Consumer Reports' May 2007 issue rates the three LEAST RELIABLE makes as:
Jaguar
Land Rover
Mercedes Benz

Glückwünsche zu den Leuten an Mercedes Benz! Stehen Sie auf und beklatschen Sie sich!
And DCX wants to sell the Chrysler group....
I'm sure Mercedes won't lose any "market share" to Lexus or Infiniti (even though thier parent companies are two of the three MOST RELIABLE makes rated in the same issue). I wonder how long Mercedes will be showing profits with these types of reviews.
Do you think Mercedes Benz might sell Mercedes Benz? Jetzt IST ES VERRÜCKT!
Makes me want to rush right out and pass the nearest Dodge dealership on my way to buy a high-dollar Mercedes! [sm=alcoholic.gif]

 

I first want to say that I think that CR is full of it in most of their ratings. They are slanted and they do flip-flop. Now having said that, I can tell you for a fact that MB is junk. My aunt's SL500 gave her more problems than most of her cars. The A/C kept going out over and over and over and over again. The roof leaked. It kept blowing tires for some odd reason. I think she also had some suspension problems.

The problem in DCX isn't Chrysler, its Mercedes. Mercedes quality is pathetic. The dash materials in my Intrepid are better than many modern day Mercedes. The fit and finish is pathetic. They have electrical problems. Their transmissions supposively have problems. They supposively have had some oil problems in some of their engines. They are just junk. They want to get rid of Chrysler because Dr. Moron (excuse me Dr. Z) and his minions decided to follow the failing strategies of Ford and GM to make a bunch of SUVs during a time of high fuel prices caused Chrysler to have a very bad quarter. Nevermind the fact that Chrysler had been carrying the company earlier, nevermind the fact that Chrysler was doing well before this, nevermind that STUPID (aka SMART) is yet to gain a profit, it must be the American's fault. I'm starting to think that these bad decisions and those stupid Dr. Z commercials were done on purpose so then they could rid the company of Chrysler. Okay, I'm done ranting for now...[sm=rant.gif]

 

i have always relied on cosumer reports for my auto reliability... and the mercedes have always been over priced and rated terrible for reliability... so why do people buy them?.... i have no idea.. i never have and probably never will.

 

Its kind of like a Harley, it isn'nt the best bang for the buck, but the image is what sells. You could get a better bike, but it would'nt have the image of a Harley. The same for MB, they have a status,and if you drive a MB then in your mind you are living up to that status. I drive a Challenger, I wonder what people think of me. { He really likes gas stations}. And buying new rear tires.

 

I would go so far to say that nearly all European brands have far more quality and reliability issues than the domestics. As stated above they are status symbols that say I've "made it". Yeah made it onto the back of a flatbed hauler headed for repair. We have a way to go to catch the Japanese but their cars have issues as well that mostly go unreported because they are termed as maintenance and not repairs

 

Exactly! Look at what is listed in the manual and you'll see why they get such high ratings. You replace just about everything.

 

I can't find a lot of fault or error in CR's ratings. I've used them to make purchases MAINLY because they don't accept advertising dollars from anyone, so the reports shouldn't be slanted in favor of thier biggest advertisers (since they have none).
In MY experience, the CR ratings are pretty accurate / reliable.

As for Mercedes, I've only driven one. That's all I needed to know that an MB wasn't MY type of car. Sounded like a tractor and felt like a boat.
With Mercedes as the parent company of DCX, it seems to me that the inmates are in charge of the asylum.

 

Just because they do not get money from the organizations does not mean they will not have a bias. I have seen many cases where they mark powertrains that I know as bulletproof as being one of the worse, and them recommend models that I know have problems as being the most reliable. One claim they made that is definitely false is their cell phone recommendations. They normally rank Verizon as the best. I had Verizon first and no matter what city I was in, the service was terrible. It was even worse in my hometown despite the fact that there was a Verizon store in town. I switched to Cingular and had no problems in either those cities or my hometown, (until I moved then they dropped me due to the fact that they didn't have towers in the rural community where I go to college but that's not what they were evaluating anyways).