Does anyone else have this issue with their R129? Mine's a 2002 Silver Arrow SL 500, and the following happens only occasionally, but enough to cause me concern:

When starting up or pulling out of a parking space, etc., if I shift from N to R, or from N to D, when I then pull away the car hesitates and then either jumps or grinds a bit before catching the gear. The jump will often chirp the tires a little, whereas the grind is occurring during that "hesitation", and the car moves very slowly in that time. Lasts maybe a second before all's well again. I had thought that it was transmission related but after paying more attention to it today, I believe it may be coming from the diff, although I can't be certain. It seems more prone to happen if I shift a little faster than usual, although I never go into gear if the car's moving or if the revs are above idle, regardless.

What am I looking at here? Anyone have a clue as to whether this is a widespread issue, is a no-biggie issue to not worry about, or is a minefield waiting to blow up under my foot? If the latter or something close to it, what kind of expense is going to be involved to fix something like this? I want to keep this car as a collectable because it's beautiful, cruises gorgeously, and my wife loves it too, but I'm afraid of this issue because it feels like it'd be really cost-prohibitive if it ever festered.

Plus, I have some large roadtrips planned for later this year and need to be secure in this thing's reliability. If we're talking about a common ghost in this machine, I'm fine with it. If not, I need to think about available alternatives.

Thanks in advance for your comments and advice.

vic

 

i would say that it is normal. mercedes trannys are somewhat "slow" in there gear selection (D N R) it is normal for the tranny to take about 3 real seconds to shift to a gear. do you have a warrenty? when was your tranny fluid changed? may want to do that before you go on your trip;

Mark

 

no warranty; the car is 6 years old, has had a few owners (the first trade was starmarked, but after that it went through non-MB dealers/auctions, according to carfax, which voids the starmark), has had a fairly recent "B" (for "big", as in price) service but to my knowledge the tranny fluid's never been swapped. i owned a 2001 slk320 new some years back, and my recollection is that the tranny fluid in MB's and most other cars should be good to at least 50k, if not more. my car just turned 31k on the odo. seems rather young for tranny issues to me.

i'm familiar with leisurely tranny engagements, having owned a few mercs and a few cadillacs, but the issue here is that once the tranny at the lever feels like its dropped into gear, i'll start to pedal the gas and instead of smoothly moving as though in gear, what feels like the diff (but may be the tranny - hard to tell) either grinds while slowly moving about a foot before "catching", or sort of freewheels for a second before catching and chirping my tires. either of the foregoing are definitely not what i'd consider normal, and this is from experience owning probably 10-12 cars in my lifetime, 5 of which were mercedes' of various vintages ranging from 72, 92, 01, 02 and 05.

in other words, to boil it all down, "am i completely FAKKED here or what?"

my mechanic is doing some other work on the car today; i told him to check out this issue and after describing it to him his face wore deep concern while he said, "that doesn't sound good". i hope he's wrong, because i love this car.

v

 

http://consumerguideauto.howstuffwor...sl-class-6.htm


about halfway down the page it makes some mention of your problem in the '97-'99 models.

 

Nice find...An ATF flush and fill with the specified fluid is certainly worth a try...

 

after a day at the mechanic's "spa", the car comes back with a very clean bill of health (the guys at the shop love that i've been able to source some ridiculously clean, well-kept merc's for super-value prices over the years); the tranny fluid was down about 1/2 quart and this has (thus far) solved the problem. otherwise, there are no leaks anywhere under the car, and it's dry like a freshly re-diapered baby's bottom down there.

i'm relieved to know that my silver arrow appears to be a "good one" as used cars go. i plan to keep it as a collectable, shifting it off daily driver status in a year or two and getting into a used low-mile/ultra-clean cayman s design edition and doing the same thing with it (keep it as a long-term toy). yeah, you could say i'm a sucker for these "limited" appearance packages, so what!

i really need to put some new front brake pads on this weekend before heading to vegas on sunday, though...

 

glad you got everything worked out! let us know if it come back! enjoy yor vegas tirp? wheres home?

 

weho; you're down in oc, eh?

i saw your red monster at the irvine thing a few weeks ago; i was only there a short time with my dad from out-of-town -- we got there late and missed pretty much the entire hang, but did the walk-thru.