j-mo

Hello,

I had some bad luck this past weekend and would love some opinions on my situation. I drive a 2002 CLK55 and have had the car 10 years - 115k on it. Its been such a great and reliable car. I was driving on the highway last Saturday and got an alert "Battery / Alternator - Visit Workshop," I grabbed my phone and googled the message but quickly noticed the temp gauge almost in the red. Pulled over and shut the car down. After a few minutes I started it was got off the highway. The temp gauge was fine. I pulled into an Autozone and noticed the power steering was going. I figured it was the serpentine belt - which I did about 3 or 4 years ago after it snapped.

Towed to my Indy shop and he calls me on Monday. Says the oil cooler was leaking and it likely leaked onto the belt causing it to slip off. So new oil cooler and serpentine belt kit - $1200 to fix if that is all that is damaged. They still have to investigate more. Next day he calls with bad news - the water pump is toast and I also need an idler pulley and fan clutch. Now the repair cost is about $2300.

So, the Serpentine belt did all this damage. I am wondering if this is typical or likely? I was thinking that maybe when a belt snaps it just comes off and its over. This happened a few years back as I mentioned and nothing was damaged. Maybe if the belt got oil on it and came off the pulleys but was still intact - now you have a strong, intact belt getting yanked around. Make sense?

I am concerned because I might have to just sell the car cheap now. In the last year or so I've acquired some decent rust and its to the point where I'd have to fix rust on every panel which is likely $2500-3000. It could come back in a year or 2 and with the age,mileage and rust, the value is quite low. I don't want to sink $2300 in mechanical fixes unless I keep the car a while longer. And Well, its getting harder and harder to stomach the rust. I have been looking around at E63's or an E550 coupe but have not pulled the trigger yet. I might have to....

To summarize - can a leaky oil cooler leak onto a serpentine belt, causing it to come off, and break the components I mentioned?
btw - my Indy quoted $500 for the oil cooler. Looks like the part is less than $100 - is it that hard to install?

thanks for any input an thanks a ton for reading!

megacrazy

1200 for an oil cooler and a belt is astronomical. It's highly unlikely for a belt to damage those other components. Maybe if you weren't keeping up with maintenance you would need some pulleys changed. The fan clutch could also be bad but doubt it's from the belt. It sounds like he's hitting you with high parts prices for items that are quickly replaced...so quick buck for him and minimal labor.

KJI3jflarryfe93

upper oil cooler has 2 gaskets on the side in it's housing also including bottom gasket for oil filter making it a 3 gasket kit
these gaskets goes sh*t starting to leak down on your belt drive, belt will slip off your pulleys.
if your in real bad luck belt will start grinding in the front timing cover.

you did good if you immediately shut off your car when you saw the battery/alternator lamp illuminate

j-mo

Thanks!

Yea I am starting to get a feeling I'm getting jerked around. When he first quoted me $1200 it was for the oil cooler and a kit for the belt. I guess it might have included a pulley or 2. He had told me the oil cooler was $500. I went the the shop this morning to get some things from the car and he showed me the car. He then says the oil cooler is already done and all they did was replace the seals. I told him I am probably just going to sell the car and need a ball park price on the oil cooler repair so I can factor that into the sale price. He says $325. A quick search finds that the seals are around $40. Is $325 high for this? I am not sure about the labor but it should like 2 hours minimum for $325.

He also pointed to the water pump and there was some minor nicks in it but I dunno....I didn't get the feeling it needs replacement. He never said its broken or won't turn or function.

I am thinking of towing to to another indy I have heard good things about.

Racin_fool

Sounds like indy shop greed to me.. Just as bad as some of the dealership techs that I worked with down here a while back.. "oh they work at the dealership, they have to be honest.." WRONG!

megacrazy

It depends on the shop rates in your area but that's not more than 1 hour job. Replacing the belt takes literally 1 minute. The seals on the cooler are about 20$, a brand new oil cooler is 160$. You should pay 320$ if he replaced the oil cooler altogether not just the seals. Pulleys also take minutes to replace and are fairly cheap, except for the tensioner which is like 200$.

j-mo

Good info, thanks! Going to get the car away from this shop

j-mo

Greetings....

I just wanted to give an update as the dark clouds have cleared from this whole fiasco. I took my CLK55 to another shop that my father uses and has a good relationship with. The simply put a new belt on the car and it is fine - drove it home today. He said the pulleys looked fine, no play in the water pump, no noise etc. I also needed rear brakes (which I knew) and an oil change. So the tow, belt, antifreeze, rear pads and rotors and an oil change for $880. To get my car running at the first shop they would have added the water pump, idler pulley, tensioner etc and with the brakes and oil change it would have been $2700. The first shop did spend 3 hours of labor on the car and did replace the seals in the oil cooler so we settled on a price on $150 - not bad (half of the total labor). I kept my cool but he I think he could tell I was onto his BS. Had I listened to him I would have spent $2k more!!!

Too bad. Been using this Indy for 8-9 years and always liked them. Never again.

Thanks for all the input!

megacrazy

Thanks for the update. Glad everything worked out in the end. Unfortunately most mechanics nowadays assume they can cheat and steal without anyone being the wiser.

KJI3jflarryfe93

Yup, you're absolutely correct!
That's what my former MB trained mechanic buddy who works for swedish dealership Hedin Bil did to me.
He cheated and scammed me for parts like a gready backstabbing kunt!

Can't trust no-body these days, not even a friend who works on your car!

megacrazy

Yeah, it's pretty bad, at least in my area....and the main problem I have with mechanics, in addition to price, is that a lot of times they do a **** poor job on top of overcharging you for stuff. So it's like "pay me whatever I am thinking of charging you, and I may or may not do a good job, and it may or may not fix your problem". Wtf seriously. A lot of times I just opt to the the work myself simply because I don't want to deal with BS.

KJI3jflarryfe93

I made a thread about my cunning buddy.
this scumbag runs his own shop on the side after work hours from the dealership.

my dirtbag buddy steals most MB customers from his employer the dealership.
8 MB owners out of 10 MB owners servicing their car at my sh*thead buddy's garage instead of going to dealership for service.
that's how loyal my former buddy is to his employer by cheating him behind his employers back!

removing and stealing parts from friends and customers cars shows how gready this b*stard is!
that's how they make quick money getting rich!
my cunning buddy who no longer is my buddy anymore has a nephew with an E55AMG W210.
his nephew's E55 is a very high mileage car.
my former dirtbag mechanic buddy and his nephew came up with a diabolique scam plan to cheat me, they swapped parts between my car which is a low mileage and his nephew's car, so his nephew didn't have to buy new parts for his E55.
it was cheaper to take parts from my car.

and we were good friends at least that's what I thougth we were?!
I trusted him like my own brother.
it turned out we were only friends so he could steal my parts from my car.

I had to pay for a brand new fuel pump coz my former buddy stole it from my car during a repair job he was doing.

now you might understand how disgusting some cunning and conniving people can be capable of cheating, scamming and stealing from friends!
my former mech buddy is the lowest and worst kind of genuine low water mark!!

when his time is up, this guy will fry in hell side by side with his beloved **** heroes Mengele, Himmler, Göring and Hitler!

megacrazy

Ah yes that's a pretty old school scam. Always watch them doing the work and always ask for the old parts. It should be...das beste tut man am besten selber...instead of the usual motto haha.

RPB

KJI3jflarryfe93

I know for a fact that he stole my 100.000km's old fuel pump back in 2013-2014 when I had a fuel leak from a bad fuel hose.

regarding other parts I can only suspect him of stealing them or swapping without my knowledge.
I know I had to repair my intake manifold last summer, shop told me the injectors were fishy missing composite spacers.
by then I was sure my buddy had scammed me.

other service jobs changing fluids for engine oil, tranny oil, diff oil, brake fluids, my mechanic buddy just could have taken them, letting me believe that he replaced oils?
I don't know if he changed the oils like I told him to do or he kept my oils for his nephew's E55?
stealing and scamming from a friend is a cheap way to save monie when he don't have to pay for oils.

I bought new hose for replacement, during this repairjob my dirtbag buddy had planned and decided to ****** my fuel pump so I had to pay for a brand new pump which he had already installed on my car when I was going to pick her up.
while I was talking to him about fuel leak he was grinning all the time which made me very suspicious about him and then all of a sudden he told me I also replaced your fuel pump!
WHAT da F*CK came to my mind, we had never previously agreed for him to replace my fuel pump when I had the fuel leak from the short sharp bend L-shaped hose.
I made the mistake not questioning him why he replaced my fuel pump coz I trusted the guy like my own brother.
most of the time I take the old parts back with me to inspect them for wear n tear issues, unfortunately I forgot doing this for the fuel pump

by accident I found out maybe 2 - 3 years later that I had been robbed by my a$$hole friend.
I have to check my service records what year the pump was replaced.
I was 100% convinced that my former dirtbag buddy had robbed me for both carparts and money when he put the dagger in my back backstabbing me at the dealership last year.
he insulted me very rudely like the Judas he is infront of his work colleagues.
he was showing off in front of his colleagues that's why he stabbed me in the back like a kunt!
from that ugly incident at the dealership I was 100% sure that I was robbed for both parts and money because my shady buddy also had put on an ugly grin on his face at the time when he insulted me at the dealership.
the same ugly grin he had put on his face while telling me he had my pump replaced.
I didn't see this coming from him that my former mechanic buddy had turned into a nasty backstabbing Judas traitor.

unfortunately swedish cops are very incompetent!
they don't make investigations for petty crimes being reported, petty crimes in Sweden are most of the time a write off!
swedish cops won't waste time on petty crimes.
all crimes, small or big crimes are important to report to the cops for investigation, however some crimes are just a of waste time for swedish cops and that is the scam of my fuel pump and other things my former mechanic buddy snatched from my car.

your Mr. President uttered these famous words last year - Look what happened in Sweden last night.
most swedish citizens don't have any faith or trust in swedish police solving crimes.
in some cities Sweden has turned into Chicago with no-go zones - murder drive by shootings, drug dealing, rapes and all kind of other nasty sh*t!
criminals throws hand grenades on authority facilities blowing up facades.
jewish people are afraid to go outside getting attacked by neo-**** groups and other extremists groups from the middle east!
we are facing huge problems and it will take generations to resolve many problems.
Mr. P's uttered the very true words about look what happens in Sweden.

a simple answer to these society problem we have is when discrimination and alienation is allowed by politicians which many immigrants facing.
some people decide to live off in parallel societies within the society.
no workie - no monie, people has to earn a living, therefore some unscrupulous people decide to sell dope to live through the day.
Swedish cops can't keep up with this type of new breed lo' lives.

enuff with incompetent cops not doing their jobs properly, I'm only getting pi$$ed off just by thinking about these incompetent morons!

by now at the swedish dealership they all know what this guy did to my car snatching parts from me and scamming me for money.
I also wrote a thread on swedish MB forum and named the dealership's name and town where this a$$hole works in Sweden.
there are lots of MB people who works at the dealership who also are members on swedish MB forum.
by now this shady guy is talk of the dealership.

this is the reason why I did a thread about this lo' life scumbag to warn other people from him!
if we all look out for each other by sharing valuable information on car forums then we can avoid shady thieve and scoundrel shops
hopefully no-one else has to experience the ugly betrayal that happened to me.

when it comes to my former buddy, what comes around goes around!

I appreciate if people would share their experience with bad people or bad shops
thanx

j-mo

Wow! I just got back on this thread. This just is just awful. Greedy mechanics with no integrity. I feel like this is such a risky practice today with yelp and other online reviews. Also, I know some really honest mechanics or have known some and if they had more work than they knew what to do with. Good practices and honest - word gets around. They don't need to lie and cheat to make make money.

KJI3jflarryfe93

Manipulative and sneaky like the son of a jackal Damien666 in the Omen trilogy movies, this is what my former friend is Anti-Christ.

I found out he is an narcissistic pathological liar who loves to boast about how honest he is coz he's swedish.
He must have sniffed way to much asbestos dust changing brake pads at the swedish dealership, therefore his so-called honorable moral compass took a nose dive into a latrine full of hypocritical sh*t!
I loathe sanctimonious b*stards like my former friend!

You should hear him talk derogative about immigrants with Jewish descent or people from other countries where they live differently opposed to the western world.
What goes through his sick mind about some people will give you nightmares for life!
This is a sick, sick and very sick disturbed person when it comes to prejudicial preconceptions !
This guy needs a serious can of whoop-a$$ to set him straight.

My former buddy is nothing but a pi$$ant
I learned the hard way not to trust people anymore.

KJI3jflarryfe93

crooked slimy weasel laugh

Day Q

Scariest thing while driving. The steering wheel locked, battery signal msg on dashboard and car lost all power, all this while driving at 60-70mph on the freeway. The car would only go straight, almost impossible to gear the steering wheel to the right. To avoid an accident. I've own a c300, 2010 with less than 60,000 miles. After 3-4 yrs of having the vehicle, the serpentine belt had to be replaced once, around 1/18. Now, fast forward to 8/18 the belt just broke off again. This time with no warning. This is a death trap vehicle. I will never feel comfortable driving it again.

exhaustgases

I don't trust any car fix it places. I worked for a crook when I was a kid, he took good parts and replaced them with junk on others cars. I know someone that had his AC worked on and the outfit does their million point check out with a list of the thousands of dollars needed to fix the found problems. Funny 2 months later the alternator craps out and the battery connection for the main wires was not even finger tight. Now what about that check? Or sabotage to get more work?

GatorMB

Sorry to hear of all this grief from swindling. I did 15 plus years in auto service and felt bad each time a colleague or sales person judged a customer for profit or hood badge.
We are to judge no one.
You have hammered your so called friend pretty bad, doubt he will change but you can find better friends and fuel pumps are not worth sending in the troops.
These cars have a fair ratio of cost/value. The more you can do your self the better the value. Aging Benz are a money pit for non DIY people.
Good luck finding a reputable garage to service your car.

Gator