JakeInTampa

So is there any legal action taken by those who's engine seized without any warning of low oil/change oil/maintenance time like me?
is it worth keeping dead car in hopes of successful class action against them? i know they are being sued for alleged misrepresentation of emission reading ala VW, but this whole Bluetec failure is another story.

krd2023

Welcome to the club (and sorry to hear!). Not aware of a class action yet. What are the details of your debacle?

JakeInTampa

about 10K on oil change. No indicator of low oil/oil pressure, no maintenance required . Car just stopped in the middle of the street.
Took to the shop and there isn't any oil in it. None. Dry dry dry. The tech was surprised "where did the oil go"?

smiledr996s

I have an 08 cdi with 183k I do try to stay up to date and probably go overboard on preventative maintenance. Which costs a lot since I have a Indy do all work except oil changes. I just dropped almost 2k today 🥴. But have new control arms and steering rack and other front suspension components.

What i do often is check my oil level. And change every 7500. Curious if they stopped making dipsticks available on the newer models? I know my wife has a q5 with no dipstick. No reason to run dry if checking regularly, other then catostrophic leak.

Steve

nelbur

Did you have the engine opened up? It is possible that the oil is gelled and still in the pan. The dip stick would likely come out clean if it is wiped and inserted into gelled oil. Some of the pictures of gelled oil, I believe on this site, are hard to understand.

JakeInTampa

Probably is and dealership will play the weasel out game and say "You used wrong oil, you need it to change more often".

What bugs the sh*t out of me is that I bought this car for my wife so she can take it for service when stupid warnings tells her to. On mine, none did. Not oil pressure low, not low oil, no maintenance required. I guess some asshat set it too high .. BTW, how do I check when its due?

The other thing is the power in the car is draining fast. i turn the key and its clicking sounds like low voltage. Guys at the shop said batteries are at normal level.

OM617.95

10k OCI on any car engine is absurd. 8k MAX for modern engines. 5k, even with synthetic, for anything older than 2005.

JakeInTampa

Then set up "oil change" for people like my wife every 5K. Why do they preach otherwise?
http://www.mbscottsdale.com/blog/whe...mercedes-benz/
"Modern automobile engines run much cleaner than older models and typically will only require an oil change every 10,000 miles or so when synthetic oil is used. "
When we bought the car this is all we heard.. Blah blah blah.. once a year... blah blah..

OM617.95

Marketing and minimizing cost of ownership. The goal of car sales is to reach the warranty expiration with minimum of cost, to the manufacturer, dealer and owner.
With 10k vs 5k OCI the cost of service/ownership is halved, and most cars still have a high chance of reaching their expected lifespan (warranty).
But, beyond that doesn't matter to the manufacturer or dealerships. Manufacturers make money selling new replacement cars and dealerships make money repairing expired cars (BMW is famous for this).

Which is what 99% of car buyers hear.

smiledr996s

Oil analysis is a must. With my cdi and q5 7500 is pushing it according to the reports I recieve. So yes the 10k interval is bull****. Esp now that the majority of cars are turbocharged, they just run hotter. Even worse with diesels due to emission regulations the oil is even less protective from mile 1. Not to mention the crap the egr puts into the oil and intake, which is why so black. Oh and 5w30 is ridiculous if you live in a hot/humid climate, but better gas mileage at the expense of the engine.

I have tune so dpf deleted deleted and egr is turned off. So I can use a better protecting oil. I have been tempted to try rotella but have stuck with liqui moly. I received the best reports and the formula I use is a 229.5 spec. I am sure with a designer motor cycle oil and changing the viscosity with the weather would help even more. But cost and complexity of our weather changes in Louisiana deter me. I have mentioned before my oil is no longer black. Which can make it harder to check on the dipstick, as not as clear as when was pitch black. 🤔

I was surprised when I sent in an oil sample for my daughters 2010 Jetta. 5 cyl na engine. As my oil reports are usually marginally good. This car had 90k on the engine and 7500 on the oil. Black stone had reported the analysis was great the engine showed now wear and I should extend my oil change. So I plan to go for a 10k sample to see what they say.

My long point is to do an oil anysis to get a baseline of oil change interval and to see if the oil is actually protecting the engine. When I changed to the liqui moly from the Castrol turbo diesel 5w40 ( which I started when mobile one 5w40 was discontinued) my iron levels ( engine wear) dropped dramatically. Unfortunately I did not sample the 5w40 Mobile 1 to compare. Otherwise you have no idea what is actually going on with the engine. Since my reports have been pretty boring on my om642. I will probably go to every other oil change. Mostly to pick up an engine issue such as coolant/fuel problem. My biggest concern has been a higher copper level. I am guessing coming from the turbo bearings. Will rebuild if ever pull for intercooler seals or if it gives performance issues.

Edit. I forgot to mention that my gl320cdi see a wide range of usage from short city driving mostly to long 1+ hr trips ( not included the return)once or twice a week.

JakeInTampa

And they should be held accountable for this "marketing". I mean its not even implied or expressed warranty, its written. In manuals, on their websites. When you buy 70K car you shouldn't be worried about testing oils, checking quality of filters they put in. You have those expensive "smart computers" that should tell you "Low oil pressure" or "time to change oil". I can't expect my wife or my college kid to know what most people on this forum know. To them its just a car.
This is the first time I'm facing this crap. I've driven Jaguar, BMW, Lexus, RR and none had this sort of problem. Out of all MB?

arto_wa

Yes, sure...

JGR350BlueTec

Just an FYI since there has been much discussion regarding litigation - there is an ongoing class action suit which was filed in 2016 related to emissions on these engines:


https://www.hbsslaw.com/cases/merced...etec-emissions


Perhaps one of the aggrieved parties on this forum wish to reach out to the law firm to discuss the apparent engine failure problem to see if they are interested in pursuing that issue as well.

dave2001auto

how is it in Europe, the OCI is 15000 to 20000 miles?
The oil filters are tiny in size but seem very clean at 5000 miles on the oil at 110,000 miles on the engine. The oil mb 40 weight is very thin.
the 6V diesel also leaks oil😖
i have no indication of oil gelling (visual on lower oil pan change and looking at chain down the oil filler).

kajtek1

I read the link and the litigation is about "not delivering what was promised"
You can sue every single US car manufacturer for exactly the same.
Then when article says the high emission happen on cold engine, at the end it says that harmful chemicals forms in high temperatures only.
I am not making fool of myself adding my name.

Tj12

I see this is an older thread but curious if you had any success with Mercedes. Our 2010 GL350 motor just seized with 130k miles. We've always kept up on maintenance, etc.

JGR350BlueTec

Perhaps this article will help to clarify the exact nature of the litigation.

https://www.businesswire.com/news/ho...g-Class-Action

kajtek1

Same thing in different wording.
Doesn't say MB broke any emission laws.

JRoberts

What is happening with all this? I this last weekend had my 2013 GL 350 Blutec completely died in the middle of the freeway while traveling 75mph. It has 78,000 miles on it. It was serviced and maintained at the very same dealership I purchased it from. I kept excellent care of the vehicle. All service was performed on time. There were multiple things that had to be fixed over the last couple of years. I had its regular service completed 1 week prior to the break down, and a "air intake" (engine light) issue fixed at the dealership 5 days prior to the breakdown. It was somewhere between 100-200 miles from the dealership post repair and service when the engine locked.

kajtek1

Hi JRoberts. Welcome to the forum and sorry for the circumstances.
From what I read about OP troubles, he just gave up on potential litigation and let things go.
But in your case, I would take the car to independent, but MB-specializing shop for evaluation what really happen. Don't let them dispose motor oil.
There is some indication that MB dealers put wrong oils in those engines and if you get independent inspection confirming that - you will have a hook.
Good luck.

JGR350BlueTec

Hello JRoberts

Unfortunately your story seems to have lots of company. And the stories all seem to be very similar - dealer maintained, by the book, relatively low mileage, recently serviced driving down the highway when all of a sudden - bham, engine seizes.

This is exactly what happened to the original owner from whom I purchased my R350. Fortunately for him it was still under warranty when it happened and the dealer installed a reman. engine. I continue to drive it and hold my breath.

I suspect that there maybe enough of these engine failures to support a class action lawsuit. If the number of reported engine failures seems high just on these boards it must represent a very small fraction of total engine failures as I doubt the majority of MB owners spend their time on message boards.

However, any legal action would require an aggrieved individual to spearhead it.

kajtek1

I would not jump on class action suit without knowing what is actually happening. Don't try to be ambulance chaser.
If specific dealer was maintaining the engine with wrong oil, it is the specific dealer that could be on the hook for the engine failure.
No base for class action.

JGR350BlueTec

I am starting to get the sense that you actually work for MB. You really believe that all these different and completely unrelated dealers are using the wrong oil? They are using the oil MB told them to use. If it is the wrong oil its MB's fault not theirs.

Just wait until it's your engine that seizes and we will see if you remain so circumspect.

DanD.

I'm watching this thread for a long time as Im OM642 engine owner with 91K miles on it, doing all cervices by myself.

I believe I newer posted here, till now.

Sorry to all who lost their engines/cars. This is sad and very frustrated for sure.

I have a few questions just to understand and maybe found commonality.

1. When was the last oil change before your engine seized?
If possible get the oil analysis with TBN, just to know if there are any additives left in the oil, maybe dealer decided to skip this change. It happened before and will happen again.
Previous oil analysts if available will help to see the pattern in engine wear.
By the book every 10K miles, one of the analysis I received after 3K showed TBN = 5 where 1 considered very low, so Im not sure if 10K interval is Ok for this engine/oil.

2. Where is most of your driving? City/ highway?
If car idle a lot metals wear is very high and oil better be fresh.

3. When was the last time owner checked the oil level?
I understand, we shouldn't do that and car should tell us if oil level or pressure is low. But ...

4. When was the last time air filters were changed? This engine likes to breeze, bu book its every 40K but we all know its all about where car used.

4. What was the outside temperature?

5. What was the speed and duration?

kajtek1

My engine OM642 did seize due to sucking some water and I am not blaming Stuttgart for this
Out of curiosity I took the engine with 180,000 miles apart and beside need for cleaning intake flaps, I did not see why the engine would not make it to million miles.
That is why I tend to believe that it takes major screw -up to kill this engine, but my engine was pre-DEF version, when all those reported seized are newer models, so maybe there is a difference?
Sounds to me you don't understand that Stuttgart MB headquarters are not responsible for US Joe putting not recommended oil.