wonderbrah

I have an 04 ml500 with around 140k miles on it. I take it on the beach almost weekly. Yes, I know it's a sin to take a nice benz on the sand but it really drives amazing well. I also coated the entire undercarriage with cosmoline and there has been no rust development.

Lately i've noticed after airing up my tires after a day on the beach, driving back on the highway, at speeds in excess of 50mph the entire car will wobble. Increasingly so as I speed up and vice versa. It wasn't happening every time leading me to believe it may have been an imbalance in tire pressure. Maybe I filled one of the tires up a few too much PSI (34 instead of 32 for example). Or sand was getting stuck somewhere because it seems after coming home and hosing the undercarriage down and washing all the sand away, the wobbling would go away.

My mechanic said the driveshaft was completely rotted out and was about to fall out of the car completely. If it did so he said it would have ripped up the engine, the transmission etc.

it will be $660 for the part plus installation he said. He said this part usually never goes on these cars but since I'm driving on the beach it's a different story for me.

I'm assuming this was the reason for the wobbling?

crewchiefpro

Most probably is the issue. When your driveshaft is not centered then it will shake the entire car.

You can air up tires at different pressures and NOTHING will happen, it has no effect on balance.

mihir_d

You can probably halve that repair bill by getting a salvage part. No point in getting expensive NEW parts on these old MLs....my 2 cents..

wonderbrah

he said he bought it third party so saved me a few hundred bucks. He also said the wobbling would have been from the sand and not the driveshaft. Interesting