cmb13

Folks,

We have an e350 4matic wagon, purchased new about a year or two ago (right when the new wagon came out). The car is just terrific in all ways, except one.

It seems you have to floor it to get it to downshift. It is quite annoying, dangerous even, when merging onto a busy road or highway. I have to keep pushing the pedal harder and harder, and it just seems to stay in a high gear unless I floor it.

I have had many cars, some sports cars, some luxury sedans, and I don't ever remember one feeling this unresponsive. Is there a way to change this? Reprogram? I'm not trying to drive aggressively, I just expect that if I'm, say, 50% on throttle, it would kick down a gear or two.

Thoughts?

thekurgan

Do you have the Economy/Sport button? I found the sport button dropped into the lower gears faster, and also held the rpm higher for a longer period of time.

ttoE550

Here is the issue as I understand it: The transmission learns from your way of driving, and responds accordingly. So if nearly all of your driving is sedate, the transmission is sedate. In a sense, the transmission doesn't know that 50% throttle means you want to "get up and go."

Hitting the E/S (or maybe C/S) helps, but is not entirely satisfactory to me.

In my car, I can do a very quick double pump to about 50% power, and it will go down a gear. I can maintain speed, and the tranny will hold the lower gear for maybe 3 seconds or so. If it then goes to a higher gear, then for a while (don't know how long) all it takes is another single 50% pump to get it back into the lower gear. Or if it has not gone back to the higher gear, another single pump will put it another gear down and the car gets really "jumpy" (very responsive to the throttle).

What I don't know is whether every one's transmission behaves this way, or if somehow I have "taught" the tranny that a double pump means I am not screwing around. In my personal experience, talking to the tranny with my foot is a lot more convenient and even faster than hunting for the E/S button as well as more effective.

Another trick if you have paddles is to hold the left paddle for about a second. The car will go into the lowest gear possible given the speed of the car. When you have completed the pass, then hold the right for about a second to go back to the normal gear. The car will shift near redline, so there is no need to worry about running out of gear in the middle of your pass.

I love this tranny except for one feature: It will sometimes downshift in the middle of a turn, which is the 550 is not desirable!

K-A

For whatever reason, my current E's tranny and motor are very snappy and immediate. Can't complain about that. Much more-so than my previous E's I feel.

BTW, I'm not sure but I think M-B states to "not change from E to S or vice versa while driving in motion", i.e you're "supposed" to do it while stopped.

ttoE550

The manual is loaded with ridiculous cautions that must've been written by lawyers. Some are so funny that my wife and I busted up when I read them to her.

If they meant it, they would block it. I've raised my car (Airmatic) at speed and switched from E to S at speed, and so far I have not experienced serious injury or even death!

Now if I were driving 150 mph on the autobahn or something, I think I would be more reluctant, but that's common sense.

Just joshing...

thekurgan

+1, not being able to use it while driving is ridiculous. If anything, if there is a throttle remap, you'd have to let up on the throttle completely for it to remap, but agree, I just hit the button when I need it and it's responsive.

BM2BZ

the "s" mode definitely helps but one of the members here had the dealer update the sw and it cured the problem.

burrito_bandito

i'm pretty sure you can "teach" these tranny's your driving style. there's a computer mounted right on the trans after all. sport mode helps, but can't you just manually downshift if you wanted to?

Arrie

Your car will not raise and it will automatically lower at high speed somewhere around 70 mph (110 km/h?).

Arrie

As others have mentioned S-mode helps but there is another way to help the situation. At least this worked on my 2011 E350 and it works on my current 2010 E550. Did this last night to verify and it does work.

This is about resetting the control module for the transmission. I understand it is a learning kind of a module that sets parameters based on your driving habits. It tunes the transmission for shift points etc, which seems it always tunes it down to less aggressive driving.

There is a lot of writing about this in the forum and that is where I originally found this.

One suggestion is to disconnect battery cable over night to reset the module. I personally would not do this.

Another is to find an open road or a very large parking lot without traffic and do a fast acceleration to 30 mph and let car coast down to 7 mph WITHOUT TOUCHING THE BRAKES and repeat it three times. Sounds complicated to me as it takes a very big parking lot or quite long road without other cars to perform.

But then there is this:

1. Get in the car and close all doors.
2. If you have Keyless GO remove the Start/Stop button from the dash.
3. Insert key and turn in position 2, i.e. ON position but do NOT start the engine.
4. Floor the gas pedal and hold at least 5 seconds. I held 10 s.
5. While holding the gas pedal down turn key to OFF. Do NOT remove the key.
6. Release the gas pedal and wait 2 minutes. Do NOT open doors or remove the key. Just sit and wait 2 minutes. TIME IT! (I waited 2 1/2 min).
7. Take key out, open door exit car and you are done.
8. Go test drive and enjoy!


Above works for me.

ttoE550

Well that's a possibility. I will have to try it. It makes sense from an aerodynamic perspective. Thanks!

cmb13

Wow, this is a great forum! Thanks for all of the responses.

With regards to the S setting, I hardly ever remember to press it. I am trying to do it every time I get in now. It still seems very sedate, seems as if it hardly does anything at all. I really wish it would default to the last setting, though, rather than back to C.

I have occasionally used the steering wheel shifters, but the problem is I really drive pretty conservatively, at least in this car. It is only on the occasion that I have to merge into traffic or want to beat a long yellow or something that I step on it some more, and seem to get absolutely no response.

The reprogramming of the software seems like a great option if they would do it.

Finally, I'll try the above tricks, maybe starting with the double pump of the pedal, then the 0-30 repeats, and lastly the above method of inserting the key to "2" and doing the above technique. I cannot imagine why this would work unless the tech guys at MB anticipated some would want to change the setting and provided a cheat intentionally.

Thanks for the responses!

BM2BZ

seriously ? most of us owe you big time if this works . by looking at your method, i assume i don't even need to worry about locking the door first or turn off both the a/c and music, right? i know the car won't move but floor the gas part freaks me out a bit .

Arrie

And why does the flooring the gas pedal freak you out? By the instructions the engine is NOT running while you do this.

When I do this I touch nothing else. I have my climate on AUTO and radio comes on to what ever it was left on. They run until I turn that key OFF and open the door.

And you do not owe me. You owe some other folks who posted this. I just dug it up again...

WEBSRFR

I do the same with my car with the double pump but I have a feeling the responsiveness you are talking about has more to do with your V8. Even in C mode with my usual sedate driving I can easily get quite a bit of acceleration without really stressing the transmission so much by simply engaging the throttle faster. I think with a 350 the effects of the car learning typical sedate driving to be a lot more pronounced...

As a rule if I need the best acceleration I always switch from C to S so to the OP I would recommend that you do your normal driving in C and then switch to S whenever you expect to do more spirited driving and the car will learn your throttle behavior in S mode.

WEBSRFR

I think the point is to not do all your driving in S mode if you drive most of the time like a normal and sane driver. In which case in the S mode the car is going to think you are a hundred year old grandpa and you are going to have the same problem. Drive with C and punch S when you need to. That's what I do and I get great throttle response. You might have to learn this but I think you will be better off. Out of habit, my right had is always close to the gear shifter so hitting S is almost second nature for me now.

I especially like the gentle nudge I feel when I am stopped at a traffic light and I hit S and the transmission downshifts from 2 to 1. It's like the car telling me: Do what you need to do, I'm with you all the way

BenzV12

I appreciate your humble message , kudos to you

BM2BZ

i know the engine is not running but just like walking on glass floor on top of some tall buildings, you know you won't fall but still freaks out a lot of people .

thanks for your time to dug it up for us again .

Kar don

To the OP: sounds like you are slowly digging into the pedal and getting no response. The computer reads pedal inputs and the rate of speed at which the pedal is depressed. This means if you ease into the pedal you are not likely to get a downshift; however, if you stab the pedal (pushing it down quickly) you will definitely get a downshift and more immediate power.

ttoE550

Ah, the long yellow! That's when you don't have time to screw around. But that's a case where I'd give it 100% throttle at least for a moment because I really do want to speed up (and not just get ready to speed up). In my experience, the car responds instantly.

I don't understand why it freaks people out to give a car 100% throttle. One of my cars (I forget which) had a physical button on the floor under the throttle. To induce a downshift, you had to floor the throttle to press the button. Click, Zoom! I think the engineers make this the universal sign for "Get moving!"

Yes, my 550 might be more responsive, but I can see the RPMs jump when I do the double-pump even though my speed does not change much. So it is a gear change too.

And as WEBSRFR recommends, do NOT put the car in S mode for every day driving. The car will learn that you don't really mean it, and it will not be different from E (or C) mode. You probably notice this after a couple minutes of driving - and over time, you will lose those couple of minutes.

cmb13

Interesting points. I guess I'm used to a stick (most of my cars have been stick), in which case I'm in the gear I want and can give any amount of throttle I need for more acceleration. My last car, for instance, the C6 Vette in the avatar, was so powerful if I floored it in that situation the rear end would break loose (even with traction control). I'm used to just nudging a little more out of the gas and getting a response. My current car (335i) is an automatic also, and it responds a lot more quickly than the MB (my wife's).

Funny the MB is quite capable, it's just that hanging on to a high gear unless floored that annoys me. Bottom line is that I really just like a stick!

ttoE550

I love driving manual transmissions too. I don't know why, but I just remember a typo Dave Barry found in some car magazine "There is nothing better than a well-timed shift." In the typo version, the f was missing.

Unfortunately, auto transmissions get more and more complicated with all the environmental regs and stuff. I suspect as well that not only does the car quickly go into the higher gears but also the accelerator goes into less aggressive mappings. These things probably increase mileage figures in testing but hamper normal drivers.

I drove a Viper once around a race track with no TC. I would not suddenly floor that car! In fact, it was pretty hard to keep the back end in the back just with bare touches of the throttle.