My wife was driving my 2001 320 4matic in town while I was overseas last week. She stopped for a red light and the car stalled and all the warning lights came on. It took her five minutes to get it restarted (after giving the bird to all the folks who were honking at her). All the lights but the check engine light went out. She drove home and parked the car. Today, I went out, fiddled with the gas cap, got in the car and it ran like a charm. Question--Why did it stall in the first place? I am sure all the warning lights (her words) came on becasue the engine was not running, so I am not worried about that, but why would it just stall? It was 12 degrees out, but that should not affect the car. Any ideas? Should I take it to a shop and can they tell me anything if it is running ok now? My worry is that it might stall again, like on the interstate when I am going about 80....thanks.

 

time to trade her in and get a new one... teh car, not the wife of course!

 

Fuel system is pressurized. A loss of pressure in the fuel system may cause the engine to be not able to obtain as much fuel as it would like. Your fiddling with the gas cap to the petrol tank may have rectified this matter.

 

I love the car, it only has 68,000 milles on it. My wife has more than that. Trade in would be a toss up. I need a better suggestion about the car.

 

Can a good mechanic, not a dealer, see what the problem might have been? Or if it is now driving fine, do I just keep going?

 

drive it around and see if everythings ok..........and i mean you should drive it, not the wife.....then if theres any problems take it to a independant benz shop or tech

 

you most likely have a bad cps sensor its a comon problem of w210's behind engine part is like 45 bucks i think but not positive not hard to do yourself

 

Look like your CPS is about to be gone. Eventually, you'll see that problem happen more and more frequent.

 

Car stalled on me last night at a stoplight. Drove it straight to my trusty mechanic. He just called to say the computer said it was my Crank Shaft Position Sensor, I assume that is what CPS is from the posts above.. %114 for the part, couple hundred for the labor, covered by my extended warrenty. Should be good to go. It is not a nice feeling to have your car stall, and for it to take a while to re-start...I get to keep my wife now...

 

You might want to replace that "trusty" mechanic. Took my mechanic less than 10 min to replace. Even book manual (dealer use to quote job) specify that it's a 1 hour labor.

I paid $70 for the labor, and that's include checking for everything else in the car.

 

You might be right. The actual bill came to under $200, still cost me 100 deductable with my long term coverage policy.

On the other hand, I cannot fix it my self, mechanically challenged as I am, but I trust this guy, and in NJ that is saying something. He has sent me back to the dealer to fix stuff that was covered under the original warrenty, that he could have fixed and charged me for with me being none the wiser.

I am impressed that foks on this board diagnosed the problem so quickly and so well. I just wish MB did not make a car that has faults so well known.

 

On a side note: do you really believe this to be any different with any other brand?! These kind of problems mostly turn up after years, when the engine or entire car isn't being produced anymore. And I guess these faults are only 'so well known' by us enthousiasts...

 

Look, I love my car, I think it is as well engineered as any car can be. My last car was an Acura RL. I had it 6 years and never did a thing to it but change the oil, for six years!. but i traded it in because it was a MB look alike and not the real thing. I got what I wanted in the MB, but the persistant little things like the windows going down and not back up, the temperature sensor, the antilock brake sensors, now the CPS, is just more than should be expected. Desigened perfectly, built less than perfectly is what i am saying.