Well, it had to happen to someone, and that someone was me. I stopped by the dealer to pick up my license plate yesterday, and while I was waiting, my salesman offered to have the GL washed. Since I had gotten caught in a mini hurricane the night before, the GL was filthy, so I accepted. A short time later, a clean GL rolled onto the dealer's main entrance, and I got in. Much to my surprise, when I started the car, no A/C was blowing, and it was 90 degrees outside. I reached down and pressed the button marked AUTO and...nothing. I pressed every button as beads of sweat ran down my face and...still nothing. I went back inside and found my salesman who was finalizing a deal with some bigshot for an S600 and I pulled him out. He must have seen the look of desperation on my face and promptly excused himself from his meeting. I took him out to the GL and he tried every button on the blank, dark panel with the same results. He went and got a service guy who pressed every button...well, you know the rest. Long story short, I had to leave my beloved GL at the dealer and drive home in a (gasp) Ford Fusion loaner . Apparently the panel became inoperable and only a small amount of hot air blew out of the vents. The GL is 3 weeks old and has 350 miles on it. I may have just established a record for the shortest amount of time/miles before a problem developed. I think I'm gonna cry.

 

but I would switch dealers...can't imagine they would put you in a Fusion 3 weeks after your taking delivery of your GL from them-that's reason enough for you to switch. My 2000 wagon still warrants a C or ML loaner when I go for service...

 

Neodoc, I feel for you. My GL is in for repair too as we speak. I hope mine is an isolated case and hope all of you GL owners still enjoy this SUV. Here are my problems:

My airmatic apparently developed dual ride personality, one the regular "good" ride and one with a very very stiff "hard" ride as if theres no suspension at all. It just change its ride characteristics sometimes within minutes of driving and sometimes within hours. Its hard to predict. I always use the same roads and freeways so I know how the typical suspension will traverse them. I know something is wrong with my GL ride. When its on "hard" ride, nobody can tolerate it even my friends who drives jeep wrangler and porche and trucks. Its that bad. At first, turning the engine off and opening the driver's door puts it back to "normal: ride mode. But now doing so didnt reset whatever it is that controls that airmatic air. I never raised my suspension and even if it did, it will go back to its normal height beyond 45mph. My interiors shakes like crazy with all the popping and cracking noises all over the place.

I took my GL to Las Vegas last weekend with the family. My entire 4 hours of driving back and forth is like driving a third world vehicle. We bounce so hard together with loud rattles and squeeks mainly from the sagging ceiling panel. The whole trip was a big disappointment. First time I had that long drive bad experience. My ceiling now sags permanently and keeps on rattling even when its on "good" ride personality. I am very disappointed Dealer is still trying to fix it. I got a C-class loaner which I never use.

 

Wow. Now that concerns me. I was really hopeful that MB was putting their quality and reliability troubles behind them. So far so good on my end. But I'm just 1200 miles in.

 

I am just about 75 to 80 days into the life of my GL450 and have already experienced two problems, which have required replacement parts with a 10+ day lead time from Germany.

The first problem occurred after about 500 miles and involved faulty electrical surrounding the air bag. The result was a warning light, which prompted a swift return to the dealer followed by a 10-day wait to get a replacement part from Germany. We received a c230 rental while we waited.

The 2nd and current problem occurred after 1900 miles and involves a problem with the digital gear shifter (transmission). This problem represented itself with a loud beeping indicator and a bright red message stating to "return car to garage. Do not shift gears". Well, it turns out that my new GL450 would start, but would not allow me to shift in reverse or drive. After calling Mercedes roadside assistance, it turns out that this was NOT a common problem and the vehicle would need to be towed. Of course this required a special flatbed tow with special handling and with the California heatwave in effect, the back-up for two trucks was hours. Extremely painful experience as I had to order a cab for my family of 6 (including two baby seat toddlers), while I waited for 6 hours for a tow truck. Our weekend adventure to the coast was cut short and my new GL450 was rendered undrivable.

I had to wait until the following day (Monday) to speak to the service manager at the dealer and he did not have a good explanation. He basically aplogized and gave me a Chevy SUV rental while we wait for the GL.

After a voicemail from the dealer today, I am now in the process of waiting for a "part" to arrive from Germany, which is expected to take approximately 10 days. That will be 20-days total in the shop for a car that is less than 90 days old!

I am concerned about the potential for a lemon here. As you can imagine, my wife is not looking forward to taking the family on long drives any longer as she is fearful that the car may break down again. It is tough especially with 2 toddlers.

I am planning to take my purchase paperwork to the dealer this Saturday afternoon and speak to the general manager. I am going to demand a clear explanation of the unexpected issues that come from such a new automobile and would either like a replacement GL or at least some type of compensation.

I hope everyone here has better luck!

 

I can't believe what I'm reading there, first NeoDoc and all the waiting he (hell we all waited with him) for his GL now your problems, bobegilbert. Sounds like to me MB missed the quality on the R and GL, but someone did better with the ML. I hope MB makes this right for both of you and that there are no more problems. Someone was obviously out to lunch when these GL's were built.

M

 

I agree that for the kind of money we all paid for these vehicles, these problems I and a few others have had are unacceptable. I'm told that after the bad press the Alabama facility received with the early MLs, they have stepped up QC. That is mostly true, as the fit and finish on the GL is very good. I wonder, though, if Bubba the alignment tech and Billy Bob the A/C control unit installer were out havin' some 'possum and chitt'lins while mine was being built...LOL. No flames please. It's just a joke.

 

I have had my GL Premier Edition for 3 weeks now and I've already put 3k miles on it. I haven't had any issues with mine (sound of me knocking on wood). So far I've been quite impressed with it outside of a few faults that are design issues rather than failures or defects.

1. Can't park it straight even if my life depended on it. I am always canted 5 degrees to the left. I believe it has to do with the rake on the front side windows. My old SUV (family car) was a '04 Denali XL and I could park that beast with surgical precision.

2. I usually park 2 feet short because of the high nose. I always feel like I am going to bump something. Parktronic is a must in this car.

3. PE doesn't come with Distronic or Keyless Go.

4. No cargo net for the tailgate. I see a place where one can be attached but there isn't one available yet. I always have to crouch down and look into the trunk area to make sure stuff won't fall out when it opens.

5. Rear sunroof is hot despite the dark tint and the sunshade doesn't help much. I usually tint all of my moonroofs with limo tint to further cut out heat but my installer said that he couldn't do the rear moonroof because it's plexiglass! Can you believe that!

6. No side sunshades available. My 745Li and my wife's S500 have them but this "luxury family SUV" doesn't have them nor are they available. If you haven't noticed, there is a heat/solar control theme here. I live in central CA.

7. It's almost impossible to get stuff that falls into the cracks between and behind the 3rd row of seats. They fold but they don't lift up so when my kids drop stuff in there, I have a heck of a time getting the stuff out. To make matters worse, the 3rd row seats won't fold all the way if something is stuck in the cracks.

8. Brakes are hard to modulate, either too much assist or too little. Even after 3k miles, I am getting used to it but it still feels a little strange when I brake.

Outside of those details, the car has been flawless mechanically (sound of me knocking on wood a little louder). I hope you guys are experiencing isolated incidents rather than problems that will eventually affect everyone. Good luck guys!

 

I forgot to mention. These issues are nothing compared to some of the problems people had with the 2002 and early 2003 745L/Li. I have been very lucky because my late in the model year 2003 745Li hasn't had a single problem outside of a software update that was needed because of slightly rough shifting. The early 7s were so bad that BMW eventually extended the original warranty on all 2002 and 2003 7s to 6 years/100k miles. They even sent me a certificate for $1500 towards the purchase of a new 2004 745Li. The 1999 996 and the 2000 S class are examples of other 1st year cars that had issues galore.

My point is that 1st year cars are what they are. It's tough to resist them and when you do pull the trigger on one, you do so knowing there is some degree of risk in an unproven product.

Even my wife's 2005 S500 (which as you know is at the tail end of that particular S-classes life span) has been in the shop for the past 2 weeks because they had to replace the A/C evaporator, main Command system unit, and CD changer. I should get it back tomorrow assuming it's finally done. German cars are quickly becoming the new "English" cars for the very same reason that English cars always broke down. Bad electronics!

Good luck again guys! Keep posting updates for us future service and parts waiters.

 

True, because the antennas are under there...

https://mbworld.org/forums/m-class-w164/123914-couple-comments-questions.html

 

Well...this surely isn't something that I wanted to hear(!).

I have made it a 'religion' in the past not to buy a first-year car, but to wait until a year or so into the MY build cycle.

With timing being what it is, and with MBZ coming out with new models this year, I had decided to try a new S-Class, a new ML, and a new GL....

I still will - but the pucker-factor just went up 5 to 10 percent!

I am sorry to hear of your problems, guys.

Please continue to keep us posted; and thanks.

 

Interesting reading here.

I have hit the 3,700 mile mark and have enjoyed every mile of it. My GL has been in the shop 3 times but those were for dealer installed optional equipment.

If you are looking for a cargo net that keeps things from falling out you can buy the MB reversible cargo mat which has a leather part that folds out to protect the bumper from scrathes when loading and unoloading. When not in use the leather portion folds and straps atach to the sides and keeps items from falling out. I also bought the MB Cargo Net but do not use it that often because I like using the cargo mat instead.

I am looking to purchase the luggage cargo dividernet that comes standard on the PE model. It seems that they are not selling it at as an option yet. If anyone has one that they would like to sell please let me know.

I also finally found a custom hitch maker that will fit a Class4 trailer hitch for my GL. MB does not have one available at this time.

~Mel

 

Hi, Mel:

I may be wrong, but it is my understanding the the trailer hitch on my GL is indeed a Class IV. Although mine came standard, I would bet that the dealer installed hitch would be the same one as mine. I use mine to pull my motorcycle trailer and I don't even know it's back there. I would recommend that you look into it before buying something else that may be more expensive. Good luck.

 

I may be wrong as well but I was told by a couple of dealerships that the MB trailer hitch is incredibly expensive if you don't get it from the factory. In fact, I was told my one dealer that it couldn't be done because of the uni-body construction. I don't remember the towing capacity of the GL but I would imagine that the factory hitch should handle max towing capacity without issues.

Thanks for the tip on the rear mat. I didn't realize that it flipped up and could be stored in that position. As an added benefit it would protect the rear plastic on the tailgate. May I ask what rear net you purchased? My dealer said that there is a floor net available but not a rear cargo net to keep things from falling out.

 

Mine came with a floor to ceiling cargo net that neatly folds in half and into a self-contained pouch. One snaps it open, hooks it on the metal loops behind the rear or middle seats with some seatbelt looking straps, and then hooks rods into the receiver pockets in the headliner. By adjusting the tension on the straps, it can be held tightly in place, keeping objects and pets in the cargo area, without blocking one's rear view. I hope they make this an accessory for every GL because it's quite useful.

 

NeoDoc -

Is the net you are referring to the one that comes with the premium P1 package? Thanks for the clarification as I have a GL450 premium P1 on order.

 

I'm not sure if that cargo net is the one I have. However, I was able to find it on the Build Your Own section under accessories. It is listed as the Luggage Divider Net that sells for $259 USD. Hope this helps.

 

Yes, my PE came with that very same net. For some reason, they refer to it as a "cargo net" on the window sticker. A more appropriate term for it would be "cargo divider".