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Looks the like coupe C300, C43, C63 sold in the United States all originate in Germany. My biggest holdup with the sedan is the quality problems at the Alabama plant, which are legendary and systemic back to when they started making the ML320 there. I think it's a communication problem between manufacturing in Alabama and engineering/design in Germany. Meaning when they find a production issue, they don't seem to be able to fix it locally. Or when a better design comes out perhaps they can't retrain or reissue the assembly instructions.
The creaking dash, the front air suspension replacements/reseating, and the steering column problems held me back from ordering the Alabama sedan. I'd consider a German coupe more seriously now. Ordering on C43 and C63 should start at the end of this year.
Last edited by westwest888; May 23, 2016 at 07:17 PM.
A lot of the problems you note are all over the world and I have read that the German cars are having more wind noise problems than AL. Old wives tails abound.
Mine is almost perfect except the trim under doors loose. FIXED
Says the guy with the 6' Wing on his gutted s4. Please don't bring your nonsense over to this forum.
There is NO problem being made in Alabama. Some have issues and others do not. Audis that are all built in Germany also have issues.
Go tour any modern car factory and tell me after the tour if u really believe that the physical location of the plant has any bearing on the quality of the car. This might have made sense 40 years ago when u had actual humans screwing rivets on car but now a days. Not really. Unless u believe those damn american robot arms are lazier then the german ones.
Whatever faults these cars have are purely due to engineering (gasp, HQ in germany), factory tolerances (gasp, HQ in germany) and ultimately cost.
I remeber I had 2 models of the same car from BMW (3-Series), one was built in Germany, the other in South Africa. The south africa car was actually much much higher in quality with 0 mechanical issues whereas the german car had quite a few. What was the reason for the difference? The SA car was much newer, so the engineers had learnt from the first batch of cars and engineered out the problems.
With that said, it does 'feel' good that the coupe is being built in Germany. I like the old sense of knowing that my german car is from germany. No doubt about it. But its nothing more then a warm feeling at night
I agree with others the issues are likely due to the engineering and in this case MB likely not doing enough quality testing on the test cars prior to them being released to the masses. I have had mine for a little over a month and my biggest gripe with the car are the annoying little rattles over bumps, expansion joints, rough roads, etc. A very close second is the poor ride quality even in comfort mode. If I am switching lanes and going over a reflector between the lanes, the rear suspension makes a loud THUNK noise. It really is annoying as I have never had this sound from any car I have owned, including multiple BMW M cars, Porsche 911s, Audis (including my R8). This past weekend we were visiting in Cali and I ended up getting a Kia Cadenza as a rental. The car had approx 5000 miles on it, not a single squeak, rattle, or suspension noises. Unbelievable that a upper 30k Kia appears to me to have better build quality than my 87k Mercedes. Aside from these huge gripes I have, I love the car in terms of the motor, exhaust, interior aesthetics, pretty good sound system, and even the exterior has grown on me. I am hoping that with a tire change from the subpar Dunlops to perhaps Conti DW, Michelin PSS, or maybe even Pilot Sport AS3 Plus the ride will improve and perhaps it will help with some of the rattles. I sure hope so, otherwise don't see myself keeping the car for longer than 2-3 years.
Says the guy with the 6' Wing on his gutted s4. Please don't bring your nonsense over to this forum.
There is NO problem being made in Alabama. Some have issues and others do not. Audis that are all built in Germany also have issues.
Yeah, who would put a wing on one of these things? Honestly if you've ridden in a car with aero it completely changes your world view of speed and grip are about. You don't add 100 HP, you add 2' of wing and 10" of rise to bring your GT4 class aero to GT3 class aero.
Go tour any modern car factory and tell me after the tour if u really believe that the physical location of the plant has any bearing on the quality of the car. This might have made sense 40 years ago when u had actual humans screwing rivets on car but now a days. Not really. Unless u believe those damn american robot arms are lazier then the german ones.
Whatever faults these cars have are purely due to engineering (gasp, HQ in germany), factory tolerances (gasp, HQ in germany) and ultimately cost.
I remeber I had 2 models of the same car from BMW (3-Series), one was built in Germany, the other in South Africa. The south africa car was actually much much higher in quality with 0 mechanical issues whereas the german car had quite a few. What was the reason for the difference? The SA car was much newer, so the engineers had learnt from the first batch of cars and engineered out the problems.
With that said, it does 'feel' good that the coupe is being built in Germany. I like the old sense of knowing that my german car is from germany. No doubt about it. But its nothing more then a warm feeling at night
It has to do with communication. It's the same reason you can't just build all US software in India. When the people building the cars know the people who design and productize the car, problems get solved faster. It's more connective tissue, instead of a few lossy conduits for information. It's not like the whole team in Germany can easily just spend every week in Alabama when **** goes sideways. It's not even a direct flight. It's totally different holiday schedules. It's a different culture at the plant than it is at the mothership. So if it's perfect the first time, it works. Otherwise something strange happens like your $89k MB gets upstaged on quality by a rental Kia SUV.
My 2006 BMW 325i built in Regensburg was of low quality in retrospect. The dash rattled and the headlight ballasts shook when the car was in motion. The more I took the car on track the more it came apart, fit and finish wise.
I have to imagine the fully loaded cost of labor is different in Alabama vs. Germany, if only for workers benefits and vacation time differing in the US. Yet in the US we get charged the same price regardless of point of assembly. If I'm paying that price, I want the one that was more expensive to assemble.
Is it of higher quality? We'll never have publicly available data on defects per plant.
When I think about a low quality car, I think of some American cars where you get thousands of dollars cash back, free options, 0% financing for 84 months with 580 FICO score, etc. I don't think walk into an MB dealer and pay MSRP or more for a UAW car.
Last edited by westwest888; May 24, 2016 at 10:21 PM.
Yeah, who would put a wing on one of these things? Honestly if you've ridden in a car with aero it completely changes your world view of speed and grip are about. You don't add 100 HP, you add 2' of wing and 10" of rise to bring your GT4 class aero to GT3 class aero.
we are not talking about a wing like this. we are talking about a wing like THIS on a 4 door sedan, with half an interior, sawed in half center console, and a roll cage.
A bit of an optical illusion when you stand on top of it. In perspective, it looks small when you stand in front of the hood.
I have the results. It's about 5 seconds quicker around any 2 minute track than a C63S. Do you suggest I remove the wing from my track-only car and give up the 4 second gain? I can shove a 300 pound ballast in the car to make it fair and then we can go "driving".
GT4 wing - OK
GT3 class wing - NOT OK?
Last edited by westwest888; May 25, 2016 at 11:19 AM.
we are not talking about a wing like this. we are talking about a wing like THIS on a 4 door sedan, with half an interior, sawed in half center console, and a roll cage.
Yea, but it shaves .8 seconds off the trip to the supermarket! Function over form.
Regarding the build quality of the sedan, the main production of the W205 sedan is at the Bremen plant (yes, in Germany), while an additional plant is in Alabama for our local market. So unless all of these early production kinks stem solely from the Alabama plant, this theory of better build quality in Germany is moot.
No one knows if the Coupe will be free of all the same issues with the Sedan.
We're getting way off topic. The point of this thread is I'd like a car that isn't for the track. Mercedes comes to mind. Tesla comes to mind. 2017 A4 comes to mind.
I'm glad Mercedes has a German car with a German price from Germany, on sale in the US. End of thread?
Yea, but it shaves .8 seconds off the trip to the supermarket! Function over form.
Actually it just shaves 8 MPG off trips. To the racetrack. Drag coefficient is more like 0.55 instead of 0.28.
Not recommended for a road car. It's basically cheating at a racetrack. It's how the Viper ACR shattered every track record, where the Viper SRT wasn't even close. That's why in homologated racing they limit the size of these things, or ban them outright in some touring classes.
Last edited by westwest888; May 25, 2016 at 11:30 AM.
Actually it just shaves 8 MPG off trips. To the racetrack. Drag coefficient is more like 0.55 instead of 0.28.
Not recommended for a road car. It's basically cheating at a racetrack. It's how the Viper ACR shattered every track record, where the Viper SRT wasn't even close. That's why in homologated racing they limit the size of these things, or ban them outright in some touring classes.
I'm not questioning it's functionality. It looks silly on the S4, I'd be quite embarrassed to be seen driving in it -- this is coming from someone who owned a ridiculous B5 S4 for 12 years (with upwards of 600 WHP).
Right, it is not embarrassing to drive it to the track. Or to explain the computational fluid dynamics of 2D wings on sedans to anyone who inquires. I could see how it's embarrassing in Boston because there is a lot of pressure to conform. California is pretty wild and people do all kinds of wacky stuff without pretense or judgement.
But the reason I'm on this forum is to find a German built C63 (or C43 9-speed) coupe with Apple Carplay and ideally zero known defects.
Right, it is not embarrassing to drive it to the track. Or to explain the computational fluid dynamics of 2D wings on sedans to anyone who inquires. I could see how it's embarrassing in Boston because there is a lot of pressure to conform. California is pretty wild and people do all kinds of wacky stuff without pretense or judgement.
But the reason I'm on this forum is to find a German built C63 (or C43 9-speed) coupe with Apple Carplay and ideally zero known defects.
I used to live in West Hollywood and I never once saw a sedan with a park bench quite as large as yours on the streets. Saw plenty of Bugatti's, Aventador's, Huaracans, 458's in BH though...
Like I said, I'm not questioning it's functionality on the track. I just think it looks comical -- and I'd say the majority of people that see it would agree, regardless of whether they're on the east coast or west coast.
If you're on this forum to find a german built C63 Coupe with no known defects and Apple Carplay, you may have to wait a while. First deliveries haven't even started, and Apple Carplay has been put on the back burner for all Mercedes vehicles due to a dispute over the management and ownership of the customer data (MB did not want to allow Apple access)... so Carplay is dead right now in the foreseeable future. Maybe in 2018 if MB and Apple are able to come to an agreement.
Beverly Hills hotels like the Peninsula are worth staying in not for the room rate and acceptable service, but for the free car show. See a P1, La Ferrari and 918 Spyder parked back to back in the valet.
SoCal is definitely street cars. NorCal has 3 world class tracks and you tend to see a larger subculture of that. Any douchebag can pay Porsche $160k for a GT car. Sort of fun to put the hurt on them in a $25k Audi with $25k of mods.
That sucks about CarPlay. I think Apple hired 1000 engineers just to get that system in 230 new car models on sale in the US. It's a huge job integrating. I doubt they are building a car...
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