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the trans fluid that might never have been changed - coz merc WANTED them to die- and so wrote the service schedule to say IT NEVER NEEDS DOING - but they are so well made, by 35k half the gearbox is now mixed in the trans fluid by 35k miles the risk was on them for failure in warranty - so they first introduced a 37k one off change but it still wasn't enough - so moved to the service schedule to every 37k miles on going
if you have ABC suspension fluid and filter change every 2 years
non ABS cars replace all three suspension level sensor link rods every 4 years
get the pin bush housing and the CPS (crank position sensor) and swap them over at 50k miles every 8 years
coil packs dies randomly from 7 years 50 k miles
front castor control lower aluminum arm bushes disintegrate at 10 years 60 k miles
lubricate and operate the silly inlet manifold vac operated internal stupidity flaps
drive belt, idler pulleys are made of chocolate, fail around 50k miles
AC compressor pulley bearing made of chocolate - replace every 50k miles
maybe a fuel filter and hidden rust on the fuel tank hidden by under-body covers
early cars all 4 doors flash door modules to keep the windows working
if you like time wasting / finger crossing. You could pull the amp out the left side of the boot and clean the circuit board, replace the cooling fan and put graphics PC card self adhesive heat sinks on the over heating chips
replace the 4 ABS sensor wires at 12 years / 50k mile mark
charge the battery every week if not driving it ..
battery pack in the alarm module - seems they can leak and spill on to the circuit board and they die ( every 10 to 12 years)
More maintenance items - left a bit out - pollen filters - I guess if you have rear AC you get 2 (both the same) - I dropped mine out yesterday
three torx screws, drop trim panel in passenger foot-well, look up and find triangular plastic bit 10" by 4" with two plastic slides - move them over, access cover drops down, and you can grab the filters - they pull straight down - I guess if non rear ac only get one filter it might be a different shape access cover
these are meant to get the big expensive heavy ones full of carbon bits - there's some budget rot out there you don't want - that's just paper and weigh about the same as an empty envelope - its been 24k miles since I did these last - turns out that took me 8 years (as I had written the date on them) point is they were weren't that dirty - but lots of leaf litter came out - might be worth checking more regularly
also spotted passenger carpet is designed to fold back (from where your feet would rest) without any tools - to get at various control modules they hid there - might be worth popping of any electrical connections and remaking them (I didn't bother)
So turned out those gaps don't need to be bridged - there are other drains below to take a water away. Ingress is from a leaking windshield seal along left A-pillar (anyone had this issue before?)
The rear is also leaking somehow rear carpet area had half an inch of water after rainstorm- are there drains at the rear of the panoramic roof? If so, how do I get to / clear those? I've seen threads but for normal roof, not pano.
Damn I wonder what mine looks like. My car was garaged by the PO. I garaged it for a short while and now it is outside again...also I live in an area that clogged the sunroof drains on a previous vehicle but I have had this car since late 2021 and have NOT noticed any leaks or related problems....I should inspect though.
I finally checked my cowl drains (i know this is a sunroof thread). The center two drains were mostly fine. The HVAC intake one required a bit of flushing and one poke with something for the junk to flush through. The other side (driver's side) was totally free.
The real issue was the side drains. They were totally clogged and I don't know for how long.
For the driver's side one, I tried a lot of different things. What ended up working was I used my metal fish tape to poke down the drain while adding some water. Eventually the gunk cleared and I was able to really flush. Took a lot of fooling around before I had this success though.
On the passenger side I was less lucky. I tried the fish tape thing and no luck. I tried a small, clear, vinyl hose that I would shove into the drain and spray garden hose water into it. No improvement. I tried a large hose that more or less filled the opening (rather than going into the drain). Still didn't clear with the garden hose spraying into it. Then I raised the ante. After trying with water, I grabbed my shop air nozzle and blew air directly into the hose shooting a slug of pressurized water into the drain. That worked!! I was able to flush clean after that.
FWIW, if your side drains cannot handle a garden hose sprayer at full force, they are clogged.
It seems like I need to pull the wheelwell liners out and clean behind though. Maybe next time....
took a look under the aluminium plate that gets soggy below the HVAC blower motor in the passenger footwell
as you can see underneath the plate mine was giving me the needle - showing that its perfectly possible for detritus to make the leap from outside to inside - great design. I pulled off both batteries and remade all the connections then put back together with ACF 50 everywhere - as per the other chaps post I pulled the airtragic ecu apart (5 screws) to look at my circuit board before coating it all in ACF 50 as well - mine didn't have any corrosion on any parts - but you could tell the foot of the aluminium plate had got wet at times - must have at least 16 canbus links hiding down there - the beige and brown connectors with all the green wires... the carpet just pulls back and then three easy to reach 10mm plastic nuts allow the plate to lift back (here its lying on the floor in front of the seat squab) - oh - and a remade the two earth points for good measure
Take a very close look at the second video posted and compare it to your video it looks like you're missing some rubber blocking perhaps. Has your windshield ever been replaced? Perhaps the rubber blocking was not put back correctly it just looks like something is missing look at the video very closely the second one
So glad I found this thread. Any ideas how to access and clean out drain 610? The trunk area of my W221 has a lot of water and I suspect it's coming from there.
Mercedes SLR McLaren 722 S Is Extremely Rare Example Modified by McLaren
Slideshow: A one-of-one U.S.-spec Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren Roadster became even rarer after a factory-backed transformation at McLaren's headquarters.
