Bugsi

[EDIT: NEVER MIND. I'm an idiot. The actuators are clearly *In the trunk lid*, and I was trying to remove the plastic fascia just inside the opening of the trunk itself, rather than the lid. The plastic trim piece on the trunk lid over the latching part is held on with T20 torx screws.]

(If there's some mechanism to delete this post, that would be reasonable.)

My recently-purchased 2005 S500 4MATIC's trunk lid's soft-close doesn't work. When I press the big red close button, the trunk closes, but doesn't soft-close or complete the final tight suction close. It stays very slightly raised, uneven with the fender panels surrounding it.

I had my Mercedes-Only technician diagnose this when I had it in for a recent "A" service. I thought it was just a weird deck lid alignment issue, but their investigation isolated the problem to two cracked soft-close trunk latch actuators. They said the hydraulic fluid part is fine; it's two vacuum-operated close-latch actuators that are cracked. They quoted around $700 total for the two actuators. I declined and had them button it back up.

Now I've researched this a bit here, and from my shop's diagnostic description, I believe the problem is *exactly* the type of cracks in the parts shown in this video:

So I'm working on removing the part so I can attempt to fix the cracks with either epoxy, super-glue, silicone-sealant or some type of similar Permatex gasket-stuff. (Casual recommendations on what material to use are welcome.)

My 2005 S500 has a plastic fascia panel over the trunk latch around the deck lid opening that obviously needs to come off. It has a number of small rectangular plastic rivet-like fasteners that pry out with gentle pressure from a pair of flat jeweler's screwdrivers. I've removed those plastic rivet-pins, but the fascia still seems really solidly attached, and I've never removed it before so I don't want to crack anything. Is there a guide, or a video, or just can someone tell me how that thing comes off so I can continue to get to the latch and the vacuum actuators?

Bugsi

And for what it's worth, for some other work I actually did need to remove the plastic trim from the trunk (the piece is properly called the "Sill Plate"). After removing all the little plastic clips, the thing that prevented removing it was the four plastic clips for the cargo net, which are each attached with a screw. Remove those, and bingo, it pops right out!

doni01

iTrader: (1)

As far as I know there is only one actuator in the trunk and not two. Had the same problem and replacement cost around $300. Highly doubt that the epoxy will work. Good luck.

Bugsi

I reported my fix on the trunk actuator in another thread here:
https://mbworld.org/forums/sl-class-...ml#post6661609

There is just one actuator, and the epoxy worked fantastically. I fixed it on New Year's day, and it's worked perfectly ever since.

doni01

iTrader: (1)

Happy to hear