1050 Miles on the odometer.
Three visits to dealer.
1. All safety systems suspended with 24 miles on the car secondary to faulty rear bumper sensor.
2. 800 miles faulty oil level measurement issue
3. Most significantly now with 1050 miles on the car it has been in the shop for three days with check engine light on. Multiple misfires in virtually all cylinders. ? manifold gasket leak. No idea when I get it back. "We are working on it and not sure all the parts we need; we do know that most are in Germany".

Wow....

 

Picked mine up CPO with 2000 miles on it. In for the second time now with "air ride malfunction". We have only put 1000 miles on it. It's a shame because I do love the car.

 

I truly wonder what can cause some of these cars to have so many issues and yet others to be just fine.

 

Extremely complicated machines with thousands of electronic parts.

 

 

That's fine, but it's no excuse. Mercedes is the one that runs around with the slogan "the best or nothing". It's sad when 25 year old Toyotas are more reliable than a brand new "best or nothing" car.

 

Mercedes Benz have been over reliant on electronics for years, and it is these electronics that are prone to failure. Everything you listed, was electronic.
But your not the only one with gremlins plaguing their vehicles, it exist across all models. That is why, I'm sticking with my 10 year old E63.

 

 

Sorry to hear than man ... are the guys at Baker taking good care of you?

 

 

 

good thing for warranty

 

Bummer. Sorry to hear about the troubles! The worst part are the delays due to the international parts shipments.
Despite these issues, MB's are much more reliable than older models ever were.

Good luck getting it resolved fast!

 

 

 

You realize that your comments apply to literally every car build these days...

 

I beg to differ. The more options these AMGs have nowadays, it seems they do it by adding more and more control units. If something is wrong electrically, a control unit or its corresponding sensor is usually to blame. Diagnosing on the other hand is where it could get a bit murky. However eg I have a basic Scantool that for a less than 100 bucks I can access most of the individual ecus on my W212 biturbo and reset them anytime I want. I also had a Star unit that I used to diagnose individual components on my old W211 with its SBC etc etc (didn't bother updating for the W212 so I gave the unit away to someone who did update it and is currently using it on several newer MBs). The aftermarket catches up on the repair front well ahead of the performance front.
Also most of the options on the AMG are available on the lowly E300, so the electronics for all intents and purposes are similar or the same. Bigger more powerful engines do not necessarily require unobtainium tools to work on. I will venture to say the S85B50 from a 2008 M5 is probably more complex than the S63B44TU turbo V8 as an example of more power not meaning more complexity (not valid in all area codes, some variations may apply)

 

Yes even Kia and Chevy have a bevy of electronic options that is similar to what's found in MBs today. The implementation will be different of course

 

 

The complexity of cars is just at its very beginning. Just add level 3+ autonomous driving, car 2 car communications, etc.

Huge depreciation isn't AMG-specific; any high-cost, non-commodity car attractive to a small customer base will experience the same. Some few and notable exceptions (select Porsche 911GT models and select exotics & SUV's).

 

The point I was making is that it is not just the part itself that makes AMGs in particular expensive to repair. The ability to diagnose what is wrong to begin with is what makes them difficult to keep as a used car. The example I gave of a cheap diagnosing tool is just to show the aftermarket is catching up faster and faster, cheaper and cheaper the more electronic these cars become. The newer the car, the more expensive the part is, give it 6-8 years and it is not much more than most conventional cars in cost. If you can identify the problem, the aftermarket has a solution for you that is usually 1/3 to 1/2 the cost of the factory replacement (which usually brings it down to the level of repairing a ~Camry).
You will have to do more repairs cos there is more to go wrong when the car is fully loaded, but that goes for the lowly E300 through to the mighty E63. So the concept of 140K vehicle repairs vs the 50-60K ones is mostly not true nowadays despite the complexities. I kept an old AMG (and Lexus) and to be honest I loved it. It was not that much more to maintain compared to most cars I have had. I did put on an ungodly amount of miles per year (25-30k) so a new one did not make sense for me, but I also went in knowing I will have to have cash to repair some things as I go. Ended up spending waaay more modifying it than actually repairing it.

Due to parts sharing, the huge depreciation on these cars have less to do with the cost of maintenance (cos they are not too far off between the base and hopped up versions) and more to do with the "someone who can afford a $70-90K used car will most likely pony up for a new $100-120k version. Dealers then get a backlog of these cars and have to reduce prices to move them. Also the lease options which a lot of these cars tend to be acquired by, flood the market with used cars, why not turn in your lease and get a new one for the same monthly payments as refinancing your old lease). Supply is outweighing demand on the used market and thus regardless of what decade we are in, these cars drop like a ship anchor in value, model after model, decade after decade. Yet they are still being sold on the used car market (niche purchasers)

EDIT: To add, a lot of these problems the W213 cars are experiencing seem to be electronic in nature....that is usually a whole lot cheaper to repair than a blown transmission from oil and coolant mixing in the radiator (W211), fuel pumps dying from the inability to replace a simple filter (W211), camshafts and tappets excessively wearing out due to metallurgy incompatibility (W212), head bolts failing (W212). All of which are regularly priced in remedy if you do it before it breaks. But I bet if any of these issues were to happen to a Chevy, it will not be cheap to repair either.

 

Notable exceptions may have to do with the the fact that they are usually bought (which owners then tend to keep longer) and bought or leased in lower numbers (less on the used car market)

 

You're assuming the ever growing number of control units will be commercially available to the general public in the future.
Try repairing a keyless go unit today.

 

Yes they are very available today. Keyless Go is a security issue and one found in a base $30k MB all the way to the $260K MB
Honda is damn near impossible to reset the radio units without a dealer....still an issue today as it was over 10 years ago

 

Correct, but that's point, the list is growing.

Who knows what the next "security issue" will be.
How many more "security" issue units have been added? How many more general "this unit that renders your car inoperable is only available to select few" will they add?

The answer to both those questions is >1. Even with a scan tool, replacing these units is not always PNP. The whole point being, the future repairability of cars today is going to be an issue.