RajwanyS550

has anybody done this mod or not. need help. S550 2008.

tanktube67

there are some videos posted on YouTube
good luck

trumpet1

I plan to go to www.midcityengineering.com to get mine done.

NJS430

I ordered the module from midcity and installed it myself. Really nice piece of work. All OEM connectors - no cutting or splicing needed. Just snap in the connectors per the instructions. It's really not complicated to install. You can see the installation instructions on their website.


Works perfectly - just hold the mute button for 2s and it turns the block off. If you press it for less than 2s it works normally (mutes the sound). It's nice that it's a hidden feature. It hasn't had an effect on anything else - seems to be done right!

I would recommend it.

RajwanyS550

that sounds great, could u tell me how much does it cost and on a scale of 1 to 10 how tough is it to install. thanks

trumpet1

Big question. What all do you have to do to the car to get to the module? Are the instructions clear on what to do to get to the parts?

irieblue

Does anyone know if there is a hidden diagnostic screen on the W221? I have seen mention of pulling up the diagnostic screen on other Benz cars.

usctrojans1

Is this module reversible? What if it malfuctions? Is there a warranty issue?

Diesel Benz

Did you look at the installation guide that was referred to on an earlier post in this thread. Looks pretty sufficient to me and I'm sure they give installation support if you face a problem.

Diesel Benz

Cannot comment on warranty, must be pretty much dealer dependent.

What do you mean by "reversible"? The device should not modify OEM installed parts. If you take it out, the car is like from the factory. My understanding is that the part is completely transparent when VIM is not activated and should then not affect car operation. Of course if it physically fails, then it would confuse the car even if set off. But again, reconnect the CAN bus as it was and you should be find till you get a new VIM part.

Diesel Benz

I have not seen this discussed a lot. There is the service menu that also lists the SW and HW status of a few units (cluster mainly I believe). It shows the battery voltage but that is about as much as it does for diagnosis.

Not sure what you mean actually but I'm not aware of something like the AC diagnosis screen on a W211 (or W210 and older with automatic AC) from the REST button.

dmills

I was worried about the same issue when I had midcity do mine because my previous car (a 745) had problems which the dealer blamed on a video input conversion that I had done but they were really good about explaining how easy it was to pull the piece out and put everything back: Its just a couple of connectors that you unplug.

At any rate its been 6 months that I have had it and no problems.

trumpet1

No I haven't seen that guide. Must have been napping that day. I'll take your advice and give them a call and ask how much is involved in doing it myself. I've done some elaborate car mods before involving trim pieces in the past and this sounds like something right up my alley. Once I find out, I'll post what I know.

NJS430

On a scale of 1 - 10, I would say it's a 2. Hardest part is prying off the side panel of the dashboard. I negotiated a $399 deal.

NJS430

I wouldn't worry. It clips in and can be removed just as easily. It's a nice piece of work - all OEM connectors. It just sends a signal to the radio telling it the car is in park. Has had no effect on any other function and I have just about every option.

trumpet1

They quoted me $499. I'll try to get them down a tad when I call them back. Heck, that's the same quote they gave me if they installed it. You'd think they should back off to $399 if we are doing the work ourselves especially since the part probably only costs $20 to make.

NJS430

I'm sure it costs more than $20 to make. I'll bet just the connectors cost more than that. I'm sure the components on the circuit board to enable it to communicate on the network aren't cheap either. I thought $399 was a fair price to pay for the device and the knowledge that's in it.

trumpet1

You're right. R&D, amongst other things, all play a part in the cost. I know in my business that to just open the doors each day costs about $500 /hr.
Looking back on it, I think he quoted me the $499 BEFORE I told him I wanted to install it myself. He probably thought I was going to their location when I asked the question. Can't wait to install it. Looking forward to it and thanks again for sending me the info.
I will take photos along the way as I install it and post them to assist in giving further visual details as to what's involved. Hopefully I can get this all done in the next week or two.

dmills

Definately ask them for the discount price: Both I and a co-worker told them that we found them on the forums here are they gave us the discounted price...

trumpet1

Funny you should post this as I just emailed Rob, told him I am a forum member and asked for the discount. I guess I'll hear from him tomorrow. Maybe he'll have one, overnight it to me and I can get it put together this Friday. I just went out to my car and performed the steps just for practice. Took 5 minutes to get everything in view.

trumpet1

Ordered the VIM221 module today and got the forum discount. Should get it Friday and I will take pix of my installation.
Thanks to Rob at midcityengineering for his kind handling of the deal. I highly recommend these guys for your aftermarket techno-gadget goodies. I wish I could have afforded the rear video system in the headrests but it just isn't feasible for me at this time.

scriber

Just wondering if this device will mess up navigation update since it is telling the car it is in park? Will navigation stop tracking your location?

trumpet1

I got the module installed this afternoon. Shweeet! Took me about 45 minutes because I didn't follow the instructions exactly right and chose the wrong plug. Tried again and it worked just fine. As far as your question above, I forgot to test the nav while giving the car a test run. I'll check out your question tomorrow.
Most likely it will operate just like normal. I really don't think the car operates any differently because of this module. I think it is very OEM-like.
As far as the installation of the module, it is a piece of cake if you do exactly what midcityengineering instructions tell you what to do. The hardest part is getting the little blue plugs with the yellow wires to come out of their sockets because the release tabs are so small and you can't pull the plug way out in the open to see very well. After plugging everything up, I tucked the module and spare wire up into the dash and snapped the CAN access door back in place. Other than that, it went well and operates exactly as advertised. I let the kids and the wife watch "Kong" on the test drive. The surround sound of this car is awesome!!

trumpet1

For those of you who have read this far and are in the process of installing the VIM221 module yourself, let me share one helpful tidbit when choosing which yellow wire to remove. There are three yellow wires to choose from, of which, only one is the correct one.
Your car may not have the radio wire placed in the same socket location as the next car. One car may have it in slot #1 whereas the next car may have it in slot #2 or #3. Mine was in slot #2 (the middle wire). The way to know for sure that you have selected the correct wire is to have your radio on while disconnecting the plugs and when the radio/video turns off, you've got the correct wire.
The instructions say to look for error messages to pop up while pulling the wires, however, even when I pulled the wrong wire (#1 closet to the end of the harness) , I didn't get any error messages!!! (The error messages did pop up later after I attempted to crank the car but by then it was obvious I chose the wrong wire as the video in motion didn't work). This is why things didn't go well for me at first. So my advice is to keep removing and replacing wires until you notice the radio stops working. That is the best way to identify which one is the one to connect to the module.
Hope this helps.

Diesel Benz

My understanding is that navigation would suffer in the case that GPS signal is lost when positioning is left for gyros and speed/steering info. Also the estimates to the next turn probably use speed signal too.

But could it be that the US VIM is only fooling the park signal, the Euro devices work out of park and at slow speed. Then a VIM module needs to fool the speed signal. I would have assumed that the US device is expecting both speed and park to be zero.

Would be nice to have feedback from driving/navigation experiences with the device active.