I have an 04 E55, US model. When I am in comfort or sport tranny mode, the car can still be shifted with the paddles or by slapping the shifter left an right. Is this normal? Weird thing too is that let say I am at a dead stop in sport or comfort mode and hit the left paddle, it goes from "D" to "4", so does this mean I would be launching in 4th gear?

 

Everything is normal. In regular C or S mode, the tranny acts like any normal autostick. That means you can downshift and all that does is make that the highest gear the car will use. For example, if you put it in 3rd while in S mode, it will still downshift to 2 and 1 when it feels the need.
Now, M mode is slightly different. It is intended to literally hold a gear that you choose and only shift when you tell it to. It will drop gears at about 1000 rpm, unless you hold the button down.
Oh yeah, there are neat features even in sport mode. You can hold the button down and it goes to the lowest gear for max power, and everyone knows that. But, on acceleration, you can also keep the button down so that the car will NOT upshift. It may help in the 1/4 mile with our gearing.

As fars as gears the car launches on, it goes in 1st with sport and manual and second with comfort.

ALL OF THIS ONLY APPLYS TO '04 AND NEWER. I dunno about the '03s and early '04s.

 

Awesome thanks!!!

I must say that the people on this forum are really great. This is my first MB and having this resource has really made it a much more positive experience.

One of the few places where people still help random folk, particularly ones like myself that are new to the benz.

 

There are lots of posts on the tranny here , just due a search. you will find alot of little tricks with in the paddles and shifting Have some fun man.. Welcome

 

I have an '03 s55 and when i first got it, could only use the paddles in M mode as stated. But after the dealer replaced the transmission module from transmission fluid leaking all over it, i can use them as if i had an 04 and up car.

Is this from a possible 'updated software' or 'updated module'. Just curious. I havent asked my SA advisor about it yet either.

 

well.. my 03.. i can only use the paddles in manual mode.. but in sport and comfort mode, i can still shift with the stick, but not the paddles

 

Great post jangy .

Ok here is my dilemma

A few times when i have been doing rolling races i am in sport mode and click the shifters to be in a lower gear for the speed i am at.

Now the problem is on 3 occasions when i reach 6,500rpm or so in 1rst gear i would then go to click to shift to 2nd gear. What happens is the car shifts to the next gear (2nd) just a second or so as i click the manual shifter, resulting in me been in 3rd gear!! Instead of second, (due to slight delay with the manual shifters)

from reading your post jangy you are saying that the car will shift its self if i am in S mode and just use the shifter to pump down a gear, so I.E no need to up shift with shifters yes?

If so then this will help allot!!
Was thinking of just clicking back to mode S as soon as i put my foot down when the race starts, so the car will then take over?

And yes in manual mode the car will hold the gear till you ask it to shift, as I remember bouncing off the rev limiter once by mistake when i was in M mode

 

David,

That is normal. 2003 55k cars cannot shift manually unless they actually put the car into manual mode (my '03 E55 did this) - however on '04s+ you can activate manual mode simply by tapping the shifter buttons or tapping the shifter left or right.

-m

 

From what I understand is that the tranny will shift itself to protect from over revving. So by the time your shifting it beats you to it and you end up in 3rd gear.

 

When stoped at a red light and you want to race what is the best mode to start off on? Would manual mode be the best for performance?

 

That is correct.
Just keep it in S mode. Click to downshift if need, then just step on it and let it do its work. The car will upshift itself at redline*

*This is on my 05'. I cant speak for 03's.


S mode. Click downshift to make sure it reads and starts from 1st gear.
Comfort mode. Traction on. Gas hard but don't floor it until you gets to 3(count in your head).

 

Just leave it in Sport mode and let the car do the work.

 

OK, here is something I wrote in another forum, explaining the various modes of the AMG Speedshift transmission.

Since 2003/2004, all AMG models (excluding the C32 and SLK32) have three modes to the AMG Speedshift automatic transmissions (5 speed or 7 speed).

"C" - comfort mode: Car will shift automatically if left alone; transmission starts in 2nd gear (unless kickdown is initiated by flooring the accelerator); gear shifts are slower/smoother and occur at lower rpm's; note that manual selection of gears is still possible at any time with the gear shift lever or with buttons/paddles at the back of the steering wheel; however, the transmission will automatically upshift before hitting the rev limiter or downshift before the engine stalls if you keep the car in the same gear inappropriately

"S" - standard or sport mode: Car will shift automatically if left alone; transmission starts in 1st gear; gear shifts are faster and occur at higher rpm's for a more sporty experience and acceleration; note that manual selection of gears is still possible at any time with the gear shift lever or with buttons/paddles at the back of the steering wheel; however, the transmission will automatically upshift before hitting the rev limiter or downshift before the engine stalls if you keep the car in the same gear inappropriately

"M" -manual mode: Car will not shift automatically if you don't do anything (except it will downshift if the engine is about the stall). Driver needs to upshift/downshift on his own using the gearshift lever or the buttons/paddles on the back of the steering wheel. The car will not downshift on its own even if you try to initiate kickdown by flooring the accelerator, and it will not upshift on its own even if you hit the rev limiter. Thus, the driver has FULL control of the gear selections.

 

In manual mode my car still upshifts automatically. No rev limiter engaged.

 

Can you change to Sport while driving from Comfort mode? Does anyone ever use the level function? I know when in Sport mode the suspension stiffens but since the level function is available in the car does anyone ever use that?

 

have you ever fixed that problem?

 

Upshifting even in M mode happens in my 2005. And shifts earlier than it should in C/S mode too. You never figured it out?

 

If you want to disable the car shifting automatically in M mode, look at the MKUltra TCU flash.

I'm a LOT happier with my transmission now since I got it done. There used to be this horrible lag between gears, but that's all gone now.

 

I will link a video I recorded. In the video the car is shifting while in M mode without me doing anything at all.

 

It seems like you are pressing a button to shift.

 

It does sound like that, is there a fuse or relay or something that does that? I'm driving with my left and recording with my right, so I assure you that no physical button was pressed

 

Just to soldify what I'm saying, both shift buttons Are disconnected/cut, even if I pressed the buttons nothing would happen

 

That is crazy. Honestly I think the best thing to do would be to use SDS or a good scan tool and see if there was a shift commanded by a button/shifter. Does it seem random or is it always timed like that? Is it linked to RPM at all? What happens if you use more throttle?

 

It's pretty consistently early on the shifts. On throttle it usually just shifts up again. When analyzing the signals you mentioned, is there a scanner besides STAR that you can recommend? I've heard of the icarsoft mb ii, but not sure if it's good enough for what I need

 

I have that iCarSoft MB-II. In theory whatever module is responsible for those data PIDs should be viewable using that MB-II. The data rate is slow though so I worry you may not see it happen but at least check it out. I don't know what module you would interrogate.