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Mine is currently being submitted for buyback. They've said they can't fix it.
This, the random creaks and groans in the dash when the vents get stuck in a loop, and the tires going bald at 8k miles have pretty much made sure I won't ever be back.
My dealer just called and said that they resolved the issue in the front speakers by replacing the speakers but the tech is now hearing buzzing in the rear speakers and they will also be replaced. I wonder if they updated the tweeters or if I will just once again be disappointed with false hope. I will keep you guys posted. 🙏
Hey, at least your techs acknowledge your buzzing. Mine claim ignorance. Good luck.
I had to sit in the car with the manager and recreate the issue. 2 other times they said they couldn't reproduce the issue and I was too defeated to care. The engine rebuild issue has breathed new life into my quest to get this car right.
I sat in the car with them too. He acknowledged the noise they gave it back 2 days later saying can not reproduce
I put several piano based tracks on an SD card and loaded them into the system. In person the teams tell me at the dealership that they hear it and it's not right, but on my form they wrote
CLIENT STATES ALL FRONT SPEAKERS RATTLE SEE HISTORY. CLIENT STATES FRONT SPEAKERS RATTLE PLEASE SEE PLAY LIST. ANY SONG WITH PIANO.
CONNECT CHARGER, CONNECT SDS, FOUND NO RELATED FAULT CODES. COMPARED TO LIKE MODEL WITH NO RELATED CONCERN FOUND TO HAVE THE SAME AUDIO CHARACTERISTICS.
Hahahaha, sounds about like mine. I didn't have piano tracks or an SD card, but he was blaming my iPod, then the songs, then everything but the car speakers. Then after he heard the noise he looked at me and said " well the music is very loud, maybe don't turn it up so high" I looked at home and told him it shouldn't matter how loud I listen to it. When im driving down the freeway how else do I drown out the wind noise coming from the front windows. He had no response. Lol
Hi guys, I have the same rattling issue. My car is a 2015 C200 with basic sound, ash trim and ambient lighting. The drivers door rattles at 109Hz and the passenger at 269Hz.
It seems that the entire ash part is vibrating on my car, not just the lighting strip. Not that it's a fix but I managed to stop the rattling by inserting a piece of paper between the ash trim and the door plastic (as shown in photo):
Note the pieces of paper left of the speaker and under the light strip.
Just make sure the 2 pieces that makes the vibration is bonded to each other.
If its something fitted to the door panel on the inside just use silicone or a glue gun and make sure its not vibrating against each other.
Be careful adding foam and paper and things like that. It's exactly what they'll look for to claim you modified it and they won't cover it under warranty.
Hi guys, I have the same rattling issue. My car is a 2015 C200 with basic sound, ash trim and ambient lighting. The drivers door rattles at 109Hz and the passenger at 269Hz.
It seems that the entire ash part is vibrating on my car, not just the lighting strip. Not that it's a fix but I managed to stop the rattling by inserting a piece of paper between the ash trim and the door plastic (as shown in photo):
Note the pieces of paper left of the speaker and under the light strip.
Hope this helps someone
Interesting. Maybe the whole trim piece just needs to be shimmed.
Ugh.... I'm starting to notice a buzzing / rattling sound coming from what sounds like the drivers side rear door speakers. Never noticed until recently. It happens only on certain songs at a certain frequency or volume. Very annoying!
I've had my C450 for 2 months now, (got the dark ash wood trim/burmester speakers) and I noticed that cringeworthy buzzing/rattling noise almost immediately when on a phone call, or listening to talk radio.
I told my dealership about it and honestly haven't had a second to bring it in. But have an appointment made for next week for them to look at it. (car is fantastic other than this!)
In the meantime, I downloaded that app that you can go through the frequency spectrum, and that was extremely helpful in narrowing down where exactly those terrible vibrations are coming from. So, whoever it was that posted that suggestion, thanks a lot!
I noticed around the 230Hz range, I get a bad buzzing sound coming from the passenger-side door, where the seat-positioning buttons are. And if I put my hand on it, the buzzing completely disappears. But I have a feeling where all of those buttons are (over the dark ash trim) that entire panel feels surprisingly flimsy.
And lastly, around the 500Hz range, that's where the buzzing is happening for me in the centre speaker behind the screen. If I press gently on the speaker grill, it also goes away instantly.
Now I've noticed that it's been quite some time since people were initially posting about this issue on here. Has any dealership been successful in completely resolving this problem for them?
And if so, how extensive was the fix?
I obviously want to try to avoid them doing as many trial and error things, if people here know exactly what their dealership did in resolving this.
Hey guys, just letting you know that my buyback went down about 2 months ago for essentially the full value of the car, plus my downpayment and all payments made in 17 months, with about 3k deducted for wear and tear since i didn't report the problem officially until about 3000 miles.
I will say that it was good of MBUSA to give me the refund without a lot of grief. The dealership was also very awesome about it.
I decided to apply the check I received into a new body style Tesla Model S. Picking it up Thursday. Woot!
Good luck with the Tesla, from what I have read in the tesla forums, it's a great car to drive, but has a lot of issues, and the interior quality is so an so.
MFI2015: how did you get them to do a buyback? I have had my car in the shop many times for the same reasons and a lot of reasons at that, and they denied mine. told me it wasn't enough to cause a buyback. I got an attorney to see what i can do.
I had a local sound shop install Hushmat sound deadener over the interior panels of all four doors. (No rattles, but I was re-doing the audio system and replacing front door speakers as well). It fixes a couple of problems.
The speaker uses that inner panel as a baffle (a "baffle" is the piece on the face of a loudspeaker cabinet that the speakers mount to.) By applying Hushmat you're making it more rigid. Since the speaker rapidly exerts force toward and away from the baffle as it's reproducing sound, any "give" in the baffle reduces the efficiency of the speaker.
Hushmat also serves as a barrier to exterior noise, and it gives the doors a nice solid sounding "thud" when you shut them. Hushmat comes in adhesive sheets. You just cut to fit and stick it on there. Any decent audio shop can do it for you was well.
If the "buzz" is being caused by a sympathetic vibration in the trim panel/speaker grille when certain frequencies are being reproduced, and with a metal speaker grille in a wood panel that's a high probability, when the door panel is off for the Hushmat treatment, shoot a bead of silicone around the interior perimeter of the grille where it meets the wood trim.
The speakers themselves have an unusual mount. They're a tri-lobe mount and have three plastic ***** where you'd expect screws, and they snap into receivers on the door mount. If there's any "play", silicone those in there as well.
(Yes, you'll forgo whatever "warranty" there may have been with respect to rattling speakers, but since MB isn't able to fix the rattles anyway, the "warranty" as it pertains specifically to door speaker rattles is useless. Sometimes you just need to say "screw it" and fix it yourself.)
Last edited by Mike5215; May 17, 2016 at 11:14 AM.
MFI2015: how did you get them to do a buyback? I have had my car in the shop many times for the same reasons and a lot of reasons at that, and they denied mine. told me it wasn't enough to cause a buyback. I got an attorney to see what i can do.
Well, we have a special lemon law in California that gives us a bit more protection than federal. if you've had the car in for at least 3 visits for the same problem or over 30 days in the first 18 months of ownership with no fix the law states that they must return all payments to you. I believe the car has to be destroyed as well. If they fight the buyback request and lose, they also have to pay your attorney fees. Rather than destroy the car, it was more affordable for them to buy it back without a fight and return my payments and downpayment, prorated to the milage of the car when I first reported the issue. For me, this was almost a 100% refund.
Miami probably doesn't have the same consumer protection laws, but there are also federal laws that may apply.
I was very polite and took it to several dealers to give them 4 attempts and 30 days to fix it. I also made sure to get all of this done within 15 months of purchase so that I would have additional pad once I requested a buyback from corporate. Also, the dealership in Van Nuys didn't try to run from it or gaslight me - they acknowledged the problem and even corporate said it couldn't be fixed.
Ultimately this frustrating experience had two happy endings. I got nearly a full refund on the car. That refund was used to buy my new baby.
I will say I'm very happy that Mercedes chose to work with me on it. I've never even heard of someone getting a buyback like that so easily from any car mfg.
Florida unfortunately forces binding arbitration. Tougher state to get a buy back, especially if it's about an issue with an accessory versus an actual drive ability issue.
I just made the most progress so far in reducing the buzzing. After having all tweeters replaced twice, at least one door panel changed out and 7 trips to the dealer I decided to take matters into my own hands. The fix is not perfect and a very slight buzzing can still be appreciated but mine was BAD so I'm ok with a subtle hint of buzzing at an occasional frequency. All it took was a 1"x4" piece of 1/16" black felt rolled up and pressed under the edge of the wood trim piece just below the speaker grills (I bought large sheets of black felt on Amazon)(a butter knife worked fine to wedge the felt but leave a small tab to retrieve the felt if you push it too far, this can be tucked in gently later). I did this with the test track running so I could find the best placement. The felt is not visible at all and the sound is so much better. I may try different thickness felt rolls but for a first attempt I am very happy. I think I might love my car again... Or better yet finally. Hope this helps.
Anyone in the UK having any luck with this? Mercedes of Glasgow have tried and failed to fix this 5 times now, the last taking 5 weeks. They asked for an example track to try to fix it, then spoke to technical telling them it's only an issue with this one song, which is obviously not the case. Technical closed the case as, as far as they're concerned, it's only an issue with one song. I've called customer services repeatedly, emailed the ceo, and after numerous back and forths, they always come back with the same answer, ie, it's within tolerances as Mercedes of Glasgow tell them their isn't a fault. They even told them they didn't hear any issue and were merely following process. If they didn't hear the fault, why would they add foam etc to the speakers, replace door trims and speakers?
First time poster, been lurking for a few months now. I bought a 2015 C400 about 3 months ago, and being pretty particular with my audio, I noticed the speaker buzz the first week of ownership. I'm very happy to report they were finally able to completely fix the buzzing. After having their technician look at it and replace one of the speakers, which didn't make any difference, they checked out other C400's they had on the lot and found they all made this noise. The head of the service department put in a technical case to Mercedes and they responded saying there were speaker brackets that could be ordered that fixed this buzzing. Brackets were ordered and installed, now the buzzing is completely gone! I tested it with the frequency generator app (which the technician was impressed by by the way) and I found no buzzing whatsoever. Wanted to let you all know there is a fix available!
FYI, I have the Burmester system, just to clarify.
First time poster, been lurking for a few months now. I bought a 2015 C400 about 3 months ago, and being pretty particular with my audio, I noticed the speaker buzz the first week of ownership. I'm very happy to report they were finally able to completely fix the buzzing. After having their technician look at it and replace one of the speakers, which didn't make any difference, they checked out other C400's they had on the lot and found they all made this noise. The head of the service department put in a technical case to Mercedes and they responded saying there were speaker brackets that could be ordered that fixed this buzzing. Brackets were ordered and installed, now the buzzing is completely gone! I tested it with the frequency generator app (which the technician was impressed by by the way) and I found no buzzing whatsoever. Wanted to let you all know there is a fix available!
FYI, I have the Burmester system, just to clarify.
Wow! Many thanks for this! Can you post the part numbers that they installed?
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