Marcus Frost

Hello everyone,

Most of you may not know me, I am a new member to the R230 club with the recent purchase of my '04 SL600. I used to reside in the E55 owner previously having owned a W210 and W211 E55 AMG.

For reference, please refer to this post which describes the failure on my previous E55:

https://mbworld.org/forums/w211-amg/118154-another-coolant-water-pump-failure-writeup-inside.html

I took my car in for service and my tech being the best around, decided to check the ECU for water pump codes. My W211 E55 had the pump crap out on it, and guess what - the SL55, 65, and 600s all have the same damn water pump! This pump circulates coolant through the air-to-water intercooler system which is what cools the air before it reaches your cylinders. If it starts to crap out, it does not pump water properly, and if it does not pump water properly, your intake air temperatures skyrocket and the car loses power. My E55 had a total failure and I'd estimate it felt like it lost 200hp @ 30k miles. On my SL it was failing so it's hard to say how much it was losing, it now has a tad under 13k miles.

This is not isolated to the W211 platform or even to the 55 Kompressor motors my friends! This is the 2nd consecutive forced induction MB I've owned and both have now experienced failures. Have your techs scan for codes if you have any indication you are down on power because it is very possible that you may have this issue and have NO idea it is there aside from the seat of the pants feel. The pump needs to trigger a fault code multiple times for the ECU to show an error code to the driver.

If you are due for an A or B service, have another issue, whatever, have the tech check it! It's not time consuming at all. There is a revised part # for a new pump and it's all under warranty. I am starting to lose count of how many of these failures I've seen, and not until my tech told me today did I know the V12s have the same problem.

I should also plug my tech/service advisor team @ Loeber Motors in Lincolnwood. You simply cannot get better service, I don't care what anyone says. If you want the best MB service you can possible get, these guys are it.

Regards,

Marcus

Scruffyone

Mine went in today for A service and I had them check the intercooler pump. My pump is fine. I pick her up in about an hour. They can have their Cramrey loaner back.

JR.

i forwarded this thread to my MB service consultant. theyu have not seen any of these problems..
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although, i did take in my car because the check engine light was on and it was leaking antifreeze.. behind the driver front tire, along the underbody
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we'll see........

DBERRY7578

Bob at Renntech told me that about 25% of the SL's have this issue and they always advise the person to change their water pump when they are upgrading.

JCortney

My car was in the shop yesterday and today (gear shifter stuck in park and a leaky front strut) and while it was there I asked them to check the codes. Seems that it's not a "water" pump as we know and love water pumps but a different pump that pumps water and air into the intercooler.

Anyway, guess what? Mine had fault codes and they tore it apart today and put in a new one.

What a great group, never would have known to look if you hadn't let me know.

Thanks,

JR.

a chicago friend of mine has this problem with his 2003 SL55.. same thing, driven hard, car heats up and loses power...
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don't know if it is a physical heat problem or some kind of safe mode that the car goes into..
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in any case, something that should be considered...
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the strange thing is this has occurred with cars serviced at Loeber and that Knauz in Lake Forest is unfamiliar with the problem, in terms of multiple cars..

JCortney

Mine had only heard of it on one car before mine. What really amazes me is why they don't check all the codes everytime the car comes in. What can it take, 10 minutes? Isn't that what the codes are for???

MBTECH2003

Would you be willing to pay for a technician to do that? Not to be a jerk but thats the reason, you are not going to want to pay a tech to do that while your car is under warranty. Mercedes will NOT pay us to do a quick test for the hell of it anyway. Most technicians will not go far out of their way looking for problems in cars. If it is simple we will fix it, otherwise we fix what the customer complains about. Just some insight from the other side. We are all commission based, and no one likes working for free!

JCortney

I guess I can understand the position but, wouldn't you make more money if you found other things to be corrected??

I also have to think that my dealer (Ewing Mercedes) must go an extra mile. My car was in for a bad shifter. When asked they checked the codes and found that the pump was bad. Now, I guess here's the extra mile. While the tech was working on the car he inspected the front suspension and found a leaking strut. Not likely that I would have noticed it.

On that note, are the struts problematic? This is my second replacement (one rear and one front) with only 22K on the car.