smooth1

Alright, so far the ML has been good. We went on a road trip with it and the added space made the trip easier. We got pretty descent fuel mileage also. The biggest perk for me was the stress relief of leaving it parked somewhere out in the open in Miami. The IS is, well, eye attracting, and my rims are of course calling to every car thief in the area. I think the ML is much more "urban camouflaged" so to speak. It seems to just blends in more even though it's an MB. Maybe it's just me, but when I leave the ML parked on the street I don't even give it a second thought when I walk away, but the IS I'm almost a nervous wreck sometimes and I have to go and check on it to make sure it's still ok. And so far, I don't think Merceds Benz dealerships are any better or worse then BMW, Lexus, Infinity or the likes. I don't think as a brand, any of them stand out or above any of the others. All the salespeople answer everything with " If I could would you buy a car from me today?" But I do think that Lexus Of Orlando has the nicest service facility of all the dealerships I've been to. Seriously. It's almost night and day. Hands down by far the nicest place. They have the only lounge area that I feel the most relaxed and comfortable in, along with these nice "little" things they do. Like they have this lady that comes out once in awhile with freash baked cookies and offers them to people who are waiting in the lounge area. The big screen TV's are far enouph away from each other that they aren't competeing for the volume levels. And the lighting is very subdued without being dark. It really is a much better expereince and imho, adds a tremendous amount of value to the car owning expereince. It's nice when the wife doesn't mind "getting away" for a few hours by taking the Lexus in for service! (A happy wife is a happy life. :) ) The Mercedes Benz dealerships could really learn alot from Lexus with respect to this issue. I've gone to 3 different MB dealerships and both are layed out about the same way. The service department reminds me more of a cow milking station set up more than anything else. Really. Their waiting areas are nice, but not thought out very well. Like tiled floors, and hard surfaces everywhere that just echo everything and make the whole time there seem more chaotic and busied. They also seem to like their MB logo appearal and luggage alot. I see it everywhere! Keychains, belts, purses, golf bags, on and on. In fact, at Mercedes Benz of Orlando, I think the waiting room IS the merchandise showroom! LOL!!! I could be wrong though. I wasn't really sure where I was at the time. Maybe I was just waiting there by accident.......It was the only quiet and carpeted room in the building.

I actually think we did, just the military wouldn't let us use it. <_< The wife and I have already joked about what some of the calls to the Tele Aid must sound like sometimes....LOL!! " Hello, yeah........Uuuuhhhmmmmmm, I took these pills and ........... well, do you know what they were and if I can get some more???.........." Or " Yes, would you know what time the 3 o clock parade starts?.....

Those are a strange combo of issues. At this point I would have more questions than answers though. Like, your IS300 has a fuel pressure light? How did you get one of those? So when you say your tach read zero, you mean it's not working at all? That is a seperate issue. You have a speed sensor off the Transmission for that. The brake light warning system is telling you that one of your lights are out. Have you gone around and checked to make sure all the lights are working properly? That warning doesn't have any effect on the ECU safety protocol, so traction control and cruise would all not be effected.

The stock offset is 50mm. with a 7.5 inch wide rim. So what do you want to accomplish here? Do you want the rim to be flush with the car? Are you lowering the car any? How wide a rim/tire combo do you want? Do you want to stagger the set up? If you can find a car that has the set up you would like I can tell you what size rims, offsets and so on to get. What rims are you looking at getting?

You know it's funny, I just noticed this on mine also the other day. TBH though, it's not a quality issue. It's a high PH issue in your body oils and persperation. It can have a very high alkaline content, and eat right thru chrome over time. You should see what a finger print will do to a gun if left uncleaned! So I was thinking about getting an after market shift knob that was all leather, or maybe a leather carbon fiber combo one. I haven't even started looking yet.

The sport package comes with a stiffer suspension, rubber studded stainless steel brake and gas pedal, and I think illuminated door sills, and some ground effects, and a rear spoiler. I'm not a fan of the spoiler on this car. I also don't think the IS needs an even stiffer suspension if your just an everyday commuter type driver. I have an aftermarket adjustable suspension and I keep it pretty soft for everyday driving. I don't know how happy I would be if "stiff" was my only option all the time.

It could be area 51 just playing around and experimenting again.......... :( 30 mins. huh? It's funny, that little digital clock is the worst imho. It's almost like going to Pep boys and buying one of those "Speed Design" velcro on clocks and pasting it there on the dash. I mean, come on, just above it you have this touch screen advanced techno with intergrated info and voice controlled features, and then theres this cheesy little digital clock under it. ????? Why? They should have included the water suspension compass and two plasto hands to hold your phone too. LOL!!!

Premium package with Nav is the most popular and I think the best combination of value and goodies. I just talked about this on another thread, in order to get memory seats you have to buy the luxo package that includes the electronic tilt steering. But that package was mostly special order, and are even harder to find used. Not to mention the luxo package was like a 3k upgrade. I wouldn't overly pursue the ML sound system also. It does sound a bit nicer, but the stock sound system holds it's own very nicely. For some reason the stock sound settings really put the sound forward in the car. I've found if you use the fader setting and move the sound to just behind the front seats it sounds much fuller and not as bright. I would however strongly reccommend getting one with the nav unit. It just makes the interface controls with the rest of the car much nicer imo. The touch screen genius!

Yeah, I've seen this before. Your probably going to have to change the rack and pinion. Inside theres an ECU and a sensor that monitors steering position, and speed. If it detects over heating it triggers a safety mode that cuts it off. Your going to need a Toyota scanner to be able to retrieve the codes. But even then, I've seen it scanned and come back with no codes, so the Toyota engineers tell em to just replce the unit, and all seems well. Sounds like you may need to do that.

Alright, why the heck does Lexus not have a "Tele Aid" service? Holy #@%&*** is that a super awsome feature! MB gives you the basic service for free for the first year. You can upgrade to the Premier service which includes concierge services, and unlimited directions and a bunch of other features. There is a charge for this service, but it's only like 250 bucks a year. I don't think that's crazy. So, now I just click the i button, and a real person comes on the speaker and says" How can I help you?" Let me give you a snap shot of our conversation with a little background info. I was in Lakeland Florida. I'm not very familiar with that area. So I hit the i button:(Remember also, this is all happening while I'm driving. No having to pull over for this.) Tele Aid: Welcome to Mercedes Benz Tele Aid, How can I help you?" Me: Hi, I'm currently looking for a descent resturaunt to eat at, and I don't want MC'd or Burger King or anything like that, can you see if there is anything around me? Tele Aid: Sure, is this "Smooth 1" I'm talking with? Me: Yes Tele Aid: Ok, I see your currently on Lemon street. Is there any particular cuisine or region of food you would like? Me: Yeah, I think I would like a steak house grill, or something like that. Tele Aid: I see theres a Road House resturant, a Lakeland Ale House, Gators Dockside grill, and a Sonny's Bar-B-Que grill all within 5 miles of you. Me: Hmm, Gators Dockside sounds like it might be nice. Tele Aid: I see there is an accident reported on Highland Road with a 30 minute delay, I could route you around that if you would like to go there. Me: No, forget it, I think I'd like to go to Lakeland Ale House instead. Tele Aid: Ok, would you like me to call ahead and make reservations for you? Me: uuuhhh, sure, ok, do I need to? Tele Aid: Please hold while I find out for you. In the mean time I will download the destination into your navigation unit for you. then the nav screen starts scrolling thru and I can see all the info being put in and the nav unit reads " calculating destination." Tele Aid: Ok, for lunch you do not need reservations, the average lunch prices are $10-15 dollars, and there is currently no wait. The special for the day is a Prime Rib sandwich with Au ju. Me: ( after scraping my jaw off the floor boards " uuuhh, ok, cool.) Tele Aid: Is there anything else I can do for you? Me: No, Thank you, that was alot more than I expected already. Tele Aid: Your Welcome, I'll end this session for you, and remember Mercedes Benz Tele Aid is never more than one push of a button away." The session ended and the sat radio came back on, the nav unit directed me to the resturant. I parked the ML, and went inside and ate the special. WHY DOESN'T LEXUS HAVE THIS???????

What have you checked so far besides the fuses? If you have a garage in the UK are you a mechanic? or just supplying a place for the car to sit?

Yeah, I thought the op just wanted to know if worked, not if he actually had an AWD or not. @ Melnod, inside the tranfer case there are a set of sensors that operate/control the traction control ECU and monitor the power distribution. If you were to have a malfunction, The " little car with the slide tracks" on the dash would flash and you would loose your traction control, and a cel would come on telling you to bring the car in for service immediately.

and a search answers it: Click here to see the results

Thats right...your IS is !Removed!! ;) Thats really weird that button would be buried in the nav menus. Its funny what they choose to put in the menus for some models and not for others. Very few functions are in my nav menus...which I like. Yeah, there are times when I wish I was in the design room when they were making some of these decisions to smack em upside the head. It's almost like they spend to much time driving other mfgrs cars and not enouph time driving thier own. For example, memory seats. My 03 Ford Explorer came with them, and I think they are almost standard on the ES. (Standard meaning the most popular package they sell off the lots without having to special order it.) And the ES has electronic tilt and telescopic steering with auto fold away feature. On the IS, that option is two packages up the ladder, and I don't think it does the fold away anyway. I think that came from the Mercedes Benz idealogy because I noticed the same package levels split those up also. I'd give up the stupid non helping AFS light things for the electro steering stuff, or the memory seats any day. And yet, Lexus does the keyless entry/start on everything! While Mercedes Benz still uses 4 button rotory dial phone system for entry and ignition. The keyless go system comes on the PO2 packages now. But I have to say that the remote start feature on the MB is frickin cool and works great. So you give a little to get a little I guess.

I hate that door! I know several people with GXs and Rav4s and all of them hate that door... You know, that's something that I have never been able to figure out. Given such the close connection between the 4runner and the GX, why the GX doesn't have a roll-down rear window like the 4runner always has, is beyond me. Ask any 4runner owner to name the top three things they love about their car, and guaranteed that feature is listed in that list. The 4runner is cheaper, it's a favorite feature (a buying feature too for some), so you'd think the rich cousin would have it too.... Anyways....sweet ride Smooth.. Instead of cookies and soda at the Lexus shop, do they offer free sauerkraut and guinness and at the dealership? Danke!! !Removed!-cruiser!!! me? jealous? what would ever give you that idea! ;) LOL! Funny you should mention that. I haven't been to the service center yet. The ML 350 has 12K mile intervals for oil changes. (Yeah, 12k miles is mfgr. reccommended intervals or 1 year!) And they are just using Mobil 1. It's not like they have some secret german oil they use. But I do plan on doing a full comparison as I think we have one of the nicest Lexus service centers around. So we'll see. Our Lexus service center serves finger sandwiches and wraps with sodas, water and cookies and brownies. They have 2 50 inch high def plasmas with a limited selection of tv stations, an internet cafe with 4 computers, a quiet room and a seperate play room for the brats. When I go into the service center for Mercedes Benz, I'll report back what they have and how it stacks up. LOL! And regarding the tailgate, now that you mention the 4Runner, your absolutely right! What is up with that?

My Lexus does this also. All you do is hit "DUAL" and it sets the passenger zone to equal the driver's zone, and both zones are controlled by the driver's control until either the passenger adjusts their control or you hit "DUAL" again. Well that's because you drive the super deluxo ES and I have the touch screen indash nav. menu stripped bare bones shell of a Lexus version. On the Is, that "dual" button you refer to is a button that appears on the touch screen.In order to make that button appear, you have to press the climate button that is located in the upper right hand side of the control panel next to the touch screen. Once that button is pushed, the touch screen changes to show the climate controls, at which point you can now push the "dual" mode button that will now change the controls back to the master control side. Then you can navigate back to the other screens such as the map mode or the audio mode you like to have dispayed while driving. It's kind of a PIA really. But oh well, I love the car anyway.

cel ???Yeah I suspected that this may be the problem, I thought K&N are good but I guess not on the IS. how does short ram/ cold air intake cel affect in this case. i wonder why. I dont really want to change back to the stock one. what would you recommend.... Am still sticking to the advice you gave me before, I have checked the sensors and seems ok. I will wait by changing gas stations brand like shell, Mobil, and 76, I have not seen any issues yet. I was thinking on maybe doing a different mod in the future withe engine, perhaphs, changing to an SRT intake but That will probably be in another department. Let me tell you I have seen how you are thrilled about cars, and how you have done it all by yourself by keaping youre rides nice, The Is 300 looks nice. I wish i can do that someday, hey am getting there. I have many friends that own the new gen, but not in black. Black is a nice looking color. my 03 is black but the sucker is hard to keep clean. Thanks. A "cel" is short for "Check Engine Light". The MAF on these cars are pretty sensitive. Alot of the short ram and cold air intakes seem to produce turbulant air intake. That and the fact the ECU's on Japanese cars don't adjust/compensate for the additional air intake ability like say a Ford. So really, I would just use the stock air box, and maybe a Joe Z pipe with a Blitz, K&N, or comparable drop in air filter. It would make your life a bit easier. The SRT does get you a few more pnies, but it uses a piggy back ECU that has to be wired in to your exsisting ECU, which is really where your getting the HP from. Unichip now makes an aftermarket piggyback chip that can get you about 12-15 more HP also, but they're $700.00 crazy!

Every SUV and minivan! It's hard to believe Chrysler was the one to popularize the power liftgate with the Town & Country in 2001. I don't know why the Japanese never caught on to the German turn signals because it is an awesome thing to nudge the stalk and get 3-4 blinks to change lanes. Surprisingly, a lot of late model GMs have this feature. That is one of my favorite features, especially since 90% of my miles are on the hwy. Blake, I did test drive the blutec also. Why do you ask? I love diesels, and I'm just curious what you thought about it? I haven't driven a Bluetec, but I have spent some time driving a relative's '05 E320 CDI (I6), and it is one of my favorite cars ever. I see they do charge you a premium for the diesel power, around $4,000 which isn't bad at all when you consider that the diesel option on 3/4 ton pick-ups is $10,000+. I wouldn't have considered the GX right now since it is so old, and I absolutely hate that stupid swinging rear door! And the swing rear gate was a huge negative for us as well on the GX. Not to mention that we both like the looks of the ML over the GX, but the GX wasn't terrible either. Speaking of which, why does the LX look so stupid? Even Land Rovers look cool now, and they are the ones that started the whole stupid looking SUV thing. LOL!! Another thing I have found on the MB that I am beginning to like is the MB's version of "On Star". Pushing that button and hearing a voice come on and say "How can I help you?" is really cool! there is another button just over the rear view mirror with this James Bond style toggle swtich cover that you press and it drops down to reveal another button that says SOS on it. If your ever in trouble and you push that button, the police and emergency help is automatically dispatched to your GPS location. There is another button in the center console with a wrench on it that does the same thing, but it only sends your road side service to you. Of course if your in an accident, and the air bags are deployed, you don't hve to press or do anything. It automatically dispatches emergency services. My wife really thinks those features are cool. Of course I pointed out that I hope we never have to use them.

1) It says Mark Levinson on the lower right hand side of the face plate. 2) Yes, it should be able to play DVD's. You just feed it into the CD slots and it should play as long as the parking brake is on, and your in park. 3) You need the digital reciever. That connects to the head unit. It's plug and play, but you have to pull the stereo out as it connects to the back. They can use the shark fin as an antenea, or they can use the lttle box one that comes with it also. 4) I already answered this in 3.

Just so you know, I've heard alot of people have cel issues from the short ram/ cold air intakes. That could be your problem right there. If the cel comes back, you might want to think about putting the original air box back on and see if that cures the issue.

@ Blake: I loved the MB deisel. That's the first vehicle I've ever driven that if someone didn't tell you it was a deisel, you would have never known it was. It's that quiet inside and out. And if it were up to me, I would have gotten it. The MB deisels are known for billions of miles on them. lol! But this was an 09 left over and they really wanted to get it moved. So for the price I paid, I was fine with the 3.5 liter V6.

Oh, and to clear the air a bit, I was actually secretly leaning on the GX 470 the whole time. But, when I did the comparisons, the MB was larger, had nicer back seats, better gas mileage, and the deal I got on it was like the extra push. I also think the MB 4matic all wheel drive system is better than the Toyota versions. But the GX was a very very close second anyway. I was going to surprise all of you with that, but the last minute "ok, heres the best deal MB can offer" vs the best deal Lexus was going to give me, I saved about $5k. And it's a Mercedes Benz. they deserve a chance as much as GM does right? lol!!

Ok, so I've had the ML for about a week now. So far everything has been great with it. Some "differences" I thought you all might like to know about and I'll give you a general review. I like the Lexus Nav system much better. The menues to navigate the system I think are much more logically sequenced than the MB. I like the Lexus auto ac system more than the MB also. With the Lexus I have the smog detector that will switch the ac to recirc automatically whereas the MB doesn't seem to have that feature. On another note, I do like the MB ac zone controls much more than the Lexus. In the Lexus, if the passenger has changed the temp on HER side, to change it back to dual you have to go back to the ac menu and manually change it back or it stays in the seperate zone mode. With the MB you just have a seperate set of controls for all three zones and the master control just overides them with a push of the button. I like the mechanics of the Lexus doors better than the MB. The Lexus, the doors almost close by themselves. You almost have to train yourself to not slam the doors closed on the Lexus. Whereas the MB you have to put a bit of grunt behind it. The MB doors are solid though. Just as solid as the Lexus is. A for interior dash materials and soft touch areas, I think it's a tie. While Lexus uses a different material then MB, I think they both have their attributes and strong points. They are just different is all. I like the Lexus gauges alot more than the MB's. But, I like the center display information center between the tach and the speedo much more on the MB than the Lexus. On the Lexus, you can scroll thru outside temp, mileage, fuel consumption and gear selection etc. etc. But on the MB, it's tied directly into the Nav and the audio system as well. So I can scroll to a screen that says your heading South on Main street as well. It also becomes the audio info screen for CD's and my ipod. So the map on the main screen can be chugging along and I can use the center display to give me all the other info I want. Very well thought out. In fact, I don't think I even use this feature on the Lexus as it doesn't really offer any of these useful menues that the MB does. I really like the MB steering. The feel is well, classic MB. For as big as the ML is, turning into parking stalls is a surprising breeze. I can't really compare the ride as I have the IS on aftermarket coilovers and the MB is on an air ride system. But the MB's ride is super smooth. Amazing could be easily used a couple times here honestly. The MB shifter. Well, it's 200% better than the BMW version. and it does take some getting used to. So with it being so simple, you shouldn't really complain about it, because, well, it's so dang simple to use what is there to complain about? I guess it would be the cool factor is gone. We really like the power liftgate. It seems everyone with a Luxury SUV has this feature though, so I thought I would just list the fact that it's cool to have. One little thing I have noticed and like alot on the MB is the tap feature on the turn signals. On the MB, if you just tap the turn signal in the direction your turning, it stays on for a few seconds and shuts itself off without the steering wheel having to tell it to. I really like that little feature. The ML's interior is amazingly quiet. No rattles, squeaks, or pops anywhere. So far anyway. I'll keep looking at the differences and comparisons as time goes by. Blake, I did test drive the blutec also. Why do you ask?

It's possible your having an issue other than the o2 sensor, but seeing as how your here, you just as well make sure it's not the simple, cheap things first. If after your sure it's not the O2's and your connections, then maybe you won't have much of a choice. Have you cleaned the MAF, intake and throttle body recently? When was the last time you changed checked the spark plugs?

Wow, sorry to hear this. But honestly, without being able to actually get under your car to see what damage was done we would all be poking in the dark here. How fast were you driving when you hit the deer? When I was 17, I hit a deer doing about 50 mph in a 442 Cutlas, and that deer mangled the front end of that car. So the best advise I think you can get herewould be to take it in and have it fully inspected. I'm actually thinking that you may have damaged the all wheel drivetrain in the front end somehow. Maybe the transfer case. It's also possible a pulley got whacked or something. Again. without having the car in front of me, there could be a whole section of damage under there your not aware of and therefore not able to tell us about. So, once they do a full diagnostic and estimate, then come back here and post what they said along with a few pics and then we can go from there. Have you reported this accident to you insurance company? You may need to do that if the bill starts adding up.