komodor

look at #1

https://www.hotcars.com/10-mercedes-benz-models-you-should-never-buy-used/amp/

E55Greasemonkey

Ron.s

Fake news and very misleading! If you count recalls for 10-20 vehicles out of over one hundred thousand as serious then maybe it’s accurate. I personally checked several recalls after reading about them and more than a few were for a very low number of cars.
Handling was very good on my 2020 GLE 450 and superb on my 2021 GLE 53.

makris0000

They used to say the same exact stuff about the 2014 Jeep Grand Cherokee and people thought I was crazy for getting one back in 2013. Jokes on them because it was the most reliable car I have ever owned!

mikapen

Talk about BS! That person doesn't know a "Recall" from a hole in the ground.
Example (according to a quick NHTSA search): The statement "There were five recalls over the power steering hose clamp coming loose," SHOULD have said "There were five REPORTS of the power steering hose clamp coming loose, none of which resulted in a recall."

JDPowers and Consumer Reports listed as sources, and we know from past discussions that they based their data on 2018 and older models.
Clickbait.

nsoltz

I can tell you something as a tech journalist. There are those of us who are good at what we do-- research carefully, don't fudge tests, don't kowtow to manufacturers and don't fear their reprisals (Apple cut me off 12 years ago after I wrote they euthanized a particular product). And then there are those who write anything for pay-by-word and regurgitate press releases, rumor sites and total lack of first hand information. We all make mistakes but this piece is so full of errors and poor information as not to qualify for "honest mistake." I love my GLE and don't honestly care about such reports. I am frustrated with MB over the T Mobile switch which won't seem to accept the ota update. And if anything goes wrong with the vehicle, i'll get a loaner and a cappucino from the dealer's cool coffee machine. I hate pseudo-journalism like that.

TexAg91

Yeah, they lost me with, “The 2020 GLE is already underweight and handles horrible compared to the competition.”

Agree, this is just Clickbait for advertising revenue.

….moving on

Wolfman

The article does read like clickbait. While I agree that the V167 could have had a much smoother launch, the car has been absolutely trouble-free for and many others.

But what is apparent is the lack of quality control at the US factory in Alabama; something I heard also from our dealer. Stupid stuff. Wiring forgotten to be connected, installation of damaged components, lack of fit and finish. And software issues; nothing major but a nuisance nonetheless.
I do not fault the car, but perhaps sloppy workers, poor management or CQ at the component vendors. Not like a car rolling off a German factory...

haibieb

My last car, a 2019 CLS 450 was built in Germany had many squeaks and rattles on the dashboard and front doors. The first time I had it in they found a number of trim pieces in the driver's door were either missing or not tightened. A few weeks afterwards, the noises came back. I think that quality starts at the assembly plant regardless where it is built. Our 2022 GLE450 is going back to have the upper dash metal trim piece and overhead control unit replaced due to rattle or squeak noises. And it is built in Alabama.

chassis

Re Vance quality. Not surprising given the German ownership of a foreign (US) plant. Dilemma for MB management: put an American plant manager in place who knows American workplace cultures/motivations but isn’t German, or put in someone from the Vaterland who doesn’t know how to work with American hourly employees. It can be a lose-lose situation because the Germans in HQ want someone they can trust but if the trustworthy person can’t work effectively with the hourly workforce the end result is not good.

People who know, are familiar with workforce “nuances” in across regions of the US. This is real and plays a role at Vance. MB may not have made the best factory site selection choice in the long term. Plenty of Vance quality problems noted through all M-/GL- sections of this site. Ignoring MB and automotive stuff, Alabama isn’t known as the epicenter of American manufacturing technology, quality or culture. But when MB chose the site it had cheap labor. So there’s that. They they seem to be getting what they paid for.

Last organizational announcement I saw regarding Vance had German sounding names in the key positions. Not guaranteed to be a failure but the odds are high of cultural incompatibility with the workforce.

The best case scenario is a German national who came up through the trenches and knows American workplace nuances. However those guys (they are practically all men) are worth their weight in gold and are gunning for top spots at MB HQ, VW, BMW etc.

Ron.s

You just can’t help jumping on every negative post on the GLE but you still haven’t owned one so you know what that’s worth…
Or Mercedes issues might just be something else. It’s a high volume vehicle being built in troubled times with workforce absences, turnover at the factory and every step in the supply line. IMO, most of the issues are not assembly problems but component supplier related. Shortages of parts being added off the assembly line doesn’t help either.
Many Germans are schooled in the US as exchange students and attend college here and speak fluent English. Too many components are built in China and other cheap labor countries.
if your culture theory was correct then the new Audi factory opened in Mexico (2017) would have really been a disaster. They had a huge language barrier and workforce culture non existent. The Audi’s at that time had a German quality build in spite of all of the banter about build quality concerns.
The Assembly line will always be a challenge but nothing to match the outsourcing of components in numerous countries around the world. Tesla is a different example since they outsource much less. Now that they are producing more vehicles their vehicle quality is near the bottom.
Dieselgate and Electrification may have created extraordinary challenges. The huge Diesel payouts resulted in cost cutting and large staff reductions. Shifting to Electric Vehicles is moving vital resources away from day to day ISG’s. COVID, Chips and Russia are adding to a ‘perfect storm” that has turned Automobile manufacturing upside down.

RockChips

Sports mode helps the handling a lot.

Unless its placebo effect.

chassis

Hi Ron.s

Are you holding on to the notion that ownership is a requirement to post? I thought that was dispelled long ago.

Do you know that the Audi San Jose Chiapa plant is less than one hour from the VW Puebla plant? Do you know that VW Puebla has been producing cars for almost 60 years? VAG are pros at this. Unlike the Stuttgarters.

Let's say that that the Audi plant startup had a 50 year training period for VAG. This is a nice risk reducer. Do you agree? MB Vance had no such benefit and the results clearly show today.

Let's compare a factory launch with a product launch. Can you agree with this? VAG has done some nice product launches recently. Panamera, Cayenne, and more. Apparently also the Audi factory launch. Not so for the Stuttgarters.

Let's also agree that "it matters who you hang around with". Many of us tell our kids that. The Stuttgarters are hanging around with Nissan. Enough said.

The rest of your comments I toss into the bucket of making excuses for the manufacturer. Would you agree? I don't cut manufacturers slack when they claim, as the Stuttgarters do, to be the best. They aren't. They are nearly nothing.

Wolfman

Ownership is never required although owners will simply know more about the car and thus can judge better how well it performs/meets expectations than people reading just articles/reviews/having opinions

Our first car coming from Alabama was a 2000 ML350 and that truck was in no way something I would have equated to the brand. But I also have to say that the truck was designed that way. Cheap and rough. At the same time, this was also by far our most reliable car at the time; the other was a new CL500 and a R129 SL500. Rather than build quality, the reason was simplicity; that thing was stupid simple.
My personal experience with the V167 has been very good so far although I also appreciated a V6 over the four banger and I like the prior Designo interiors much better than anything available today. But this car is better engineered than our prior W166. One caveat is that all of our experience is with new cars, not used...

As for experience, the Alabama factory has been producing cars/trucks for 25 years. Audi has no leg up here; 50 or 25 years makes zero difference. This is a question of process/quality control, vendor quality, part availability and to some extend market pressures. I see issues here...
Can't follow the Nissan comment, completely non-sensical and irrelevant. VAG is no beacon of build quality unless you cherry-pick brands or even models out of the group.

chassis

Hi Wolfman

Fully agree that having no experience with the vehicle is less advantageous than having experience with the vehicle. It's great to find common ground on this.