Hi All,
I’m a new member. I have been reading the forum for several months now (lurking). I’ve gained some good insights and enjoyed the discourse between all the members. Thank you. Unfortunately my first post is not to rave about my new MB but to get input from anyone who has had to have major repairs performed. I’ll say I was very happy with the car until the problems started. Let me outline my experience so far. At 2,120 miles the low engine oil warning appeared. I thought maybe sensor error, so I tried to check the oil the normal way, dipstick. However this car doesn’t have one. So I had no way to verify the error message except to have it checked at the dealer. Dealer told me sensor is fine, just a quart low on oil, nothing to worry about as it’s common for cars that are built and set for a long period of time (mine 6 months) before being sold. I thought BS but decided to not argue the point. I starting watching the oil consumption closely, 500 miles ¼ quart low, 1,000 miles ½ quart low. So it was using oil at a rate of 1 quart every 2,000 miles. At 4,340 miles almost a full quart low but no warning message yet. Saturday I drove across Phoenix and back, about 90 miles and when I pulled into the garage I thought I could hear a ticking sound coming from the engine. It was barely noticeable in the cabin but when I opened the hood and started it up, well it was either rods knocking or severe valve train issues. I scheduled a service appointment first thing on Monday morning, at the end of the day I was told they need to pull the engine and disassemble to determine the extent of the damage. Service rep told me they would replace all damaged parts and put it back to together, I refused this solution, as I will not accept a rebuilt engine from the dealer mechanic. I told them there was 2 acceptable solutions. 1. Complete new engine from the factory or 2. Curtesy buy back of the car. They next day they told me the original engine had catastrophic damage and was unrecoverable and they had ordered a complete new engine. It would arrive in 2 days. After 3 days I called for a status update. Was told the engine arrived but the mechanic had damaged the flywheel and had to order a new one. Again 2 days for the part to arrive. Called for status update after 3 days and was informed the flywheel arrived and they installed the new engine. The alternator was not communicating and they had to order a new one, again 2 days delivery for this part. Called 3 days later to check the status, was told new alternator arrived but is also experiencing the same issue, not communicating. They now tell me they have ordered a new ECU. This part is back ordered until 7/18/2020. 6 more weeks without my new car.😡 During all this time I had a loaner but had to return it to the dealer because of a check engine light. 2nd loaner has a fuel filler cap error message that keeps appearing and the cap is tight. Will exchange this loaner when they have another loaner ready. 😰

When the service department first told me the engine was bad and it would be disassembled and rebuilt. I called MB USA and created a complaint/concern report. They were very empathetic to my experience and logged the issues. A MB USA customer advocate called me the following day to discuss the complaint further. I explained my concerns about a rebuilt engine and gave him my acceptable solutions. This was before all of the accessory issues came into play. I was told they would contact dealer for all the details and to call them back if I thought the repair was not proceeding to my satisfaction. I called MB USA a second time to inform them of the ongoing issues and now the back ordered ECU and requested a curtesy buy back or vehicle exchange. The customer advocate told me he would pass along the request to a different department that handles Lemon Law criteria. This process can take anywhere from 6-8 weeks and I will not hear anything from them until they have a determination. He said they would determine if my car meets the legal requirements and if so they could offer a curtesy buy back. I asked the customer advocate if this is all that MB USA is offering as a solution to my issues. And if so they were not offering a curtesy buy back but a mandatory buy back per the legal statues. So in my mind no attempt to offer a unique solution to a probably uncommon problem. No love......

I have reviewed the AZ Lemon Law and it states after 30 days of the vehicle being out of service due to repairs it will qualify.
I don’t want this car because I believe it will be unreliable and I also believe the resale value has been severely diminished due to these major repairs. Would you buy a used vehicle with this repair history?

Any input from anyone who has had similar issues is appreciated. I’ll update this post as I get more information.
I hope I have posted this correctly.

 

How did you monitor and ascertain the oil levels?

 

The only way was to use the on board computer function. My car has the 12.3 digital gage option. It shows a bar graph divided into 3 sections, the middle part of the graph shows green when the level is between full and 1 quart low then the color will change to yellow When outside this section.

 

This is really unexpected from MB. I don't think you should consider keeping this car anymore. You're right about the resale value and even without that aspect I wouldn't want to take a risk. Who knows what else your dealer mechanic has spoilt, they don't seem very competent to me.

 

One word. Lawyer

 

Any work/replacement would be covered by a new warranty.
I do understand your apprehension but it is very 'doable ' to replace the engine successfully.

 

Wow, that really sucks. Sounds like a leak somewhere that they should have helped you diagnose well before it crapped itself.

For reference, there is a dipstick but for some reason the dealers don't like to talk about it.

 

There actually is not a dipstick in my 2020 - build date 7/19 - I saw the same screen in my car when looking for it but If you read the bullet under Requirements it says the engine must have an oil dipstick but if not...
Maybe some builds have one and some don't - can't imagine why - but I am 100% positive that I don't have one in my car.

 

So where is the dipstick then?

 

My owner’s manual shows a similar diagram, I looked for this tube/cap for probably 15 minutes before giving up in frustration. I mean how difficult should it be to check the oil? When I was at the dealer for this warning message I asked them to show me where the dipstick was located, was told it doesn’t have one. I wonder if having the optional 12.3 digital gauge option makes a difference. I have a GLC 300 non 4matic with the standard gauge package as a loaner. I’ll look to see if it has a dipstick.

The picture you posted does say it must have an oil dipstick, if not, the engine oil level can be checked only with the on-board computer. I didn’t see this notation in my owners manual. I may have missed it.

 

There isn't one in some engines I guess. That picture is for the cars that have one.

 

Althor, for reference I have 4matic with standard gauge package - no dipstick - 7/19 build - not sure why some have and some don't - could it be by build date?

 

I just checked my loaner and it doesn’t have a dipstick. I thought having the optional digital gauge package might have been the reason but doesn’t look like it has my loaner has the standard gauge package.

 

Ok, my sincere apologies. I mistakenly trusted my manual but have just spent 5 minutes checking under the hood and can't find it. Where the diagram shows the dipstick I've got a heat shield that can't be moved, but with some creative phone camera work I can't see anything under it anyway.

 

Sorry that you are having to go through this.

Could you please tell us in which country the GLC 300 was built?

 

It was produced in Bremen Germany on 7/15/2019. I purchased it on 1/14/2020.

 

yikes my 2019 GLC 2.0 TC makes a lot of noise... running... dealer said that's normal noise output. LOL i only have 9400 mlles on it.... my previous 2011 ML350 V6 purred... oh well... so far liking my 2019 GLC 300- base suv..

 

Can't really compare a port-injected V6 with a direct-injection turbo 4 in terms of noise.

 

Correct. ....direct injection is noisy.

 

On 6/8/20 MB USA called to inform me that they will be buying back the vehicle per the AZ Lemon Law. MB USA use a 3rd party to handle all the logistics, inspection, recovery and refund. So I have spoken to the 3rd party and supplied all the info they need for the process. Was told it takes approximately 3 - 4 weeks to complete. Now I’ll wait to see what the offer will be.🙏🏻

On 6/9/20 dealer called and told me the back ordered ECU had mysteriously arrived 3 weeks early. Car is ready to pick up. Service receipt was 6 pages long of parts and service. I almost made it home from the dealer ( 8 miles ) before the check engine light appeared. 😕 Called the dealer and scheduled an appointment for the next morning. Waited for about and hour while they worked on it. Was told it was a connector pin issue. Fixed and ready to go. The service writer didn’t have any paper work for this repair, said it wasn’t needed, I refused to accept the car without a receipt of the repair. They accommodated. I made it home and while waiting for the garage door to open another error message appeared on the screen, this time a temperature message. Dealer sent out a driver with a curtesy loaner and took mine back to the shop. That was Thursday afternoon and I haven’t heard anything as of Monday morning. I hope the buy back offer is acceptable so I can move on from this unfortunate situation. I’ll post again when I have more to share.

 

The (mis) handling of the OP’s situation by Mercedes-Benz is unfortunately par for the course, or the normal performance for this company these days. By these days I mean the past 5-10 years.

 

I would consider 3-4 weeks unacceptable considering the incompetent customer service you received. Lawyer.

 

Sucks that you had a major issue and also apparently got a poor quality technician to work on your vehicle. In this case I would fully agree with getting bought out of the car. Scary part is, that car will get wholesaled to some other dealership or independent who will re-sell it with the balance of factory warranty for someone else to suffer. The title brand will often not stop people.

In general, if you had an internal engine issue a rebuild or repair would be just fine if done by a competent tech, I put many sets of pistons into the 274 engines and never had a single issue after the repairs, but I watched co-workers have cars that never made it back to a customer successfully after a major repair like your case.

 

Looks fairly straightforward. I would bring up the lemon law issue with the dealer since MBUSA is already looking into it and your car meets the requirements for a required manufacturer buyback.

 

Althor, do a search of this forum....I experienced a severe problem with my 2020 GLC with less than 300 miles.....turns out the issue was some "loose" bearings.......went through the same issue with MBUSA and the dealership....ended up rebuilding the entire engine because they had to get to the parts of the engine where the bearings were.....I had your same concerns; however, the service dept told me that the engine is probably in better shape than when it came from Germany because a human was taking the engine apart and putting it back together rather than robots.....the dealership gave me a very nice "make good" of a $750 Marriot gift card.....I now have over 2,000 miles on the car and it is behaving flawlessly.