This morning I started my car and went to put in a new CD. I hit eject, took out the old one, then tried putting the new one in. It said CD Error. I tried again and got it to go in. The CD started playing, so I cranked up the volume. Nothing happened. I can't get the volume to go past a certain level. It is very low (almost low enough that you can't hear it while driving). I do have an aftermarket amp and subwoofer which was installed about 5 months ago.

I took it to the shop that did the subwoofer install, they played around, disconnected the battery, looked at the amp and sub, and came to the conclusion that the problem is my radio itself. They said that maybe if I unplug the battery for 30 minutes that it will reset everything. I'm afraid to do that because last time I did, my ESP unit got fried and the dealer had to replace it. I can't afford to try that again because now the dealer will probably give me warranty issues about my subwoofer, amp, and NOS.

Please, does anybody have any ideas or experience with this type of problem? Thanks!

 

that happened to me once before also. I put a cd in and it was playing but no sound. And no sound on the radio either. I let the car sit overnight and it was ok the next morning. Hasnt happened since.

 

i had the comand unit crap out on me as well, but it went away after a couple of hours i turned the radio off and came back after work and it functioning... you posted this problem last night i hope it got resolved

 

As of this morning it isn't resolved...

I am going to Mercedes in an hour to pick up the S550, so I'm not sure if I should let the dealer check out my radio and see whats wrong. I'm hoping that it works soon, I never realized how horrible driving is without music.

 

Almost the same thing happend to me today. VERY weird. I have NO volume at all. The radio and CD works but NO sound. It actually happend to me before like a year ago. I let the car rest overnight, and it worked the next day.

 

Damn, this is the 3rd day and I still have the same problem...

I'm starting to wonder if modding is really worth it. The advantages are you have your car the way you want it. The disadvantages are that I worry every single time something goes wrong because I don't want to take it to the dealer and get my warranties voided. This morning I stopped at a red light and my car was shaking. As soon as I started to move, it was ok. After a few more red lights, it started again. Now I'm worried that if I take the car in, the dealer is gonna bust me for having nitrous, green filters, and/or ECU.

 

In a situtation liek this just take it to any mechanic that works on german cars, theyll tell you if something is up with that shaking... dont even take ur car for service A or B just do a synthetic oil change elsewhere and reset the service countdown yourself.

In regards to the radio you said your installer said its something within the actual radio so that would need to be addressed by your mercedes service center... best make friends with your SA if/when you decide to take it in! If you have a good SA then you wouldnt have to worry about these things.

 

Thanks for the advice dude, I'm still happy to see you posting here. You get a replacement car yet?

...yeah I got a pretty cool service advisor, but he was cool before I did the NOS and ECU. I'm not sure how he'll react to the new stuff. I'm gonna pull the NOS bottle out and see if they notice anything. I also gotta do a search for a service shop.

 

no car yet no good lease rates this month

i would be very careful and refrain from going to the dealership they WILL spot anything that might not look like its part of the car. My advice is to call up the service center, or MB main office and ask them how you can reset it or something along those lines... when i had to reset my service countdown they told me exactly what to do with no hassles

 

Well, my cars been in the shop since yesterday afternoon. I saw an awesome black CLS63 and red CLK63...I asked about leasing a CLS55 but no luck, too much $ for a youngin'.

I called up the s/a today, at first he said there was a problem with a wire and the radio is totally fixed. I called back a couple of hours later and now he says that they had to order a new amp and it should be in tomorrow morning and my car will be back tomorrow afternoon . I'm a little worried because theres a good chance the aftermarket subwoofer and aftermarket amp are the cause. If thats the case I have 2 problems. a) I gotta worry that the dealer will charge me for everything and void my warranty at the same time and b) I now have to do something about my aftermarket system.

 

Got even worse news. They replaced the amp and found that it made no difference. The problem was still there. They gave up and said they tried everything, it just won't work. My s/a told me that its gotta be my aftermarket sub or amp. Of course, I have to go back to the custom shop to have them try and figure out the problem. I just have a feeling that they won't be able to find the problem. MAYBE my aftermarket amp is the problem? But I noticed that if I have the car off and hit the radio on, the amp and subwoofer are both off. So, I don't think the amp is what is causing it.

This problem is me. I can't believe I have a car with no radio. Thats what I get for trying to save a few bucks and going cheap...

 

i think there was an issue back in the day when these cars just came out that the aftermarket stuff had to be fiber optic or something like that i dont remember what it was but maybe thats what is stopping your radio from working??

 

This is crazy. I had a stock radio on order which finally came in to replace mine. Now, the dealer is telling me that MB knows about my car and I'm on some sort of list. I now have to pull out all of my aftermarket stuff and take the car in. I am now very very close to putting my car back to stock and getting out of my lease (Swapalease). You can get a Viper SRT10 on there for less than 1000 a month so I might just go for something like that. My car is a great car, hot looks, pretty good performance, modified to my liking, etc...but its just been falling apart. The inside rattles like theres no tomorrow (I've had it looked at so many times, and it has been rattling before I modified anything). The engine has been acting funny on me, sometimes while I'm at idle the engine will shake and the revs will go up and down and it makes a real weird, almost scary noise. I've had problems with the stock radio since day 1 but the aftermarket sub is whats getting the blame. Plus, this car sucks with mods, wayyy too many electrical, safety, ECU, mechanical issues. Even my power steering pump and rack and pinion had to be replaced but it still doesn't feel right. The tranny has a very violent shift from first to second and second to first and it seems to hold gears while going downhill for no apparent reason. On top of all this, MB service just sucks. I'm actually going to be writing a letter to MB about all the issues we've had (not just the CLK but the E350 and SL55) and how bad the dealer treated us.

I'm really sorry for rambling on about this and I still love Mercedes but I'm just kinda pissed at the way things are going. Just imagine having no music for 2 months and having an SL55 that sounds like its going to fall apart and an E350 that keeps on getting seatbelt and SRS visit workshop malfunctions. The only car that seems to be problem free is our '07 S550, maybe because it is brand new and will run into problems or because Mercedes cleaned up there act with the '07 cars.

So, now first step is to go to a shop, get the subwoofer and amp uninstalled and pray that the dealer can fix the sound system. Then, I'll get everything back to stock, call up swapalease and see what I can do.

 

wow man i relle feel for u that sux, i too have a system that was installed about 3 months ago but havent had a problem knock on wood..but did u keep the stock head unit or did u change it? and wtf is this about this list?

QUOTE=ItalianStallion;1799533]This is crazy. I had a stock radio on order which finally came in to replace mine. Now, the dealer is telling me that MB knows about my car and I'm on some sort of list. I now have to pull out all of my aftermarket stuff and take the car in. I am now very very close to putting my car back to stock and getting out of my lease (Swapalease). You can get a Viper SRT10 on there for less than 1000 a month so I might just go for something like that. My car is a great car, hot looks, pretty good performance, modified to my liking, etc...but its just been falling apart. The inside rattles like theres no tomorrow (I've had it looked at so many times, and it has been rattling before I modified anything). The engine has been acting funny on me, sometimes while I'm at idle the engine will shake and the revs will go up and down and it makes a real weird, almost scary noise. I've had problems with the stock radio since day 1 but the aftermarket sub is whats getting the blame. Plus, this car sucks with mods, wayyy too many electrical, safety, ECU, mechanical issues. Even my power steering pump and rack and pinion had to be replaced but it still doesn't feel right. The tranny has a very violent shift from first to second and second to first and it seems to hold gears while going downhill for no apparent reason. On top of all this, MB service just sucks. I'm actually going to be writing a letter to MB about all the issues we've had (not just the CLK but the E350 and SL55) and how bad the dealer treated us.

I'm really sorry for rambling on about this and I still love Mercedes but I'm just kinda pissed at the way things are going. Just imagine having no music for 2 months and having an SL55 that sounds like its going to fall apart and an E350 that keeps on getting seatbelt and SRS visit workshop malfunctions. The only car that seems to be problem free is our '07 S550, maybe because it is brand new and will run into problems or because Mercedes cleaned up there act with the '07 cars.

So, now first step is to go to a shop, get the subwoofer and amp uninstalled and pray that the dealer can fix the sound system. Then, I'll get everything back to stock, call up swapalease and see what I can do.[/QUOTE]

 

My head unit is stock, the only thing I did was have an amp and subwoofer installed. The thing is, before I had them installed my radio would act weird, like once every month the radio wouldnt work and then the next day it was fine. I have a feeling the whole radio is messed up but because of the aftermarket parts it won't be covered under warranty.

Bro, I got a list of complaints that are way too long to even post. Me and my family are trying to get all of our complaints together so that we can send a letter to the dealer and MB.
Here is a list off the top of my head of the major problems

SL55
- Supercharger shuts off after one high speed run. When the s/c goes off it pulls like a prius.
- The engine shut off twice while my dad was driving on the highway. He was doing 70mph and the car just completely shut off. Luckily, he made it over to the shoulder and didnt get hurt.
- The car rattles like you won't believe. Its actually embarassing.
- Hydraulic suspension is messed up, it makes the car low when you start it and sometimes it raises it.
- The car randomly feels like it wants to go fowards, this just started happening tonight.

E350
- My grandfather drives this car and I dont want him to get hurt, but its the 3rd time that theres been an SRS and seatbelt malfunction "visit workshop."
- Teleaid wont get activated.
- We tried getting his car switched for a loaner 3 days in a row. We kept getting straight out lied to by the dealer. My grandfather even left work early to switch with the loaner and nobody was at his house.
- His radio keeps getting messed up, can't listen to stations and CDs.

CLK500
- Rattles a lot, headrest rattles, the rear sunshade rattles, the whole back part where the subwoofer is rattles, the underside of the car rattles.
- Engine sputters at idle randomly, the RPMs will go up and down and the engine makes a weird noise and the car starts to shake.
- Tranny is really harsh and has been since day one.
- Radio issues.
- Windows and sunroof sometimes dont respond or will do the opposite of what I want them to do.
- Rack & Pinion broke
- Powersteering has a weird feel to it
- 1st to 2nd shift at redline sometimes has a very noticable hesitation.
- And many more

 

3 benzs and bad luck with all of them? thats hard to sallow. I guess the saying " you get what you pay for" has no meaning in this case... Its very funny how no benz owners have just a couple of problems with their cars its either flawless, or it has tons of issues...

I think sending a letter to benz wont do much for you (except hopefully take care of your grandfathers loaner) But if you are having the same issues over and over especially like the s/c in the sl55 and the tranny in your clk I would seriously suggest contacting your lawyer to see if you are eligible to lemon these cars you can also read a few other threads on this forum There have been a few ppl that used the lemon law against benz

 

Thanks, I'm going to look into it. I will most likely either sue, get out using swapalease, or endure until the lease is over.

And yeah, its a shame that we get 100% better service from Ford with our Explorer than MB with our SL55. Oh well, MB still makes some of the most beautiful and luxurious cars, and AMG knows how to make monster engines so I will keep repping Mercedes, but if someone asks about service and reliability I won't hold back.

 

wow that is crazy bro,,i would deff. write to mb

 

Write to mb and say what???
that you modified your car and now the radio is messed up. I'm all for modifying cars, but you inherent the risk. all of your other problems should be covered by warranty. now that you have an issue that you created, you have found other reasons to dislike the product and blame your service department. [q]...yeah I got a pretty cool service advisor[/q] you even said you liked the service advisor earlier. writing a letter will not help your issue, because all they will do is refer you back to the dealer. MBUSA does not get involved unless it is a serious issue.
P.S. the other cars you mentioned should be repaired by dealer(sl55,e350)

 

You misunderstood me. The SL55 and E350 have been in service a number of times and they are completely stock.

My CLK came with a messed up tranny and radio. My mods may have worsened the problems but these issues arent what I am mostly annoyed about. It was the blatant lying by the dealer in regards to the E350 and the fact that the SL55 just can't seem to get fixed. Another issue which I might have forgot to mention is that the dealer stole all 4 of my stock 17" AMG's when they replaced them with the 19s". I've been waiting for months to get replacement wheels or $ but I keep getting the runaround. These wheels were quoted at over $4000 for the whole set. There are so many issues with the MB dealer that I forgot most of them. I'm not mad at Mercedes if my NOS blew up my engine. I'm mad if I had 3 cars which have all had a history of problems with the most expensive one being the worst. I'm even angrier that the dealer is treating us like s***. We even met a saleseman in person and tried to lease the S550 off of them but they wouldn't even call us back. We left a message with the manager but still no reply. We wound up leasing at a different dealership. We then finally got in touch with the manager and after giving him the list of complaints and telling him he lost the sale of a 90,000 dollar car, he still fails to return phone calls.

I think its understandable as to why I'm just a little annoyed with MB.

 

Well, they finally fixed it. It wound up being the stock amp even after they told me they replaced it before and it wasn't the problem. I don't want to get into what happened but I'm pretty happy with how I was treated and I'm gonna keep my sound system stock now. If anybody wants a 12" JBL subwoofer and Kenwood Amplifier let me know lol