For all of you that want to own a Benz..

=\ Never said i was crying over the bill... (maybe I should setup a paypal to collection donations for my service.. humm :twisted: )
Just highlighting how much the dealers charge around here and the true cost of owning something like an S-Class.
 
Just be glad you didn't get it tuned by Brabus. Guy i spoke to at the Mercedes Forum meet 2 weeks ago, paid 3600 euros for front discs + pads and rear pads on his '05 S500 5.6 Brabus. Front discs on it cost 1200 euro each. Still a horrible amount of money. Thank god parts for my Mercedes are dirt cheap (Mazda parts are more expensive) over here.
 
Wait what???? $1k for rotors and pads on a 323 (gtx)? I know it's a special edition, but thats what you'd pay for 'em on a brand new evo with Brembo's

it's about $100 per rotor and whatever in pads. what really fucks you is labor charges. The rotors are BEHIND the hub so the whole assembly has to be taken apart to change the rotors.
 
So according to you, its the dealers that make it expensive, not the fact that its German. A Toyota dealer could charge a huge premium too, they wouldn't be too popular, but they can still do it.

When the dash illumination on my Audi went out... my 3 local Audi dealers quoted me from $500 to $900 to fix it. One told me that the bulbs were not replaceable, and that I needed a whole new instrument cluster (the $900 one). The other two told me it was possible, but would take hours to do, and Audi dealers charge $110 an hour.

I ended up buying the dash bulb kit off blauparts.com, some auto shop repair software off eBay, and the Audi CD for that software for $50 total. Spent 2 hours in the garage, and voila... just as bright as new, if not brighter.
Dealers with German cars are generally more expensive than like, Toyota or Chevy.
 
I feel your pain about getting parts for your foreign car. I just got a call from the body shop and they said they don't know how long it's going to be until my Disco's new bumper arrives. At least the other driver's insurance company is footing the bill for my rental car. :)
 
=\ Never said i was crying over the bill... (maybe I should setup a paypal to collection donations for my service.. humm :twisted: )
Just highlighting how much the dealers charge around here and the true cost of owning something like an S-Class.

Did you buy the car new?
 
I also forgot to mention, that when the oil pump on my brothers bmw decided to explode, it destroyed $1400 worth of aluminum on the front of the engine (timing cover and casing with integrated oil pump). It was actually cheaper to drive 600 miles round trip to Chicago to pick up a used motor and use it for parts. Total bill was about $400 plus about 8 hours of labor.

Had we paid a dealer to do it, it would have been $2500 in parts alone (the entire timing gear was shot), plus about 5 hours of labor at $110/hour. Total bill would have been roughly $3100 (this assumes they cut us some slack on things like oil and coolant, and didn't force us into a new waterpump/thermostat).



Any wonder why VW/Audi has trouble getting repeat customers?
Audi isn't that bad (at least here). Merc and BMW are. That's why the only german car in our house is an audi.
 
Rotors can be not so bad or wicked expensive, depending upon the car.

The good news is that for my car the rotors are 60 bucks each. The bad news is that the pads are 250 bucks a pair.

Fortunately, since they generate a lot of dust and the lesser-performance minded folks swap them out right away for no-dust (but less braking action) pads, I have been picking up virtually new (less than 500 miles) sets of pads for about 150 bucks for both pairs. :)

Steve
 
A $1600 brake job? That's more than twice what I payed for my car :lmao:!
 
it's about $100 per rotor and whatever in pads. what really fucks you is labor charges. The rotors are BEHIND the hub so the whole assembly has to be taken apart to change the rotors.

Thats a bit more logical. For some reason I had thought that $1000 was per wheel.

over here you can't go wrong with a vw, second hand parts and engines go fo literally no money at all

Sadly thats not the case in the US. It's been covered in other threads but basically, the cars we get are built in Mexico and Brazil by labor that apparently doesn't care, and management that cares even less. Add to that the fact that 9 times out of 10, the VW dealership is going to do everything it can to piss you off and encourage you not to come back... you can see why VW has such a bad rep in the US.

No body buys VW's (except for the same kind of people who buy Macs and defend them to the death), so they are harder to come across than BMW's or Porsche's.
 
i could spend less then that on a brand new set of wilwoods for my car and install them for free... thats just highway robbery. damn germans and there expensive cars.... i kid i kid! germans are cool
 
From what I've heard, many European cars sold in the US are way cheaper there than here in Europe (especially now with the weak dollar), despite higher shipping costs. Profit comes from more expensive parts and service. Here (in Sweden) Mercedes parts are pretty fairly priced, don't know about the service though.
 
Yeah - I had a 94 C280 (pictured in avatar). You can get one now for about 5 grand, so its not reserved just for plutocrats who can afford unlimited service bills. I had a similar experince. Dealing with Mercedes dealers was a long, unsatisfying, stressful seige of waiting, passing the buck, and enormous bills. I too paid well into 4 digits for what amounted to new brake disks. It ate about a week of my time between having difficulty getting it in, and the delays for the actual service. They really rail you. It gets even worse for more severe problems. From my understanding mercedes has some kind of special code language that can't be read by anything but their diagnostic machines. You don't want to know what I paid for a new fuel pump. This was all in Jersey - the service was terrible. But that said - the one on Rt 128 in Mass. actually has fantastic service, albeit no better pricing.

PS: Just like the Audi - MB uses bulbs that are between sizes - so I couldn't get a 2$ replacement at pepboys - I had to get a 25$ replacement at the dealer.
 
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If its a 20 year old car i can say from experience that Toyota rips you off much more then say VW parts dealers. I think i was once qouted $350 for just inner/outer tie-rods on both sides (on my old MR2), i was able to pick up the same parts for under $60 at a online dealer for a VW Rabbit.

If you avoid the dealer, or join a members club (like with BMWs) then German cars aren't always expensive to get parts for, its mostly that the newer (1990s and up usually) German cars are not at all designed with the mechanic in mind.

/agree

You own a fucking luxury car - you should be able to pay the bills for it.

somebody's angry about riding the bus :p
 
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Yeah - I had a 94 C280 (pictured in avatar).

The one in your avatar was yours? How'd it happen?

How was the car itself, from my digging around 94 was the beginning of the over-priced, under-engineered Benz's. I've heard everything from bodies not being fully painted to massive issues with air conditioning and electronics.
 
i had a 95 e320 and at MB of san francisco, service was always done within a day and is about the same price as a gas station service center.
so i don't know of exorbitant pricing
 
The one in your avatar was yours? How'd it happen?

How was the car itself, from my digging around 94 was the beginning of the over-priced, under-engineered Benz's. I've heard everything from bodies not being fully painted to massive issues with air conditioning and electronics.


Tree fell on it during a storm. It had 90K miles on it, and it would have taken twice the cost of the car to repair, so it was time to move on. The irony being that everything mechanically worked perfectly even after the tree - it drove, it stopped, all the electrics worked. It was just a bit lacking of.....headroom.

The car itself I adored. Straight-six, rear-wheel drive, in a weird seafoam color, whats not to love. The handling was fantastic, there was plenty of steering feel, its ride was good, the interior had a quality feel, and it was reasonably quick (194hp, 0-60 in under 8 ). Also the steering ratio was nice and tight, and the turning circle was absurdly small. It also had about 3 times the range on a tank of gas that my Legacy does. The autos kick downs were kind of slow, but after the delay, the straight-6 linear grunt was very satisfying. My only big complaint was the traction control, that absolutely positively could not be turned off. Even that ESP off button (that tones it down but doesnt actually turn it off) wasnt added till the 95. I abused it pretty badly but had absolutely no reliability problems whatsoever until about 70k miles. Then in turn the fuel pump, crank sensor, and electric seat adjustments went. Im not sure what that really says about reliability one way or the other. Nothing MECHANICAL ever went wrong. Dealing with MB dealers and their prices was easily the worst part.
 
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But you have a kick ass Legacy GT now, so all is better.


Does anyone remember the thread I made a while ago when I destroyed my dad's left side mirror? It was a 01' S500. They changed out the entire thing (i just broke the plastic frame...) and it cost like....500 dollers, for a side mirror.
 
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