amgmercedes

My barely used 01' CLK (only 3000 km) suddenly developed a problem a few days ago as I drive out of my house, I noticed that the car was pulling to the right side.

Let go of the steering wheel and the car gradually pulls to the right. Checked tire pressure and everything is ok, looked at the front suspension parts and everything looks ok too. The car has never had any repair work done to the front suspension, and neither has it fallen into any pothole or gone over rough roads that could misalign the front suspension.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

blackbenzz

The only thing I can think of is alignment. Or maybe one of the wheel weights fell off of one of your wheels (its possible)

amgmercedes

Was thinking alignment too, but how could alignment get so out of whack just like that?

I dont think its a wheel weight since there is no vibration at any speed.

J Lucas

So what do you think it is? Alignment seems like a pretty good guess to me..

whiteyford

Apparently Mercedes claims this is normal. The car pulling to the right is a safety thing. The reason behind it is if a driver were to fall asleep or for whatever reason pass out then the car will pull to the right away from traffic. Your guess is as good as mine whether that's true or not.

amgmercedes

Was thinking someone here could have an answer, if not then I will just have the alignment checked.

With regards to the car pulling to the right as a safety feature, it does make sense, but it should happen very very slowly, not as abruptly as it does with my car. And the problem was not there when I got it, it only appeared last week.

mtimmy

The funny fun is.,, I have this problem too,

the aligment is corrcet and within spec.

the car won't pull to the right if I hold on to the steering wheel.,it only pulls very very slowly if I am not holding it

allenjdmb

hooey. Right drift? Yes, most MB cars with larger wheels and tires may have a right drift. A pull? No, they shouldn't . Most likely issue, especailly if you have shorter springs and larger wheeels and tires, is alignment related, but is most likely caused by improper front camber. It's a recurring problem on the 208. 209, and 211 cars. These cars are quite sensitive to camber, and there is usually not enough adjustment in the stock setup to get adequate camber for your front wheels to "stand up". For my car, the best fix was installing the factory "crash bolts" which gives the alingment tech much more flexibility in getting the front camber back. If you're car is all stock (ride height and wheels/tires), then a simple alignment at at quality shop may get you back on track.... If not, I bet this will help you. Had the same problem for weeks, very frustrating! Hope this helps

Renn 208

Another possibility is that you may have run on an underinflated right front tire for some period of time. Even when the pressure's returned to normal, the wear on the tire will continue to cause the pull. You might want to switch the fronts and see if the pull switches to the left. If that's the case, you're experiencing tire pull, if not, it's likely to be a suspension issue.