this is he reason why i am a MB fanatic

[elite_hunter_sh3]

i love mercedes benz... all MB cars... and this is why.. all other companies based their safety of MB.. MB had the first airbags,crumble zones, seatbelt pretensioners , "passenger cell"

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fu...oid=1428174512

and that version had no airbags and the family survived...

[Skybird]

Looks like a Leo-2 took a bite, found that it does not taste well and left the rest untouched, moving away...

[SUBMAN1]

Not to trump on your passion about the car, but Mercedes is not what it used to be. A friend of mine who used to work on Mercedes, because he thought they were the greatest thing on Earth, quit because he can't stand the quality of the cars anymore. You could see his desire drop for them as the years went on. Same thing with another guy too - My sales guy at Cadillac used to sell Mercedes. A couple years back he went to selling Cadillac for much the same reason - he no longer felt good about the product he was selling.

Why? Haven't you noticed that Mercedes haven't changed in price in 10, 15, to 20 years? Other car manufacturers costs keep going up, but theirs stays pretty much the same unless you buy a 'specialized' version. That means their quality is what has taken it in the shorts to make up for the stagnent rise in the cost of the cars. Everything is cheaply made now on Mercedes. BMW, though they have done some things similar, has for the most part avoided the pitfalls Mercedes has fallen into. Hopefully at least one of the good German car manufacturers stays inline, and that torch goes to BMW to carry on for now.

Maybe Mercedes will pull out of it at some point and go back to building top notch cars, but I seriously doubt it.

-S

[Letum]

Air bags?
crumble zones?
seat-belts?
"passenger cells"?

I know not of these!

Helmets! now there's a safety feature!
...goes to polish the Honda...

[Chock]

If you want evidence of the quality drop in Mercedes, take a look at the shut lines on a new Mercedes and compare it to one from about pre-1985. Then try shutting the door on an old one and listen, after that, do it on a new one, that sound is not the sound of quality on the new ones! Also note that the price has dropped considerably, but the extras are more abundant; up until about 1999, you didn't even get a radio as standard in a Merc, so why are they now cheaper - when one is now included - if the quality hasn't dipped?

My wife's old Merc 300 Estate was way better than the ones you get these days.

Chock

[Torpedo Fodder]

I'm about to take on an old Mercedes restoration project, an '88 190E 2.3, with 219,000 km on it, and boy is that thing made to last. All I had to do to get it running again after two years of dormancy while exposed to the elements (without any long-term storage preparation, I might add) was unstick the brakes, clean the battery posts and add fresh fuel and she ran almost immediately when I jump-started her. Unfortunately, she's not going anywhere just yet, due to a gas leak (hope it isn't the tank, because I'd have to drop out the differential and driveshaft to replace or repair it). Those cars are little tanks, and I still see plenty of 190s on the road here today.

But yeah, unfortunately M-B simply doesn't make their cars the way they used to, and the recent black eye the lack of their current cars' reliability has given them attests to that. In less than 20 years, Mercedes' have gone from one of the most reliable cars on the road, to one of the least.

[Lagger123987]

Originally Posted by elite_hunter_sh3

i love mercedes benz... all MB cars... and this is why.. all other companies based their safety of MB.. MB had the first airbags,crumble zones, seatbelt pretensioners , "passenger cell"

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fu...oid=1428174512

and that version had no airbags and the family survived...

MB suck, Muscle cars will smoke them sauage burners.

[Torpedo Fodder]

Originally Posted by Lagger123987

MB suck, Muscle cars will smoke them sauage burners.

Let's not get too carried away, shall we? While I do have an affinity for classic American muscle cars (and the Corvette is my all-time favorite car), fact is Mercedes has produced some of the fastest production cars in their respective classes, such as the AMG models and the vaunted McLaren SLR, which are indeed faster than the majority of "muscle cars" (and a simple check of these cars' performance numbers will prove that). Of course, most of these are multiple times as expensive as their muscle car counterparts.

[elite_hunter_sh3]

and muscle cars..... arent safe... id rather be in a high speed crash in a mercedes benz s class or e class or c class... etc... then any american muscle car....

[Happy Times]

<No personal attacks! - Gizzmoe>

[Hitman]

I'm about to take on an old Mercedes restoration project, an '88 190E 2.3, with 219,000 km on it, and boy is that thing made to last. All I had to do to get it running again after two years of dormancy while exposed to the elements (without any long-term storage preparation, I might add) was unstick the brakes, clean the battery posts and add fresh fuel and she ran almost immediately when I jump-started her. Unfortunately, she's not going anywhere just yet, due to a gas leak (hope it isn't the tank, because I'd have to drop out the differential and driveshaft to replace or repair it). Those cars are little tanks, and I still see plenty of 190s on the road here today.

Is it a 16v version or the normal 2.3? I did the same with an E30 M3 some time ago, boy it was a nice project. In the end I had to seel the car with pain in my heart because I used it so little that I had to divert time from other things to get the car out for a spin and prevent it from rusting and wearing out in the garage

The 190 2.3 16v was made for competition, like my E30 M3, (Both went head-on-head in the DTM in the 80s) and as such the road version's detuned engine has even more durability because of strengthened components. A friend of mine had one with 325.000 km on the clock and it still felt powerful with a good psuh in the back when accelerating

I agree that quality was better some years ago, MB did cars like tanks for duration, until they learned that selling a new model each few years was more profitable. IMO of course they are still better quality than most other cars except certain models of other makes, but in average, the best quality cars around are MB.

That's however not to be mixed or messed up with safety! Safety comes from design and certain gadgets, quality not just from design but also from the materials chosen and the build process.

Proof of old MBs durability is the amount of them you see in the hands of north-African inmigrants proceeding each summer thousands of kilometers down and up the mediterranean coast with little maintenance. Never seen any BMWs or other cars as old as those MBs and still running under such abuse

[Torpedo Fodder]

Originally Posted by Hitman

Is it a 16v version or the normal 2.3? I did the same with an E30 M3 some time ago, boy it was a nice project. In the end I had to seel the car with pain in my heart because I used it so little that I had to divert time from other things to get the car out for a spin and prevent it from rusting and wearing out in the garage

Just the regular 2.3L with an automatic transmission, unfortunately. The 2.3-16 are very rare over here, and the 2.5L-16 never made it to our shores at all. But since I'm only paying $350 to buy the car (plus repair costs) I'm not complaining. Someday though I may drop a more powerful engine into it.

I agree that quality was better some years ago, MB did cars like tanks for duration, until they learned that selling a new model each few years was more profitable.

They also learned a good way to enrich their service departments, which is why modern Mercedes are deliberately made to be hard to work on without specialized tools and training. By comparioson, that 190E of mine is proving to be a rather easy car to work on: Nothing very unusual about the design of components, and most of the fasteners are either standard screws or Metric hex nuts.

[azn_132]

Originally Posted by Lagger123987

MB suck, Muscle cars will smoke them sauage burners.

MB along wit most of the japanese made cars that I like. And Muscle cars are for usin hydraulics in the cars and 20's on them too, also use for the hyphy movement too.