Friggin dealer couldn't even begin to fix the annoying rear deck rattle. Oh did I mention is was the MB of Long Beach stealership?

They called me to tell me factory warranty wouldn't be honored, I would have to buy a new seatbelt. They couldn't get the rear seat back down on the left side? The seatbelt appeared to be stuck. They blamed it on my sheepskin cover. It would be my problem. And since they couldn't get the seatback down, they couldn't access the rear deck, therefore, they couldn't fix the cricket chirp problem.

Now the deal was, the rattle was occuring with the venetian blind in the retracted postion. But when it was erected, the rattle vanished.
So we headed over to the dealer. They had already moved it out of the shop considering it a closed case. I opened the trunk and had the service advisor hold the left seatback trunk release and opened the left rear door. I said, humm, seatback won't come down, huh? Pulled forward on the seatback, and it plopped right down. The advisor, "OMG!"

"Well mr. mb advisor, do you think I have any confidence to let you guys, I mean the factory trained Mercedes mechanics, proceed tearing up my brand new C63 AMG and using it for a learning tool? We're out of here." The advisor stated there were screws removed from below the seat cushion. "I'll take care of it, you guys have done enough damage for the day." "Why you drive my car 6 miles to hear cricket?" "Blah, blah, blah" and "we have very important test equipment utilized in the car to detect rattles." Count to ten, wind my watch, let the emotions cool. We left, the rattle still there.

Last Saturday, after removing the sheepskin seat cover, we visited MB SouthBay and met with Robert, who released the seatbelt in 15 seconds, the same seatbelt MB of Long Beach wanted to cut and replace at our expense! I tipped him a twenty.

Then yesterday, my son, 17, the C32 AMG driver/owner, looked up under the rear deck from within the trunk and found a stainless steel fastener totally backed off, at least 3/8", but with thread lock on it. We tightened it up this morning. That fixed the problem. The rattle/cricket chirp is totally gone regardless of venetian blind position, radio volume level, or the new BMC filters and Evosport tune (yesterday) which really made our test drive a pleasure this morning.

We thank Robert, of the Torrance, CA dealership for unjamming the seatbelt, the seatbelt which always worked before and after visiting MB Long Beach. We also to thank the forum members for posting about similar rattle noises in the rear deck for their observations. And a big thank you to my son! Hat's off to you guys! The old man is happy again.

In the pics attached, I am pulling down on the speaker tray mounting structure and producing a gap between the head of the ss fastener and the steel deck mount, thumb is pointing to fastener.

In the second picture, have the torx bit in the fastener, note right hand seatback release above to the right. Simply tighten the fastener which will secure the speaker tray.

Hope this helps anyone else with same condition.

Avoid dealership at all cost if you want a happy ending.

 

Ha ha ,Some dealerships have no idea. Glad you got it all sorted in the end

 

Great stuff, Lomita.