I've had my CLK for about 9 months now, bought it with nearly 70k and recently rolled 81k on the odometer. Thus far, no real problems other than an old battery.

Today on the way to work, I was braking at a stoplight as usual -- nothing out of the ordinary, no unnecessary pressure applied, just normal slowing down (did I mention it was normal?). I had just gotten off the freeway and already had stopped at a red light prior to the one I just arrived at without incident.

I slowed from an initial speed of ~35mph. As I was braking, I hear this terrible, crunching, grinding sound as if there's rocks or gravel stuck between the pads and the rotors, and the brakes were engaging sporadically. They would slightly bite, cut out, slightly bite, cut out, etc. and everytime the brakes engaged, the crunching sound would occur. If it helps to describe the sensation my foot felt on the brake pedal, it was as though I was running overly evening spaced 2x4s...I suppose this could be classified as brake judder.

Naturally, I freaked out; all this happened within about 8 seconds or so and thankfully, no one was in front of me at the light or else I might have actually rear-ended someone. Hearing this sound made me scared to fully engage my brakes again so I was timidly coasting and engaging till I hit my work's driveway, fortunately it was only another 1.5 miles or so. When I was in a safe stretch of open road, I coasted up to 35mph again and mashed the pedal and...nothing. No sound, brakes engaged fine...did this a couple more times and I couldn't replicate it.

I immediately did some research and other makes who have had this problem say it's either just a design flaw (American cars, lolz) or the pads and rotors need replacing. Well, I just had my car fully inspected by an MB tech a couple months ago and said I have plenty of life left on the pads and rotors. I also visually inspected the rotors and there's no extraordinary grooving on the rotors so I'm not sure about any of this.

Sounds like either dirt or rust between the pads and discs, or warped rotor? Anybody else experience something like this or have any insight?

Thanks in advance

 

I would pull the wheels and check the pads. You never know what you'll see.

https://mbworld.org/forums/clk-class...ame-apart.html

 

Will do -- car's due for service A right now so when I get back from vacation, I'll make sure they take a look at the rotors and pads.

On a good note (I think), sound hasn't come back since it happened so my fingers are crossed.

 

+1... just because the outside pad looks good doesnt mean the inside pad is the same story. If you dont want to pull the wheel at least take a careful look to see if any metallic dust has collected on the inside of the rim

 

Swing it in to Vacaville if you don't DIY stuff. I can have a look possibly.