Good morning guys, long time lurker but finally pulled the trigger and got a 2011 E550 4matic!

I recently purchased the car (picking it up on the 7th). It's a 2011 E550 with 98,000km it has the star certified warranty for another couple months, car was bought and services at the original dealership(which I purchased from) 2 older gentleman were the previous owners. The dealership offered me the ELW on it for 3650 for the 36 month/160,000km.

My ultimate question is should I purchase that extended warranty or am I better off putting that 3650 in an interest account and if needed use it for repairs I plan to have this car for a good amount of time.

I read about the rear suspension and swapping them for the arnott, I live in Canada so I'm not to sure about individual vendors.

thanks again for your time

 

I just bought an E550 with 65k on it last week and it was a no brainer for me. It may also just be piece of mind, but I want to be covered as long as possible and Merc repairs aren't cheap.

 

I bought my E-Class new, but if I was buying used or CPO, I'd opt for the warranty. Just one major repair would cost more than the warranty does.

 

Congrats on your new ride! The ELW sounds like a 3rd party offering. I would find out what is covered, the company's reputation, etc. Before buying the warranty I would shop around. If it's a good deal, and you like peace of mind (I do) buy one that best fits your needs.

 

Thanks! I've contacted the dealer and it's manufactured extended warranty directly from MB

 

I would say check the extended warranty discussion forum. That price seemed high, but then again, that might be the right price for Canada. I think in the US it's typically in the 3k range from the dealer and then the ones that discount in the forums are about $2k. Not sure if there's a dealer that discounts like that in the forum or if you can just call around to other dealers across Canada to find one that discounts it more. I've fixed a few things on my car cheaply, but it would have been nice to have the dealer do it. I'm hoping it's a wash, but if you to the dealer for all work, it's probably better to get the warranty. One recent fix I did was the console cover, had an indy do it for me, it was broken and we ended up taking the whole thing apart to get it to clip back into place. Was well under $100 for the fix as I did it as part of replacing the faded wood trim. That fix would probably have been $500+ from the dealer. I also have a bad seat heater and a bad temperature sensor that I haven't gotten around to replacing yet.

 

Get the warranty.


You have the 4Matic and there has been some issues with the transfer case bearings that cannot be repaired. Requires the whole transmission replacement for repair.

 

All the 4MATIC will have this issue ??


Usually at what mileage ??

 

It doesn't seem to be very common but transfer case, differential and transmissions could go and those are usually at least several thousand in repairs. But you don't really read about it too often in the forums so it might be rare.

 

I got an extended warranty through Carmax when I bought my 2011 E550 4matic. It was about $3k for 6 years of coverage up to 100k miles. I was worried about airmatic and other expensive fixes. About two years in, I used it for a headlight repair (bi xenon was cutting out as auto high beam feature was not working) and control knob fix. Parts and labor was just over $2.5k. So I've gotten some use with almost 4 years to go. Spending over $2k to replace a headlamp was not something I expected at all. These cars are crazy expensive to repair.

 

The bixenon headlamp is about $550 on rockauto, the regular halogen one is about $220. There's actually a video online about how to repair the control knob, it was somewhat helpful in taking apart the entire center console assembly to fix my broken cover. Someone sells a $40 part so you can just repair the control knob instead of replacing it. You can get a new control knob for around $200.

 

I think someone already recommended it to you, but hit the "extended warranty" sub-forum for a list of sympathetic stealers selling Merc ext warranties at very competitive prices. You may save yourself some big $ if you go that route.

When I asked a former Merc owner (non-s/c'd E55) about his experience, he started off by saying "well it's not a Lexus." That said, I'm happy to report that I haven't gotten my money's worth out of my ext MB warranty if you get my drift... but I've still got ~18mos to go.

 

I paid $1650 for a 2 year extended on my 2013 E550. I would expect a 3 year to be more in the range of $2100; all USD of course.

 

I would have done the control knob myself that was pretty straightforward with the video and all. but I was waiting for something else to go to use my warranty and it didn't take long. The headlight was not straightforward as it wasn't clear if it was the ballast or assembly itself. Used oem headlights were going $500ish while new ones were over $1,000. Since I don't have diagnosis tools or care to drop the bumper myself to remove headlight, someone was getting paid to do this anyway.