Hello,

I have the following issue with the three-color ambient lighting on a 2011 W221 S550 imported from Japan. At the moment, only the blue color lights up, and I cannot change either the brightness or the color of the lighting. The COMAND NTG 3.0 module was replaced with a European one so that the radio would work, but currently there is no option in it to select the color. Only a brightness adjustment from 0 to 5 appears, but it doesn’t work. Does anyone have an idea what the problem might be and could help with resolving it? Additionally, on the driver’s side door, not even the blue light is working.

 

Hello, the ambient lighting on my driver’s door isn’t working. Does anyone know if it’s possible to replace only the LED strip, or does the whole trim piece need to be replaced? The car is an S550 facelift, but the ambient lighting has only one color – blue. From what I’ve read, this is the cheaper version of the ambient lighting system on facelift models.

 

It may be possible to change the coding on the Command unit to make it know that it has the Japanese ambient lighting.

The door strip light is integral to the trim strip.

 

Did you really fit Comand NTG3 version?
You need 3.5 on a facelift w221.

 

on Japan import cars until the end of the production they are produced only with NTG 3.0

This is Chatgpt explanation:

• The Japanese facelift (2009–2013) arrived a bit earlier than in Europe, but Mercedes Japan continued selling inventory and parts based on the pre-facelift NTG 3.0 system.
  
• Japan has strict radio frequency and navigation certification rules (ARIB standards), so Mercedes kept using NTG 3.0 hardware that was already certified for the local FM/AM bands, DVD region code, and GPS mapping format.
  

 

I would have thought you don't need it - basically the NTG 3.0 and 3.5 is the same thing and the jap cars are so wildly different every wire would have needed to be re done

a bit of menu colours and one tick box for toggling Fade on or off