Sincity

Yes....on a '09. But I have done two oil changes on it so far.

Pay insurance and registration on it to have it sit. Surprised my wife hasn't told me to sell it and she doesn't want to drive it work.

BAD430BENZ

i enjoy my car all the time . i actually bought my car with the intention of modding the hell out of it , which is why the GLK is my dd . i knew the tranny was good but could only handle so much power until bye bye . and since widebody and Weistec are next , that should be good enough for my weekend toy without getting really deep into it

Sincity

You're right. Need to take it for a CA run. I only work 7 miles from home and 2 from the gym (opposite direction) and prefer driving the 190e. I do take it to work once in a while.

BAD430BENZ

i agree....i am only 3 miles from my office

4ramin

I work most of the time and I really dont want my cliets to see the car. If they see the car, then they think i make too much money. Plus some of the areas i drive to,I may get killed for it lol....

bushburninc63

I just wish that if anything breaks, I hope it breaks now before my warranty runs out. :o since I don't mod it, I might buy the extended warrant.y 09 with 29000 miles.

Even Money

IDK, I've been told those cost 4K or more??? Just save it and use it if you need to fix something. I'm at 42K miles, 0 issues to date, and I've probably made 50 dyno runs and about the same 1/4 mile passes, most of those with my LT headers.

Merc-Skycap

Lol I like how this thread went into how often people drive their C63s. Just like some of the other members here, mine isn't a daily. Not everyone has an AMG as their daily, I'm not a baller like you mr. _AMG_.

The C63 holds a great deal of value for me and is staying with me for at least 10+ years. Therefore, I don't trash it or use it as often as everyone else. Think of it as a poor man's One 77 to give you an idea.

As for the volts reading, mine doesn't give a reading in the dash either so I wasn't able to check. However, I brought it to my service adviser's attention.

@Militia - Mine is more of a whistle compared to that sound. It's the first time ever I have heard such a noise come from a car but it could have been due to the Alternator having some issues.

Sincity

Sorry for going OT. So they still haven't diagnosed it?

PetroleumGuy

Back to the OT of daily driving. After today, I'm about to swear off driving the C63 to work. My commute is about 17 miles and usually takes from 40 min to an hour of stop and start driving. This morning someone bumped into the back of my car while I'm stopped waiting for traffic to move. The damage to my rear bumper was very minor and most people won't see it so I let her go figuring it's not worth the hassle, but I'm sure it's going to bug me. So that's on the way to work, on the way home while in very heavy traffic moving about 50 MPH something hits the wind shield making a loud noise and leaving a deep chip in the glass. Now I'm really frustrated and need a little speed rush to make me feel better, but for the next 15 miles traffic prevented any fun and then once I had some clear road their were officers of the law and then I was home. Very frustrating!

Jeff M

Ahhh, got it in 2010 with 2,400 miles on an 08, that I fixed this year by getting it up to 7,709, and 4 oil changes.

Jeff M

Brought to their attention, but they forgot to reply back with what they found.......? There is also a bulletin on a wind sound back of the engine, somewhere near the air filter boxes to throttle body, might bring that to his attention too .

Merc-Skycap

Yes Jeff M I told him to check the Voltage since I couldn't. He said he would do so in front of me as the last thing on the list of issues to fix. Let's see what he says tomorrow when they diagnose the car on a cold start.

There was a video somewhere here showing our engines clicking/ticking. Anyone have the link by any chance?

Merc-Skycap

Update - Car is still in the shop. There was a transmission issue according to the voice-mail left on my phone but I have not understood yet what exactly was the cause for them to "reset" the transmission.

AdrianL

Beat the **** out of mine. 52,000 KM problem free.

Merc-Skycap

Dealer states a reset of the torque converter was applied due to the fact that the transmission was not smooth when shifting....???

I asked him what "resetting" meant and he told me that it's just a software tweak to help reduce delays between the shifts and allow for smoother down shifts.

Is he just blowing smoke or could this "reset" really have been needed and performed?

Merc-Skycap

Guys I could really use some help here. Dealer installed a new Vac in the rear because of the whining noise?? There was some recent bulletin issued by Mercedes to replace it on these C63s due to the whining noises the engine was creating after the hard start-up. Anyone know if this is true or is the dealer just giving stories?

Apologies if all this sounds a bit stupid but I really am not much of a technical person when it comes to these things, so your help would be appreciated. Thanks!

Jeff M

Sorry your post is being trashed with other subjects.... First the last bit, transmission work, if their diagnostic tool found discrepancies, or update(s) needed, then yes, all good info they are giving you, and doing it for you. The transmission is quite complicated, a great deal of software in it/shared with the other systems, as well devices the software is controlling and needs to have calibrations and complex learn procedures to be set with these.

As for the whine, not being a snot, should apologize for sounding like that last time , but has the whine gone away (the details are a little thin for at least me to go on )? Is your car starting and performance properly now. The whine could have been a leak, or a passage way in the canister that can get such a sound when it is functioning, and an update was made to address this?

I don’t see anything wrong or false in their efforts, and they are making efforts, and sounds like they will continue if there is anything else left that they did not yet identify. These (not just an MB or AMG) cars are very complex, we all want tech, it comes with complexity, and some issued to bug out, but a good dealer will do what it can to try and (basically reverse engineer at times to understand a problem) diagnose a condition best they can, but they have to know every model and year MB/AMG that can cross into their shop, that is not easy, the techs have training that would make a diy’r cringe!!!

Better luck now for you I hope!

Merc-Skycap

Thanks so much Jeff M for taking this seriously and replying.

As per what I was told is that the transmission needed a reset for the torque converter and they also went ahead and replaced the battery due to the fact that it was drained since the car does use the battery quite a bit even when it's sitting in the garage.

Therefore, I would assume that's what caused the whining/whistling noise from the engine to begin with since it was not there before the slow crank start I experienced.

Also the pressure regulating valve was replaced which they had told me was making the whining/whistling noise. First I was told it was a vac pump towards the rear of the car so I'm a bit confused now as to what was actually replaced that was creating that noise. I'm sure the vac pump or pressure valve won't be covered under warranty so if anyone could chime in here, that would be great.

Thanks again!

Jeff M

You bet, do what I can, just a bit in need of details to do any good serious work for you (like the last sentence), which you gave me, thanks.

This is all good, I will explain, low power for electronics (like your transmission module) ends with an occasional glitch, and something a reboot won’t fix, therefore a reprogram is needed, and a relearn as the software is not old an school set-in-stone list of rules, it adapts to parts being a little different, age of the parts and things wearing/normal wear over time, and driver style (aggressive, sedate), as you can see from this, cars are fukn amazing in what they do, that most (a lot of people) don't even know!

Weak batter will tax the alternator trying to charge it, which if a battery has been run too low, will never happen, but the alternator will try, and could have been the whinnying you heard/it complaining as it struggles to charge the weak/rather dead battery, and I am not stretching it here, the diodes/rectifiers and electronics that regulates the alternator output will talk, more so when taxed, if you could reach your alternator, you could (but would not recommend it) put a long screwdriver to the case and the other end to your ear and hear it whinnying (not as loud when it’s not struggling and things are normal) normal sound then.

The vacuum canister sounds like I said, your dealer is really trying to cover all the bases and get your happy, you do NOT know how this is not often the case with any dealer, and with any brand car! Vacuum is sometimes used to control things, olden days cars used it to move HVAC dampers in your heater/AC vents, transmission modulators, fuel pressure regulators, power brakes, there was a lot of things used off of vacuum as the driving force, but not as accurate as what more expensive electronics can do, and not as adjustable/programmable as what software can do with electronic controllers. So, there is something in your car that uses, and only needs the level of control a vacuum system can provide, whatever it is I won’t try and find out, just knowing its there is enough to say, they exist for a reason, and there was a bulletin that made it better, das gud! One last thing, we can have vacuum pumps, or just what vacuum the motor makes when at low load conditions, the canister is often used to store this vacuum so there is still some available should your engine be more so loaded and not be providing a good vacuum to use as a control medium.

Here I go again, is the whine gone?

JonMBZ

the valves should be covered. You should get a trickle charger they sell to hook up while the vehicle is not being used.

Merc-Skycap

Hahah Jeff I'll let you know myself as soon as I get the car back if the noise is gone. They said it did once the valve was changed and the new battery installed.

I will report once I get it back. I'm interested to see the difference with the transmission reset. This is the 3rd time MB service has either reset or reprogrammed the transmission and the car has only gone in 4 or 5 times since I bought it. So not quite sure why they have to keep fiddling with this transmission. Let's see if it really changed much from when I dropped the car off. I'm also interested to see how many miles were put on to "test the transmission."

If it's anything like what another MB dealer did (12 miles) I will be very pissed.

@JonMBZ - I will make look into the trickle charger, might not be a bad idea. Thank you!

Jeff M

Glad you read my words and knew I don’t talk rash, might push but for a good cause some .

Not sure why the transmission keeps needing this/the same reprogram(?). Is this the first time you had a low battery condition? That seemed to be the same time you needed this last reprogram?

Fairly new C63, and the transmission (in most cars) advances a bit each year, some more than others, but might be something that will happen enough with other’s trannys to generate a tech bulletin, kind of like a virus, no fix till they know there is one, that has spread to more than just one being effected/infected LOL. These cars are far less problem prone as a whole than most believe, or feel, though still is easy to understand; having a tranny reprogram issue over and over would stretch anyone’s patience, but know that plenty of American and Asian cars can have more fits, and when there is a problem finally found with something like a GM car, there are way more owners effected compared to the few with a limited run on MB, AMG and other premium, German cars.

I would say they did do something, whether you feel it or not, they are not about to waste their time doing something they don’t need, that and MB is very stringent on what they will warrant a dealer to do, the procedures they have to do to prove work, even just testing at times, before MB will authorize a repair, reimburse the dealer, yea that is actually true and another part most don’t often hear. But for them to do as much as they did, might be losing a little reimbursement from corporate just to keep the customer/their customer happy, and coming back.


Some of the reprogramming of the tranny will require them to simulate a list of conditions on the road, not sure it takes 12 miles, but 6 miles out and their tool says programming done, means they got 6 miles to drive back, could be something as easy as that, I give benefit of the doubt sometimes too, though if you want, measure the rear tire tread depth before you take it in LOL.

As for charger, one company that is recommended by Bentley, MB, Porsche, whole list of those that tested these and saw they are quite a bit above the rest of the normal trickle chargers enough to risk thier blessing, is C-Tek, give them a check out, I have 6 of them, (don’t ask LOL) and am impressed.

http://smartercharger.com/

Merc-Skycap

Thanks again Jeff M. I got the car back tonight, and I have to say the transmission is pulling higher revs longer in Sport Mode than it used to and is more responsive than before but by not much. Also the car holds the gears longer when decelerating but it lost a bit of that blipping action which is not a huge deal. The exhaust sound has also changed a bit (I notice it all).

Service was great in the fact that they did all the repairs necessary and didn't drive it too much either. 9 miles is what I calculated which I think is alright.

Also the noise is finally gone, but I'm keeping a close ear because the ticking/clicking did not occur according to them and after reading about the pulley noise and clicking issues others had, I doubt I'm getting away with it for too long.

The only thing that I didn't like from my experience was that they went ahead and used dirty cloths and quick detailer to clean the car which created nothing but swirls all over the paint which I spent years getting rid of myself (lots of hard hours and sweat). Also they went ahead and charged $70 for wipers that do not even match the car. So overall I'm happy that the major issues were addressed but it's in the minor details that they messed up in. It's not that big of a deal but it just means I'll have to take it in again after it had been there for a few days.

_AMG_

Lol, I am by no means a "baller"....far from it.