Mercedes Benz Consumer Reports ratings

[trinacriabob]

I was at Barnes and Noble tonight...yes, I'm a geek, I know, looking up good cheap restaurants in Europe and looking at car mags...so what else is new?

I was looking at Consumer Reports. After about 3 or 4 years, a lot of Mercedes products, like the C-class and the M-class, start racking up a lot of "black dots" (more problems that what is typical) and in some critical categories to boot. I was wondering: "Why the hell would someone pay that kind of money to drive one of these when it isn't it "red dot" land like a Toyota, Honda and now even some GM cars"? I was kind of surprised and it would certainly keep me out of a German car (eat your heart out, Irma Bunt), especially as costly as they are to repair and such.

Are Mercedes products really not trouble free? Or is Consumer Reports "on the rag"?

[JT64]

In the first pages of the magazine, Consumer Reports describes their methodology.

The population sampled is "Consumer Reports subscribers".

So the reports are skewed with some sampling bias.

You pay for a subscription to have your opinion counted.

In which way that affects the results, I am not too sure.

Presumably the sampling population would be upper middle class and up, leaving out the lower class and lower middle class, who would probably not subscribe to Consumer Reports.

But that probably wouldn't give Mercedes-Benz results any bias, since few poor families would own MB's.

At most there would be a smaller sample for Ford, Chevy, and Dodge.

Super rich people would probably also be absent, as they may not care about getting the most for their money.

Since MB is the most expensive brand of full line mass produced vehicles, the MB owners in the sample may be pickier than the whole population of MB owners.

This bias would lower the MB scores somewhat, as other brands may have more "non-picky owners" that automatically give good marks.

Edited May 26, 2007 by JT64

[Paolino]

I was at Barnes and Noble tonight...yes, I'm a geek, I know, looking up good cheap restaurants in Europe and looking at car mags...so what else is new?

I was looking at Consumer Reports. After about 3 or 4 years, a lot of Mercedes products, like the C-class and the M-class, start racking up a lot of "black dots" (more problems that what is typical) and in some critical categories to boot. I was wondering: "Why the hell would someone pay that kind of money to drive one of these when it isn't it "red dot" land like a Toyota, Honda and now even some GM cars"? I was kind of surprised and it would certainly keep me out of a German car (eat your heart out, Irma Bunt), especially as costly as they are to repair and such.

Are Mercedes products really not trouble free? Or is Consumer Reports "on the rag"?

A colleague of mine has had her Mercedes in the shop 3 times in the 9 months I've known her. It's a 2004.

[Drew Dowdell]

Mercedes has had a lot of problems with reliability recently notably the C-class, M-class, and S-class when it first came out but I think things have quieted down for the S-class...

[ocnblu]

Merceds-Benz needs to return to the days of the "imperturbable tank". Ride in an older Mercedes, and tell me you don't feel a big difference, even in the way the doors close. That old "M-B Tex" vinyl upholstery that wears forever, the metal radiator grille and body trim, those hearty diesel engines... now that they'll be less distracted by Chrysler, perhaps thay can return to what they once were. (NOT a knock on Chrysler, btw, they were just a bad marriage.)

[Z-06]

Hopefully the divorce would be good for both the companies. MB's stellar quality of the older models needs to come back, and should bring much chargin to the Lex-ass.

[A Horse With No Name]

Older Benz=sweet

Newer Benz=Needs to donate itself to a beer can factory.

Chris

Edited May 26, 2007 by 66Stang

[CARBIZ]

All of the above:

1) sampling bias

2) M-B has no business building $30k vehicles, and the kids who stretch to lease one are expecting perfection

3) unnecesary complication. Electronics and toys are causing a lot of problems in many high end vehicles these days

4) Being "cutting edge" sometimes mean being experimental and the customers are the test subjects

[CSpec]

Mercedes for the early part of the 2000s made unreliable junk for the most part... they have since gotten their act together and their new cars won't break down as much (supposedly).

[Hollingsworth]

My grandfather drove a W126 from the early 80s for many years. IMO, that model (along with the W124) represent some of the best in German engineering in the past thirty years. Look on eBay motors for 300SD models from the early to mid 90s. Most have 180-250,000 miles on them. They're indestructible.

Of course, that was back before everything was digital and computerized. Now in the S and CL classes, the "analog" speedometer is a computerized representation on a display screen. And you can't even change the radio station without using the Comand controller. With all that electronic gadgetry, lots of things are bound to screw up.

[Flybrian]

When Chrysler were more reliable than Mercedes, that said something.

[regfootball]

this is why CR is so fricking dumb.

when you make money (good), you are in the black.

when you lose money (bad) you are in the red.

So why does CR have their setup ass backwards and make the red dots good?

why couldn't they simply use a 5 star system that everyone can understand? the dots and donuts are really funking dumb.

[Sixty8panther]

CR will never be worth the price of the toilet paper it's printed on.

[balthazar]

I was talking to a 13-yr old kid who's parents immigrated from Europe to the U.S. and have taught him that everything imported is OMFGAMAZING !#@$! I could not break thru this kid's mantra... until I asked him how his dad's m-class mercedes has been; 'in the shop much?'. His head fell and even had to admit 'Well, yeah...'. Priceless (tho he's still in La-La land).

[ZL-1]

this is why CR is so fricking dumb.

when you make money (good), you are in the black.

when you lose money (bad) you are in the red.

So why does CR have their setup ass backwards and make the red dots good?

why couldn't they simply use a 5 star system that everyone can understand? the dots and donuts are really funking dumb.

they don't do it because common sense is a rare commodity

[The O.C.]

Merceds-Benz needs to return to the days of the "imperturbable tank". Ride in an older Mercedes, and tell me you don't feel a big difference, even in the way the doors close. That old "M-B Tex" vinyl upholstery that wears forever, the metal radiator grille and body trim, those hearty diesel engines... now that they'll be less distracted by Chrysler, perhaps thay can return to what they once were. (NOT a knock on Chrysler, btw, they were just a bad marriage.)

......JUST like the 1994 E320 Cabriolet that I picked up.....that has 96,000 miles on it....and is still tight as a drum, and the interior looks like new........