Ive got a 97 S320 with 130k miles on it. Its an amazing car, amazingly nimble for its size.. ( Still seems small compared to some of my other cars..

I've driven it over 40k miles, across country and back, only an occasional annoyance.

anway, its just developed a strange problem-

the shift lever does not want to go below Drive. It just wont move over , as though its locked or blocked. anyone seen this ? how hard is it to fix?

-M

 

The problem is in the shifter mechanism in the selector box. The linkage is seized, probably from rust. You'll need to have the selector box disassembled completely to free it up and lube it.

 

with my 95 s320, it is necessary to move the shift lever over to the left, from the D position to the 4 position, then it will move down to the 3 and 2 positions. If you try and pull straight down from D it won't go
Barry

 

interesting... so it might be seized up? maybe just jammed? hmmmmmm

now for another twist. This had happened about a year or so ago, and I took the car to my dealer to have them fix it ( to the tune of about a grand)... I'm pretty mechanically inclined, so I wonder if I can fix/rebuild it myself. the thing is, I do not have any service info on the 140, only stuff up to the 201.

thanks for your replies....

 

the last pic is of the lock-out system

hth

guy