To start I drive a 2000 ml320. Last week I accidentally left my drivers side window cracked about an inch. That same night we had a rain storm adding up to over 4 inches. I went out the next day to go pick my son up from his grandma's 10 minutes away, the car drove fine. Came home, parked it & nothing seemed wrong. The next night we went out to do some shopping & it wouldn't shift out of park. I did some research and found it was most likely the brake switch. Replaced that and nothing. Still stuck and brake lights are working. I used the override to get it out if park & as I was driving it down the road I noticed it wouldn't shift out of first gear. Brought it home, did some more research and found it was actually stuck in second and it was in LHM. I had a friend try to read codes off of it and it showed up nothing. My boyfriend thinks we might have to replace the shifter assembly because it may have gotten wet but since we were dealing with the brake switch it had dried before we got a chance to check it. Anyone have any idea of what this could be?

 

If the computer senses something wrong, it starts in limp mode to avoid further damage.
Have the car scanned with a pro level scanner. Post the codes

 

It probably the shifter mechanism, but you still haven't told us if the shifter had gotten wet.

 

Jim, If it is the shifter mechanism will the car still be in limp mode after using the "overide"? She mentiones that the car was in limp mode after overide.

 

Yes it will.

 

Hello I recently couldn't get my 01ML430 out of park so of course I searched
the threads and found this to be quite common so I took it to a foreign car
specialist near home in limp mode. The mech said that the gear shift assembly
needed to be replaced. Since I saw no brake lights and figured this is an issue
related cause I did the lesser 1st. After the repair the dash indicator doesn't
show what gear Im in its a blank square box also it's still in LM..could it be the
shifter after all..I've also read that a weak battery could cause this type of stuff

 

You aren't telling us too much. What repair did you make?

If you do not have brake lights and cannot shift out of park, then the problem lies with the brake light switch.

 

The repair that was I made was I replaced the brake light switch..I have brake lights now but like I said before the foreign shop I went to said that my shift assembly needed to be replaced because the module thats attached to it is not removable...see pic..so I opted get a second diagnosis and he put the shifter back in the vehicle..mind you before the brake light switch was replaced the only way I could put it in drive was to stick a pen into the shifter..afterwards I could shift into drive..my issues now are

1. The vehicle is only drivable in a low gear ( no changing from 2nd to 3rd etc)

2. On the dash where the letter D should be theres no letter..it's boxed out
even when in R or N..
Here's the pic of the shifter turned to the back showing the module that;s supposed to be causing this..could it be