ouch... s55 (no pics)

[dtmcoupe]

heres a paste from another forum...i would link you, but you have to be a member to get to it so here you go..i have no other info, but will keep you posted.

For sometime I was a firm believer that Mercedes Benz was builder of a bullet proof V8. But after hearing about this interesting incident its seems that the darkside has its dark days too.

A customer of ours takes delivery of a 2003 S55 AMG a few months ago. He realizes its a beast of a car and decides to take it tracking. While running the car the motor suddenly blows. We take the car in as a tow-in and discover there is a hole in the engine the size of a mans hand. Mercedes Benz investigates the situation and finds there was no foul play or physical damage to the engine. Our service center is than given the green light to order the $40,000+ motor and perform the warranty work. The repairs alone took about a full week and that was a month ago.

Just today I was informed that The Mercedes Benz Tele-Aid Satellite has a satellite image of the S55 on the track the moment the motor blew. Now MB is disputing the warranty work and the two sides are about to clash since the owner has made a case of it.

To Be Continued.....

[So.Cal_Benzo]

wow.. that sucks.
So the warranty is voided because he was racing it on the track?

[pokerface]

..if MB can pull satellite images (obviously quality good enough to locate and positively identify the vehicle on a track), I'm sure they have onboard computers on the car to pull telemetry data from.. a black box of some sort to figure out exactly what the owner was doing.

I mean, the owner could be a shit driver and really only doing 50mph around the oval :rolleyes:

[dtmcoupe]

wish i had more info for you guys...but i too am amazed that there is that much tech on that car...hell i dont even have keyless entry on my coupe...and my seat is 1/2 electric 1/2 manual ;)

[scottschoe]

had the S passed it's break-in period?

[So.Cal_Benzo]

Originally posted by scottschoe
had the S passed it's break-in period?
I heard that AMG engines are broken-in from the factory.
From what i've known the dealership can check through the computer to see what you've been doing to the car (such as hard driving and so on)
The honda dealership that my friend goes to found out that he had done 130mph and speeds over 100mph a lot of times and did a lot of drop-clutching which was the main reason why his car is having some problems.

[dtmcoupe]

everytime i take my car to the dealer the techs say my car "must go through hell everyday" :) they check the obd which tells them how high ive reved it...and how many times ive hit the limiter

[Ozzie Bob]

That's a sad sad story man! Poor S55 :(
Maybe that idiot didn't let his car warm up, or maybe he gave it too much :confused: Either way, it's sad!

[pokerface]

the other thing is, with all the safety systems on the car, i thought it would be nearly impossible to overrev that engine! :confused:

so im leaning towards a defect or running hard w/o warmup

[AMGDood]

oh man... this story scares the shet out of me! I really dont like the fact that Mercedes was able to find out exactly where the car was and at what time. I feel like its an invasion of privacy. Its like they know exactly where you are and can find out without your permission. That shouldnt be allowed at all.

[scottschoe]

Originally posted by So.Cal_Benzo
I heard that AMG engines are broken-in from the factory.


oh well that would explain it. i test drove a basically new c32 yesterday (just for fun, no intention of buying) and the sales guy said something to the extent of 'have fun, hammer the thing and try not to get tickets' and handed me the keys.

but i was too afraid of harming the engine so i didn't try anything crazy.

[Ozzie Bob]

Originally posted by scottschoe
the sales guy said something to the extent of 'have fun, hammer the thing and try not to get tickets' Just one reason why buying a 'demo' is a bad idea! :eek: :( The sales people have WAY too much fun in the demo's!

[mrjones]

Originally posted by scottschoe
...the sales guy said something to the extent of 'have fun, hammer the thing and try not to get tickets' and handed me the keys...
:mad: :mad:
Two things make me mad about that:

1) My MB dealership wouldn't even let me test-drive a C270CDI demo model.

2) A friend of mine and myself test-drove the Opel Turbo Coupe about a year ago, and the salesguy reluctantly gave us the keys. It didn't even have 100km (60miles) on the clock, so we gingerly warmed her up. Once up to temp, we never went full throttle, never over 4000rpm and didn't drop the clutch.
We got back to the dealership and the salesguy had suddenly turned into a DTM fanatic.
He told us how she "sounds the best" after 6000rpm. :confused:
And how she smokes the front wheels all the way through first. :eek:
What a moron!!! :mad:

Edit: some pics

http://www.stierado.com/pics/benzsport/opel_tc6027.jpg
http://www.stierado.com/pics/benzsport/opel_tc6029.jpg

[stoked]

i kinda doubt this story because as far as i know tele-aid just works through normal GPS satellites and cell phone systems, I dont think mercedes has the money to launch their own, much less with cameras of good enough resolution to rival the military's best. Until i see pics of this car, this story is based on a figment of truth at best.

[EvoII_Racer]

[i]Just today I was informed that The Mercedes Benz Tele-Aid Satellite has a satellite image of the S55 on the track the moment the motor blew. [/B]

I really doubt that, but if it the case, its pretty scary!!!

[Rocky]

Whats the point of buying a high performance car when it can't preform?

Can't the d00d go back and sue MB for false advertisement or something?

[Vodka G]

Originally posted by pokerface
the other thing is, with all the safety systems on the car, i thought it would be nearly impossible to overrev that engine! :confused:

so im leaning towards a defect or running hard w/o warmup :werd:

i mean blowing up the engine is one very very hard thing to do on these engines i mean it gotta be some mis-run of the engine ie not eunff warmup time etc

[reiKo]

Originally posted by So.Cal_Benzo
I heard that AMG engines are broken-in from the factory.
From what i've known the dealership can check through the computer to see what you've been doing to the car (such as hard driving and so on)
The honda dealership that my friend goes to found out that he had done 130mph and speeds over 100mph a lot of times and did a lot of drop-clutching which was the main reason why his car is having some problems.

///AMG engines are NOT broken-in from Factory. You still need to drive a minimum of 1'500 Km without going over 4000 rpms, no Kickdown, nothing. I got this information first hand when I was at AMG in Affalterbach.

And the race track thing is true . If you track race you car, MB does NOT cover you warranty-issues... I dunno for the Tele-Aid thing.. It's kinda scary, but who knows..

[redline]

Originally posted by So.Cal_Benzo
I heard that AMG engines are broken-in from the factory.


I heard that they drive them 500 miles then re-set the odometer.

[dtmcoupe]

its not considered a RACE unless its timed....ive never tracked my car with official timer, only stop watches. autox is not covered, but me lapping willow is...kinda funny....either way i would have the car towed else where and make up a story for insurance, just to be safe.

[dtmcoupe]

heres the posts from bimmerforum members,

What does the track have to do with anything?? I mean they market these cars that have a racetrack bred history and they get penalized for tracking it? I mean its a high end sports car!!! For God's sake they even checked the engine and said no foul play was involved...so what the hell does the track prove?Its like giving you 500hp and say, nope nope, don't track it, it wasnt made for that. What in name of ZUES'S BUTTHOLE was it made for then? In sense its like telling you, yeah go street race bi*ch, if you blow it there, we'll cover. Sorry, im just annoyed now.

Sigh, whats the point of paying for cars that a race bred then. I mean the Porsche GT1 is like a full race car, but I guess that's void too huh...damn. For pure enthusiasts, it would be a nice twist if a car company had the guts to build a full bred race car that if it broke down on the Track due to car failure (not driver error), they'd cover it. Now that's supporting your products! I bet people would be willing to shell the extra couple of bucks for that version too.


Wow...that is some crazy s*it.So if you take cars onto the track it automatically voids the warranty?



that's just not right... next they will be taking that information and giving it to the local law enforcement so they can send you tickets in the mail.

Interesting. It'll all depend on whether or not taking satellite image of the S55 is considered spying/snooping. I think what happened was MBZ recorded the location of the driver at the time that he claimed the engine broke down, took the cordinate and ordered satellite imageries of that specific cordinate. They then concluded that he blew the engine at the track.

I seriously doubt they have the exact image of the S55 on the track blowing up his engine. This is probably just scare tatic trying to get the driver to confess. If they can get satellite imagery of every single point at any given time, a lot of unsolved crimes would have been solved by now.

Even then there got to be something in the fine print that the owner must have signed when he got the car with Tele-Aid installed. The fine print would legally allow MBZ to use Tele-Aid to track its customer on top of doing what it was designed to do "Live Support".

If this is in the fine prints and the owner signed it, chances are MBZ never told him about the clause. Without explaining that to him, technically he could go to court and have it thrown out since they technically tricked him into signing it. That's bad faith.

AGAIN I DONT KNOW HOW MUCH/IF THIS IS TRUE AT ALL, IM JUST THE MESSENGER AND I THOUGHT YOU GUYS WOULD FIND IT INTERESTING TO HEAR.