BudC

This was a used car. No one has checked it's history (that's the first thing the guy should have done before he leased the car). I can't understand how anyone would buy a used car that appears to have been a demo or possibly a buy-back w/o doing a background check on it.

After this event occured, I would check the car's maintenance history too. Somewhere there's got to be a dirtly little secret about this car.

Jakpro1

Yes true...granted.

However, I know everyone thinks the same thing as you are sitting behind the flatbed trucks with the bed right at "head chopping level", thank GOD for my brakes.

Bottom line, we can debate this forever, but SBC is toast on the E Spring 06 and slowly will be phased out in all models. Benz would not have spent tens of millions to just drop it...something is wrong. If it revolutionized the industry, they would slap it on all models and all other makers would follow suit. No biggee.....just didn't work as consistently as they thought.

Honestly, I love mine...no complaints and no worries when driving. I trust Benz...whatever comes after will rock for sure.

BudC

One thing I'll always wonder about is what if there was no fail-safe system that reverted to back-up when it thought there was a problem? I wonder how many times the real failure was the fail-safe system. In other words, is this system crying wolf more than it should?

Maybe there are situations where the fail-safe system should display a message saying slow down and stop w/o shutting down the system. Of course a power failure will cause SBC to go to back-up but then nothing on these cars work when there is no electrical power.

I really hate these drive-by-wire vehicles. As an example, if you do have a brake failure, you can't simply pull the shift lever back to low, you have to tap the lever sideways to work your way down to a lower gear. My wife didn't even know that's how you have to downshift these cars.

I bought the E320 in part because I wanted my wife to have a reliable car if something should happen to me. It turns out that the reliable car is our 1991 300E.

So what do you buy today that isn't an electronic marvel? I don't know what it is. The new diesels are even more complicated than the gas engines.

JimPurdy

I think the good news is that the electronic system do check themselves and report malfunctions to the driver before the driver notices a problem. This is a great safety feature for me.

BudC poses the question of what cars aren't drive-by-wire anymore. I don't think you can find a car that doesn't have multiple computers to control just about everything in the car. The engine management systems of all cars are now computer controlled. Whether it is throtle-by-wire or a sensor like the MAF that sends a signal to the computer, the fuel flow, fuel distribution, and ignition is controlled by one or more computers. Good news and bad. Fuel economy and engine efficiency is better but any failure will shut you down.

The post by DJ about his total failure of the braking system is quite interesting. This would indicate that the manual system was what failed and the SBC sensed the loss of brake fluid. The question I would ask is what other car would have sensed this failure before the driver hit the brakes and noticed the failure.

calum

Is that confirmed? I've seen rumours of this, and also a lot of comments saying that such a major change would never be done in a facelift.

For me, I find the SBC works perfectly when driving, and I never even think about it. However, I really struggle when crawling along. I need to inch my way up my driveway, very close to the wall (so the wife doesn't graunch my paintwork with her A class) and I find it impossible to "inch" smoothly. I let the pedal off as gently and slowly as possible, and there's an almost digital transition from stationary to going too fast for my liking, and similarly when applying the pedal.

Is it just me?

vraa

Doesn't the BMW 3er come with some features of SBC?

BudC

Yup, and it looks like it's got it's own problems..
http://bimmer.roadfly.com/bmw/forums/e90/6820146-1.html

vraa

Wow that is a really really dangerous problem!
I would think the braking systems would have the most reliabilty!

BudC

There's a very long thead about this problem and not everybody is buying into it.

Anyway, if Mercedes replaces the SBC pump with a normal vacuum brake system, it won't necessarily eliminate the potential for problems. Maybe that's why Mercedes dropped things like soft stop from US models.

I think I'd avoid buying into a new brake system until we know it's not going to have it's own set of problems.

Spartan

Fazooley, DJe55 and myself,

Now that is 3, REPEAT, 3 members who had COMPLETE BRAKE FAILURE.....and no deaths....YET! And if there was any deaths, did the people know that they died because of brake failure?

How many members are there with SBC on this board? 500? 1,000? 2,000? Three in 2,000? Think about it.

I am not a Mercedes test driver and if I have a recurrence, I am not going to be so nice next time around. Money back and hello BMW....

baubaulu

If the the driver is dead because of SBC failure, how could he report to us? Will his family report the error to Mercedes Benz? Will they post the message in this website?

So how will we know the death rate about the SBC failure.

CE750

Lets calm down now... if there were ANY deaths from SBC failure, there would be a major DOT effort to recall the cars and repair the failure. Last checked the death rate in an E-class was the lowest of ANY car sold in the US, so enjoy your car.. and if your brakes ever do fail, stomp on them with both feet, and the car WILL stop.

NATS64

I normally drive the W211, but today I drove the W210. I have to say i like the brakes on the W211 the best. I don't have any of the problems reported by people on this forum. The cost of service is the only drawback I can see.

baubaulu

Do you mean step the "foot break and the middle break"?