96'S320W

Hello 👋 to all you W140 fanatics out there! So, I bought a 96’ S320W on Sept. 1st, 2021, for $3000 - Yay! for me, cuz I woulda gladly paid double that, even though it’s not perfect …. It’s in damn good condition, and drives like a dream!

Its a two-owner, relatively pampered example (according to CarFax - lots of service listings) with 178k miles, 9/10 cosmetically, 8/10 mechanically/functionality….

The paint is surprisingly nice (2 tone black/gray), and interior is great except the drivers seat, which is awful…. and the sunroof liner, which is peeling, and must be kept slid back so it doesn’t rain black asbestos into the rest of the car 😷….

The side mirrors both need to be repaired: the driver sides glass is glued into place (so no motor there) and hardly dangling onto the door, and the the passenger just seems to have a mind of its own - it moves when I adjust the steering column, but not when I use the actual mirror adjustment switch???

Until the drivers door came “unhinged or unlatched,” due to my poor door opening procedure (kicking the door open sometimes, and allowing it to fully extend and “snap”-back at me so I can then control it), the soft close feature worked, and my window went all the way down - now the soft close doesn’t work on the drivers door only, and my window only goes down halfway….it must be due to that bar becoming disconnected from whatever it was connected to inside the door (the inch wide half foot long bar that connects the door to the frame - the one that slides around and makes a bunch of noise when opening or closing the door)….

And most recently, as of 2 days ago to be exact, the transmission started slipping…from a dead stop at times, not catching even the first drive gear - or shifting at first, but not shifting or having difficulty shifting into the following gears, sometimes from 2-3, or from 3-4 …. Almost always from 4-5 seems to be difficult, and I actually have to physically slap the dear shifter the the right to ding it into the D position better, or it’ll come out of 5 back into 4 ….. reverse is fine, and the car actually seems to shift fine from cold start, until the tranny heats up - and then all this slipping starts, anew.

I’ve added over 9k miles since Sept 1st 🏁🏎🥇🥳, cuz I drive a bunch on the highway - why I bought this car In the first place, and haven’t had the first inkling of anything wrong with anything, yet….until I had just arrived in ATL after driving from Chattanooga a couple days ago, parked at a gas pump, filled up - and then as soon, and I mean as soon as I pulled off - I could feel there was something wrong wjfb the tranny, cuz I wasn’t being pulled but my rpm’s were jumping …but eventually it “caught” and I spent the next 3 hours nursing my way back to Chattanooga praying I wouldn’t blown the motor up!

next morning, crank up to drive to store….and not a damn thing wrong! Super excited and relieved, I call my wife and tell her the great news - and I’m sitting in the drivethru waiting for my order, and when I pull into traffic - slippage central all over again!!

I’ve called every German auto shop, every Merc shop - and no one wants to touch this car cuz “their mechanics aren’t even as old as this car, and they aren’t familiar with them”….. and I mean I went thru the yellow pages 🤷🏻🤯….

I need help! What’s wrong? Any ideas? I thru some Lucas in the dip stick tube for tranny fluid, but that didn’t seem to help….that was last night. I need ideas, recommendations, etc etc …. And maybe a shop or mechanic recommended to me.

Thanks, in advance!!! I might just be selling this, anyways…I got approved for a 2012 Audi A6 3.0T Prestige w/ 72k miles at CarMax for $2500 down….so, if anyones interested in picking this car up - I mean it’s in great condition besides tranny and what I detailed above - got new tires & shocks all around, and an alternator since I bought it! I clean it once a week, if not more….