AFAIK from posts on a lot of forums, the BAS PLUS was not activated at all. The engineers knew about the problem so they had someone inside the car brake it manually to simulate BAS PLUS. They put a peice of wood at the point where the driver would brake. But I'm guessing the suspension was too good so the driver could not feel the peice of wood, so the driver didn't brake in time.

Well at least we know that the suspension is going to be really good. And I do see the small damage which is also good.

Man, after reading and watching everything over and over again, I think my brain is going to explode. :wwf: :wall: :hammer:

What is Brake Assist (BAS)? I thought I knew but I guess I was wrong, I thought it applied full braking force if it sensed that there was panic braking action. So you'd have to be braking in order for it to kick in, sort of in the same league as ABS. I thought 'stops the car for you' was DISTRONIC. What the hell is going on?

Hope some of the many CEOs realized excessive salary cuttings will be a result of angry employees start screwing things up even just a piece of software. I do appreciate MB is making their inovations more available and affordable in every new car model. They surely win on speed to market. I will continue to place MB car as my priority of choice.

Driver error
 

Came across this article on on a car site. They have the complete video although in german, and you can see the driver isn't from MB but an AutoBild journalist.


Quote:Germany’s Stern TV has posted a video on its website of the mishap involving a failed demonstration of the Mercedes Distronic automatic braking system. Last week, we posted a follow-up report on the incident, which turned out be the result of an AutoBild journalist’s attempt to fake the demonstration, rather than a technical failure of the radar system. According to recent published reports, Mercedes engineers realized the hall in which the test was to be performed would foil the demonstration. However, Michael Specht, anxious for a scoop, convinced the Mercedes team to fake the demonstration — manually braking the cars instead of letting the automatic system attempt the task. The scheme didn’t go according to plan, and the journalist, who was piloting the test car, crashed it into the back of the parked car ahead.

http://www.leftlanenews.com/?p=817

Now for my $0.02...

No damage has been done to the S-Class reputation/launch. This was fake; no one that intends to purchase the S-Class will change their mind because of such crap. It has generated a lot of online talk and that was probably the intention of the AutoBild journalist who screwed up.

We hear so much about unreliable electronics and such in these cars that I wonder, why is it that the S-Class continues to have the best ownership royalty among all cars with over 90% of S-Class owners buying another one when they get back in the market to shop for another car? Hmmm...

And I heard the S-Class is the best selling Mercedes, and it's true that the owners do buy another one.

Best selling Mercedes as...? Ever? For the month? For the year?
And if you think buying another car of the same type is the best measurement, then the Lexus LS truely takes the cake.

http://www.theautochannel.com/news/2...01/153813.html

MERCEDES-BENZ USA
Sales -- November 2005

Model Nov. '05 Nov. '04 Monthly % YTD 2005 YTD 2004 Yearly %

C-CLASS 4,858 6,297 -22.9% 50,852 60,381 -15.8%

E-CLASS 3,884 4,925 -21.1% 44,049 51,378 -14.3%

S-CLASS 1,400 1,733 -19.2% 14,124 18,082 -21.9%

CL-CLASS 100 238 -58.0% 1,124 2,428 -53.7%

SL-CLASS 800 794 0.8% 8,982 11,804 -23.9%

CLK-CLASS 1,145 1,618 -29.2% 16,479 20,441 -19.4%

SLK-CLASS 829 1,293 -35.9% 10,302 5,659 82.0%

CLS-CLASS 951 n/a n/a 13,605 n/a n/a

R-CLASS 1,213 n/a n/a 2,529 n/a n/a

M-CLASS 2,980 1,804 65.2% 29,619 23,223 27.5%

G-CLASS 124 130 -4.6% 1,212 1,318 -8.0%

GRAND TOTAL 18,284 18,832 -2.9% 192,877 194,714 -0.9%

Hmmm. I heard that somewhere not sure about when. I don't know how to read those numbers! :(

Sorry, they did come out messed up. Just click the link, it'll have them in a much better format.

Damn Ricky, you're like MBWorld's junior Columbo! Or maybe a darker Sherlock Holmes! :y

2007 S class crash video (German video)
 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0yX3...earch=mercedes

The video is in German. Does anyone know what it is about? It seems to show an independent (non-MB) person from Autobild testing out the distronic/night view assist, but the S-klasse ends up crashing anyway.

Was the reporter purposely screwing up the test, or is the distronic on the S class defective?

Thread merged.

I have another question
 

What if you have 2 cars both with distronic approaching each other on a narrow street? Would that interfere? I believe the S-class uses W band radar at about 70 Ghz, which is mostly used for experimental autonomous vehicles, but I believe other brand like Jaguar and BMW uses the same Band at a slightly different freq. Can someone with distronic try that with a friend? (probably dangerous and I assume no liability) Would the distronic radar also affect radar detecters?

to comment on the MB test, I think it's a very good reminder not to rely 100% on the safety systems of your car, whether it's ESP or distronic or BAS. I personally find ESP quite helpful, in the winter, it probably comes on every third turn (my city is notorious for not cleaning up snow). but I once got too ****y and almost ran into a stop sign while on going 25KM/h, ESP never came on just like this distronic thing, apparantly, ESP only reacts under very specific conditions and will not engage everytime you slip.

I've tried to stay out of this topic because of the obvious mis-information being passed off as fact here.

First of all this story is older than dirt. Secondly there are thousands of W221 S-Classes on the road in Europe and have been since Sept 2005. Now there are about 4-5K of them on U.S. roads and some of them have this system and you haven't heard anything about the system malfunctioning.

This "test" WAS NOT done at a Mercedes-Benz facility. It was done at a German magazine's test facility. Next, Mercedes told the editor (who has since been fired) that the system would not work in a steel room where their test facility was. Since the system would not work in such conditions, besides where in the hell are you going to encounter an all steel road with surrounding steel walls, they decided to "simulate" what the system would do. The editor was supposed to hit the brakes and keep from hitting the car in front, but he didn't because the board placed on the floor that was supposed to tell him to hit the brakes wasn't felt by him because of the new S-Class' outstanding ride, so he didn't hit the brakes and hit the car in front of him. End of story.

Common sense here folks, do you think Mercedes would have actually let such a system go out the door and it didn't work?

Yeah we all know Mercedes has had reliability problems, some of them electrical, but none of them have been in the areas of safety equipment like Distronic.

M

Oh man, I laughed so hard when I read that. :rolf:

Uh-oh....We have an all steel bridge here in Hawaii w/ all exposed steel on the ground and steel supports on both sides!:rolleyes: