Donnymac

As I am a first time owner, my question to you seasoned owners is when do you trade? I read the maintenance comments and wonder: is age or miles what triggers the failures/repairs?

Car has been great so far - only one strut and one module has needed replacing. Exclusionary coverage is in place. It is my DD.

All comments welcome.

mercedesbenzs55

If you drive it carefully and change the fluids every 3-4k miles it will run a long time.

Polar Bear

Everyone has different reasons to trade. Financial, family changes, changes in life, or just looking for something that will temporarily bring excitement to their life. Could be a good idea, or a bad idea. Think carefully.

Donnymac

Thats pretty much the way I view it. The car will take care of you if you take care of it.


However, seems electronics are the gamble - thus the warranty.

DaveW68

If you still enjoy the car, drive it until your warranty expires. You have that nice TT motor that most folks on this board don't have, and being one of the later 221's, many of the bugs have been worked out of it. It will still be prone to the usual failures, but that's why you have a warranty. IMO, it is still the best looking S-class of the last 3 generations.

DaveW68

Why would you do that? Unless you like blowing a lot of money (oops....almost forgot who I'm replying too. ) Just follow the normal maintenance schedule and you'll be fine. These cars take full synthetic oil which is good for 10k miles of normal driving.

Mike5215

Yeah, making ritualistic fluid sacrifices in the hopes it'll stave off serious failures makes as much sense as throwing virgins into volcanos to stave off crop failures.

The fact is that the costly stuff most likely to fail is either electronic or pneumatic gear with no maintenance requirements whatsoever.

The stuff that needs regular fluid changes is actually pretty bulletproof...engine, tranny, dif, etc. Just follow the service schedule in the manual.

My last service visit on the 221, for a dead cluster, a blown front strut and a cam position magnet was $6,000. No preventative maintenance is advised or even possible for any of that stuff.

The tranny that failed in my 220 (also $6,000) got the 40k mile full service...drain and flush, filter, fresh fluid, the 80k service, same thing, plus an extra unscheduled full tranny service at 100k miles before CPO expired. At 103k it imploded and sent shrapnel everywhere, destroying the tranny plus the torque converter. A clutch pack just seized up and shredded itself. Not a maintenance issue.

A pristine service history is no protection.

Pristine physical condition is no protection.

Sacrificial fluid changes are no protection.

Only a solid warranty is actually able to protect you. Things will fail. It's only a question of who pays for it when it does. I suggest making it not you, especially on these $15k cars where the cost of an unexpected but critical repair can exceed the car's value, turning it into a lawn ornament.

sloanbj

A lot of the major issues these cars suffer are electrical and mechanical related to the billions of unreliable components systems of the endless gadgets. Very few of these involve fluids, so fluid changing, while fine, does little to prevent failure of struts, coils, dashboards, Windows, doors, moon roofs, and the list goes on.

Fluid changing is an archaic holdover from the old days when engine and transmission oil as well as coolant were critical as cars had nothing else expensive to break. I love it when some old timer tells me his new S class should be bullet-proof because he is changing the oil on schedule. At the dealership!

Mike5215

True. Everything is connected to a servo controlled by a microprocessor monitored by another microprocessor. I knew it was all over when the gear selectors ceased to have any mechanical connection to the tranny.

I'm amazed the vanity mirrors in the sunshades can still be manipulated by hand.

Donnymac

Thanks for the good feed back. To me with waranty and good mainteance, the car is king of the luxury hill complete with highway proven performance. As to repairs, especially electric in nature - luck of the draw. Synthetic or or not, I am a fan of early fluid changes - cheap insurance and always fresh on power demand.

No plans to trade. Just plans to keep on enjoying the best sedan I ever have owned.

Thanks all.

wilassasin

Keep it until you're ready to part ways.