New owner of a 2010 GL550 w/ the optional on/offroad package. Today I had a chance to take an in-person first look at the car after buying and shipping it from another province.

played with a few of the buttons and dials, one of which was the dia to raise/lower the suspension. This dial is specific for the on/offroad package. Question for those who have or have had any experience with an X164 or W164 w/ said optional package: how long should it take for the suspension to move up one notch (there are three horizontal indicators on the dial)? With the car running, not on perfectly level surface, AT in Park, suspension in comfort mode, I dialed up one notch (it was on lowest) and the second indicator started flashing. The pump kicked in and was on for a solid minute, if not longer. The car was noticeably higher (front seemed higher than rear, but this could be just my eyes; I did not measure). Not knowing how long it should take and thinking that the pump may be working overtime, I dialed it back and the car lowered, and the second indicator line stopped flashing.

I would think a minute would be more than sufficient for the car to move up sufficiently to satisfy the "second mark" height. The system is working at least to an extent with the car rising/lowering. I also tested comfort/sport mode and the car visibly moved up/down, respectively.

Also, how long should the suspension take to reach from second (middle) to third (highest) mark on the dial?

This is the first vehicle with air suspension in the family. I have not seen the car before and don't know if it has done the same before I saw it today. It was sold to me by a dealer (another major brand, not MB). I would like to reserve questions to the dealer until I know more about how the system should behave. It is questionable how much they might know about the MB Airmatic.



Edit: the photo is not from my car, but depicts the dial I was referring to. The other dial to the right is for locking the diffs, which was set to Auto in my case.

 

I have a GL 450 with this package.

The step from L2 to L3 can seemingly take forever - i've found that raising while moving/rocking the car back and forth, that seems to shorten the raise cycle time.

If your compressor is weak you will see no difference raising while stationary or moving.

 

Thanks for this! The compressor was doing its job raising/lowering, I just didn't think it would take so long to move the car up one level with the dial. FWIW, coming down was much quicker when I dialed it back, and moving from comfort to sport to comfort took a reasonable time to my untrained eye. I will play with it again, this time with increased patience.

 

and a stopwatch.

 

Update to this thread. It seems like this issue was related to a seized front height sensor linkage. After fixing it the heights are reached within approximately 10 sec for every notch with the manual dial.

Only took a month to find the problem.

 

Good! Those sensors send the signal that tells the compressor to end process when the selected level is reached.
If seized or maladjusted the process never ends.