timberman

a couple of weeks ago I had my Valeo radiator replaced because it cracked and was leaking on the bottom hose,
I told the shop that I wanted it replacing with the Behr replacement and not another crappy Valeo to which he told me that Mercedes would no longer supply the faulty radiator so not to worry

Well today I checked under the bonnet because I thought i could here a strange noise and noticed the new radiator had a Valeo sticker on it

so I rang up the workshop and asked... why?!!.. has my car got a Valeo radiator on it when I specifically asked for a Behr. The guy in charge said "we have to fit what Mercedes sends us" so I pointed out that the Valeo ones are prone to fail and that he told me they no longer supply the faulty radiator to which he said the fault will have been rectified and this will be an updated version

so here's my question... have Valeo rectified this problem and are now supplying new improved radiators that won't fail ?

or have I just spent a fair amount of money having one crap radiator replaced by another?

jgsx

They also replaced mine with another Valeo . . . I want to know the same thing. Keep in mind that I have an 04 and my factory Valeo failed which required a replacement of the radiator, torque converter, transmission, and engine mounts.

Eurocharged Rick

as far as i know, the updated Valeo radiator is supposed to be problem free...i think only time will tell though...

Moxxon

My dealer told me the new Valeo radiators do not have the defect the older ones had. I still didn't want a Valeo though and that is all they could offer me, so I bought a Behr radiator online for less than $200 and had them install it.

sales@eurocharged.com

My Valeo was replaced with another Valeo in 2003 and I have been fine. IT has a production sticker on that says 02/2003.

jgsx

The problem is that my 2004 C32 should have had the 'newer' Valeo in it, and it still failed.

sales@eurocharged.com

Yeah, I don't think the problem is limited to a specific radiator.

According to MB, they provided Behr and Valeo with specs as to how to build the radiator. There was a flaw in the design, and it carried over to both manufacturers.

Either way you need to watch out....this is why I designed a new radiator with the tranny cooler that is separate.

hkycoldrct

Ditto, my radiator was replaced with the 'updated' Valeo radiator. Odds are they fixed the problem. Worst case scenario is that you bought another 4 years with a new one.

timberman

Rang MB UK to try and get some sort of guarantee that Valeo did upgrade the radiator to stop it from failing, but they just said
"parts are always being upgraded and we don't keep a list because it would be too long"
he told me to ring my local dealer and ask the parts department when the part first came into production, so I did

I gave the guy the part number (Valeo radiator A2035004203) and my VIN number and he told me that the radiator fitted to my car has only been available since Jan 07 and also that there have been 5 different part numbers for this radiator since the original one fitted back in 02
so it looks like they've made a few changes from the original faulty versions, I just hope they got it right this time

c32used

I have owned my C32 2002 for over a year now and yet no issues thus far...