he still said he hadn't heard of the issue. So I don't know if he didn't' read the article or is just telling me something else.