jason427

Driving to work, esp turned off for a little fun. All is cool... Get to work, park, go inside.

Come out an hour later, start car, says ESP MALFUNCTION or something like that and car will only go 1mph, can not give it gas. Turn car off, try again, same thing. Go back inside. Come out about 30 min. later, try again. Seems fine, BUT check engine light is now on.

What do you think? Should I try to unplug the battery and see if it clears the code or take it in?

Thanks in advance,
Jason

sack5000

IMO take it in...think of something else it needs, oil change whatever to make it somewhat less painful. I dread my visits to the stealer......

jangy

I dread it, too but take it in.

mclarenm8d

I'd take it in either way, but check your battery(s). Also, there is a procedure to reset ESP in the owner's manuals.

If it is an issue with the electronic throttle control, wheel speed sensor, etc, the techs should be able to see a code indicating a problem.

Could be a number of simple things ... but in my case, what you have described was a case of my torque convertor lock-up not disengaging. So, basically it was like trying to get the car rolling without any torque convertor action. Even more fun is that this will cause the supercharger to engage because of the high load, making the car fall on it's *** even more. If it happens again, the dead giveaway on this is that the RPM gain will be real "heavy" when the car is in park or neutral. Turning the car off and then on again will sometimes get the TC lock-up clutch to unstick.

Tuskir

I'm sorry to revive this thread, but I've just had the same exact problem on my SLK55. I went for a drive today after not driving it for a couple of weeks and made a stop at the mall. Spent about 1 hour there and when I tried to start the car again, "ESP malfunction, visit workshop" message came on. The car would only drive like 5-7mph, assuming it was in "llimp mode" or something.

I tried restarting the car a few times, but that didn't solve the problem. Just as I was about to call a tow truck, I tried starting it one last time and what do you know - the car is working perfect. The "ESP malfunction" message and CEL light are still on, but the car drives perfect. What the hell happened here? First its only driving 5mph in limp mode, then the next thing you know its back to normal. I drove home about 10 miles on the highway and no problems whatever (except the CEL). What the hell is going on?


P.S. This may sound crazy, but I got the power back right after I put the car in R and gave it some gas. I had to turn the car around, and fully expected it to still be in "limp" mode, but to my surpise it went in reverse like nothing was wrong. When I put it back in D, it was also working fine and I drove home. Not sure if putting in R actually solved the problem or if that was just a conicidence.

sack5000

Might be the steering angle sensor. With the engine running, turn the wheel as far as possible to the left and then as far as possible to the right. This will reset the sensor and might help. Probably need to visit the stealer on Monday.

Tuskir

Thanks! Now that I think about it, before going in reverse, I turned the wheel... so that could be what fixed it. Unfortunately, the error message and CEL are still on though. Did anyone else have a similar problem, it seems to be rather common if we both have a practically brand new car and the same problem

ChicagoX

If you go to a Pep Boys or similar, they can loan you an OBDII code reader.

Plug it in, read the code, look it up in the book. That would help a great deal.

Good luck.

Jakpro1

+1. Take it Pep or The Zone and tell us the codes.

We'll tell ya in seconds what is up.

Well, maybe minutes or an hour.

MB_Forever

So it wasn't the ESP that went bad

Tuskir

I still have no idea what it was. The car is still working fine, however, the "ESP malfunction" error and CEL light are on. The good thing is that the car never went to "limp mode" again (fingers crossed!). I'm taking it in tomorrow or tuesday....