tneal

We've had our 2012 ML 350 gasser for about a year now, with a little over 10, 000 miles one it and have been very impressed with it overall. However, in the last few months I've had several occasions where it took two tries to get it started. Today I had a situation where it took me FIVE tries before it finally decided to start. Anybody know what might be causing this?

27T

What exactly are you doing and what exactly is the car doing?

Do you have keyless go?

fabbrisd1

Sure - take it to your dealer for diagnosis - there is nothing someone can do from this forum to give you a diagnosis by remote control.

If it was me - I would buy a bottle of Stabil Marine Formula (Blue) and dose one tank for instructions on the bottle - today's ethanol in pump fuel is really rugged and Stabil will clean that up over a couple of tanks if fuel was a issue.

We had three brand new Benz's - including one new ML - that stalled out on the raod in our area in the past two weeks - and ALL three had bought a recent fill up at the same brand gas station - bad batch of gas got delivered to that specific stations..

tneal

I really wasn't expecting a "diagnosis by remote control", just wondering if anyone had this problem before. I have keyless go and just came out of a store after the ML sat for about an hour. Each time I pushed the start button the rpm did its thing and then down to about 400 and then quit. It took me five times before it would stay started. I was just wondering if this might be another thing that might fall into the category of "could not duplicate" at the dealer.

fabbrisd1

No, the non-start MB will be able to pull from the record if the dealer connects your ML upstream with MB.. may or may not read on the local Star diagnostic..

RJR

My wives is doing the same thing. We had it in 2 weeks ago and they changed something in the ignition and that worked fine for about a week. It is doing the same thing again. Looks like we will be taking it in again.

MLee

My wife takes 5 goes to get her started too these days.......oh no, you mean her car

RoundEye

Same thing is happening with ours. 2012 ML350 with 12K miles on it. Not even a year old... The dealer kept it overnight so hopefully we will get some answers tomorrow.

tneal

I'm anxious to hear what you found out.

RoundEye

Just got a call from the dealer. Turns out it was a "software" update. When we go pick up the car, I'll try to get more details.

RoundEye

OK, so here is what the service guy told me:

There was a glitch in the software that caused the engine to go into idle/limp mode. Our Engine Control Module (ECM) needed to flashed and re-synced with our Transmission Control Module (TCM). Might be placebo effect but the car is starting up a lot smoother than it has in the last two months (when this problem first started).

Here is what the service invoice says:

Cause:
541011 Short Test, Perform 3783 W67
540991 Control Unit - Software (After Short Test), Install 3783 W67
540992 Control Unit - Code (After Short Test), Perform 3783 W67

Flashed M.E. and SCN/CVN Coded.

Hope this helps you guys out.

Will update if we have this problem again...

soomba

OMG. Exactly same problem here. My ML is 2013 gas. I also found that this happens only when engine temperature is between 20-50 degree. This means when you park the car (after you did drive your car for at least a hour) and around two hours later you try to start the car again, then this problem might happen. Sometimes engine doesn't start and sometimes even if engine starts but there was a lot of vibrations. I will drop off my ML next week at service center.

sxue888

How many wife do you have again?

RoundEye

This was our exact symptoms. In the morning on a cold start it'd be just fine. Then we park in our parking garage for work, go out to lunch and the car won't start, second try it felt like the engine was going to vibrate right out of the engine bay...

So far no problems after the trip to the service center.