Hi, my 2011 GL550 (184k miles) gets an intermittent "ESP inoperative / check your operator's manual" error on startup. There are no noticeable symptoms other than the warning light and the steering column makes a bit of a grinding noise when adjusting steering wheel / column height. The car drives fine. The error goes away when I turn off and restart the car. It looks like the previous owner replaced the Steering Angle Sensor 2 years/10k miles ago.

Any insight is appreciated.

I scanned and reset codes with iCarsoft scanner and these are the codes that come back:
DTC 5035 - No CAN Message Was Received from Control Unit N80 (Steering Column Module). DTC Status stored
DTC 9065 - No CAN Message Was Received from Control Unit ABR (Adapthive Brake) or ESP. DTC Status stored
DTC C126 - No CAN Message Was Received From Control Unit N80 (Steering Column Module) Are not Available on the CAN Bus. DTC Status stored

 

I will check on the air steering column for integrity ,any loose panels or missing fasteners.

ESP can be triggered off for a variety of reasons, one of them is a steering angle sensor failing… Who knows what quality part prior owner used.

Other reasons for having this would be failing wheel speed sensors or ESP/ABS ecu errors.