TBond8

Hello Everyone,

As a new person here I really enjoy everyones comments and posts here. I have enjoyed looking at all the different topics.

I am asking for some help from everyone here, I am considering purchasing a S550. I was wondering what all of you current owners think of the new S-Class? How has your ownership gone? Any of you have the panoroof? What options do you recommend? I have owned several Benzs.

Thank you to all of you in advance.

dr.skp.ortho

Best car I have ever had. Period. 5.4s 0-100....extremely stable at high speeds, comfortable and great interior room (i have the 5.5L V8 long wheelbase).

Basically its a great luxury car with the sprinting ability of a sports car...you'll need at least a Porsche carrera s to catch it in a sprint.

Two features i think are a must have

1) Night vision - i do a lot of night time driving on country roads and the range is amazing
2) Distronic...great for highway crusing

Another plus is that the quality seems back to the standards we expect of Mercedes.

Good Luck.

Germancar1

Out of all the recent advances Mercedes has made this one is the most important! That will bring folks back to the brand in a hurry when this becomes official at the usual quality check points like JDP and CR.

M

dr.skp.ortho

Good point germancar1. I have driven mercedes cars since the 80's....started with a w124 e-class. There was a definite drop in quality with the w210 e-class that arrived in the early 90's if im not mistaken. The w221 e-class was an improvement but I still had some minor issues (fortunately my SBC worked well!). I also ran several other variants including the current clk - w209 is the designation i think - and it had a large number of electrical glitches. It was one of the first CLK cars to arrive here in Australia and unfortunately the "early bugs" were well and truly not ironed out....once I even had a seatbelt failure!!!!

My S500 was also one of the first cars to be delivered and i was slightly apprehensive but so far (touch wood!) it has been reliable. Another plus is that the materials seem to be of a much higher quality than the late w220 series. I was driven to the airport in a w220 S350 about a week ago and the improvement in materials in the w221 is quite amazing.

Hopefully Mercedes will learn the lessons of the cost cutting they attempted and will return to the philosophy of "over engineering" their cars. Many of those "over engineered" vehicles are still providing their owners with reliable and comfortable motoring decades after they were purchased.

shimo

I agree, I drive a S430 w220 and a friend just bought a new S500 w221, and there is a big difference in the build quality and the materials. Don't get me wrong - there's nothing really wrong with the w220, but the w221 is built fantastically well with brilliant materials - and feels as solid as a rock.

If you can afford one, buy it over any other car.

I would also agree with ortho - get the night vision and disctronic, once you have them you'll never know how you did without!

phonetics

at its price range, i can't find any other car with similar quality level as a luxury sedan...the w221 is just really great.... i would believe it's even better than maybach, at least the technology in w221 is more advanced and meaningful...

the reason that maybach is so expensive is coz of all the useless gadgets, e.g. laptop, internet connection, refrigerator, working table... etc. but who really uses those stuff anyway? the price of maybach makes w221 a really cheap and good deal...

phonetics

i have just compared the interior of a maybach and w221..... my god, u can't believe how cheap the maybach interior looks.... it's the same as w220 interior with plastic buttons etc.... i really don't know who else will buy maybach after seeing w221... probably the only thing now that worth its price is maybach name... i think that's it...

dr.skp.ortho

problem with the Maybach is the s-class is just too good.........arguably a s600 is a better car.

the other problem is, depsite the technical brilliance of the Maybach, the Phantom has more presence on the road

Germancar1

Yeah the only Maybach model really worth considering is the 57S IMO. The changes really do make it look the part and the performance is staggering for such a battleship...lol! The regular 57, forget about it!

M

JAdmiral

My S550 is currently in the shop. Over the span of two service visits, today will be day 12 it's in service. The problem? My back-up camera has not worked consistently since Day One. Works about 40% of the time, but the rest of the time, it just displays a black screen with the warning "Check Entire Surroundings". Yeah, thanks...

Anyway, a glimmer of hope. After changing the actual camera unit (which wasn't the problem), they believe it is the entire COMAND computer that is faulty. They put my COMAND unit into a working S550, and on the third reverse attempt, the screen went black. So, they ordered a replacement unit from Germany, and it should be in and installed this week.

Being optomistic, I don't see this as a build problem with M-B, but just an unavoidable glitch in the manufacturing of one COMAND unit. Outside of that problem, I LOVE my S550, and can't wait to get the beast back!

Nevada Jack

Sorry to hear that J...I agree it is probably poor quality control with the COMAND contractor. Pretty hard to find prior to delivery if it works "sometimes."

My car is, I hate to use the word, but "perfect" up to this point and a little over 7,300 miles. Not a ripple of a problem.

I changed my signature pic again and think I have to reduce it some...although it looks so much nicer when the image is big...:-)

abh11570

I just got the 2nd JD Power survey. Gosh I felt wierd not to have to list any problems with the car. I didnt list "Outstanding", because I dont own a Rolls, so I listed many of the aspects as " Perfect".

I had no problems with the car yet. Almost 3600miles. The only gripe I had was the Soft Close doors. I still think they should shut at the slightest catch, like the 7 series.
What can I say, the car is extremely nice, to put it a modest point of view.

JAdmiral

Well, I picked up the car today, and so far, the back up camera is working 100%. If it doesn't fail in the next two days, I'd call it a successful (COMAND) brain transplant.

Bummer, though... all my phone numbers and nav destinations are gone, including my voice command individualizations. Guess that means more time to play this weekend getting it set up again!

akburton

I agree whole heartedly. The only issue I have had every blue moon is that the passenger side rearview mirror does not always return to it's original position after going from reverse to drive. This has happened less than 5 times.

akburton

My passenger side rear seat belt does not work.

hcwong

I have had a problem with the COMAND display pretty much since day one.

It would intermitently do one of the following:

1. Swing continously from passenger to driver side and back again to passenger side for a few minutes till it got so tired it would take a rest in the centered position, or

2. spontaneously park itself, with no human intervention, facing either the driver or passenger, at which point it would not respond to the controls and just stubbornly stay there, or

3. be centered but not respond to the controls to swivel.

I would guess 70 to 80% of the time it would work fine as intended, and so until recently I decided to do nothing as I have a morbid fear of dashboards being dismantled, especially since this is still a relatively new model and the mechanics may not have that much experience.

On the spur of the moment driving by the dealership, I decided to leave it with them to look at.

They ultimately replaced the entire display unit. They tell me that relatively little dismantling was required and the whole job took a little over an hour.

Oscar1388

Hi Mr Wong ,
You bought your car from C & C ? A normal servicing there will take one whole day.

hcwong

That has happened to me umpteen times with every car I have owned (Benz's and others) where the passenger side mirror dips when reverse is engaged.

Given that, I suspect since it has happened with many cars of different brands, and the pattern of occurence, I have come to believe it might be to do with the way or the speed I switch from D to R and back to D.

The easy fix of course is to hit your memory seat button to restore that setting instantly.