I follow a couple of MB 'boards and your observations are definitely borne
out by their commonts. Models as recent as 2001 are prone to rust-through,
chintzy fit/finish and bad paint. It actually sounds like they're
describing mid 80's GM x-bodies ;-).
I own an '86 420SEL (V126) with build quality that was exemplary for its
time. It was not the highest-tech car on the road at the time, but
certainly one of the safest and best built. I am not interested in a new
S-class, even if I could afford it.
Jamie
Fort Myers, FL
----- Original Message -----
From: "Chris Barker" <ftog@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <olympus@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, November 12, 2004 2:06 AM
Subject: [OM] OT Merc quality, was Olympus Trouble
>
> The merger was definitely an error on Mercedes' part, and building
> (perhaps designing as well) cars in the US for the European market was
> a gross error in my view. The first M-Class had appalling fascia,
> cheap and plastic-looking; it improved with the first "face-lift" and
> the move of production to Graz in Austria, but my (face-lift) M-Class
> had all sorts of niggling problems for the first 2 years of its life.
> I needed the warranty for 20-odd visits to various garages in the
> Netherlands and England ... for almost the full 3 years. I sold it
> because I could see that repairs on top of a £300 annual service were
> going to be prohibitively expensive (plus £200 every 2 years for
> replacing front or back pads. If I felt that I could not rely on a
> Merc, that meant to me that quality had really dropped. I also wanted
> to get rid of my image as an SUV driver ... ;-)
>
> But I believe that Mercedes has managed to drop its quality itself, it
> did not need Chrysler's help.
>
> Chris
>
> On 12 Nov 2004, at 2:01, Larry wrote:
>
> >
> > It is possible that Mercedes has gone down in quality, but it would
> > still be far
> > better than Chrysler was. Maybe the Chrysler affinity has dragged
> > Mercedes down.
> > That would be sad.
> >
> > Larry
> >
> <|_:-)_|>
> C M I Barker
> Cambridgeshire, Great Britain.
> +44 (0)7092 251126
> http://www.threeshoes.co.uk
> http://homepage.mac.com/zuiko
>
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