They Said it Can't be Fixed - A Journey to the Inside of a Mercedes Bluetec

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

See, that's what I've been trying to tell them!  Yeah, I'm missing the O2 sensor (which I told them I knew was gone and that I was willing to buy from them for their inflated $300+) and, as it turns out, the mounting bolts and the tubes that go to the DPF pressure sensor.  Making me buy or provide all of those things makes perfect sense.  But there is absolutely nothing wrong with the operation of the vehicle that performing the AEM will not remedy.

What kills me - and tells me that they're really trying to make me go away - is that when it comes to a DPF the dealer is insisting that it must be the OEM Mercedes DPF for the GL350 only.  No test pipe, no aftermarket DPF, and no cutting a DPF off another Merc and grafting it into place.  They'll sell me one for about $5,000 plus a $1,000 core charge that I wouldn't be able to get back....

I haven't heard back after having called the settlement administrator.  I found a number for Class Counsel and called and left a message there as well this afternoon.  My next step is to also follow up with an email.

Doing some more digging - and this is where my wife can call me a hypocrite since I'm always telling her that she has to read ALL the instructions - it turns out that I have failed to understand the difference between the Settlement Administrator and Class Counsel.  I mean, it's completely obvious to me now and I don't know how I could have been so stupid, but here we are.

The attorney emailed me back and we had a bit of an exchange so she could get to the meat of the issue.  She gave me the correct number to call to talk to Mercedes customer service so that I can get a case number.  That case number is the first step in getting her team involved.  So, for the last half hour, I have been instructed, repeatedly, to please hold and a Mercedes-Benz representative will be with me shortly.  They claim to be looking forward to speaking with me.

I also was contacted by the guy who's got a used DPF for sale and I've made him an offer.  It's kind of a belt-and-suspenders approach since those things are hard to find for anything short of a king's ransom and the Oct 1 deadline isn't getting any farther away.

Finally got through.  Funny story....  According to customer care they have "many" service centers that will refuse to do any work on any vehicle that anyone other than a Mercedes dealer has ever done any work on.  She claimed (and I'm pretty sure she's full of stuff) that if I had taken my Mercedes to a quikie-lube for an oil change they would be within their rights to refuse to do the airbag recall.

In order to open a case, I have to first talk to the Service Manager at the dealer.  This would be the escalation step that I'm supposed to follow.  I had asked my advisor who my escalation step was, actually, and he told me there was no one I could escalate to and I was just done at that point.  So message left, and now we wait to hear back.  I guess they want the dealer to have a chance to reconsider and then they want a quote for what it would cost and then they'll open a case.

Yeah no... safety recalls have to be done, even if the vehicle is half disassembled and rotting in a field.  

If/when the Mini gets an airbag recall, legally they have to change the bag.  Not sure what happens if the vehicle has no airbags anymore, though.

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

Ha!  That's a good question...  If the bit that the original airbag bolted to is gone, what do they do?  I'm sure there's some sort of precedent for that they've already figured out.

The way that I am reading it, the only out they have to avoid performing the consent decree work is to declare the vehicle "non-operable".  Granted, I am not a legal expert by any stretch, but I did read the entire settlement agreement and that was the only "out" that I could find documented.

My estimation is that the retail value of the parts in EMC #5 is around $15,000.  Plus the cash they'd have to pay me.  So I can see why they would be incentivized to deny the AEM for any reason and try to get people to go away.

...And just left my third message for the "service director".  Starting to really get pissed off here.

...and I continue to be a moron.  The attorney doesn't need a case number - given after the service manager and I talk.  She needs a reference number.  Which I got last Thursday.  Oy, me so stupid.

By my understanding they now have 30 days.

That was all for naught.  The attorneys had a back and forth and gave me the thumbs-down.  Basically they're saying that because the DPF isn't there they can't be sure that everything will work once one is there so I can't prove that it won't affect the AEM.  Back to trying to get the guy from Maryland to sell me his DPF....

In reply to wae :

That sucketh.

Mine has a new OEM aftermarket DPF on it. I hope they don't give me any crap about it, since the DPF was replaced to deal with their failing emissions system.

Received a call from the local dealer that all parts for emission update are in stock. It will go in for service next week.

Holy crap, I can't believe it's been over a month since I first messaged the guy in Baltimore who claims to be selling the emissions system for a GL350 BlueTEC.  Over that time, we agreed to a price, I got a forum member in the area to agree to meet the guy, give him the cash, and box it up and send it to me (thanks Steve Jones!!), and I thought we were finally settled.  Turns out that the guy lives about 60 miles away from the location he put in his listing and is just really not very motivated to meet up and get some money.  I have never tried so hard to buy something from someone that they have actually advertised for sale!  You'd think I was trying to convince him to sell me an heirloom pocket watch or his only pair of shoes or something!

Since I wasn't sure if this was ever going to happen - and October 1st is getting awfully close - I started calling junkyards and doing more searchtempest searches.  I tried calling a bunch of localish places that had OM642 motors out of 2010-2012 GLs and 2010-2011 MLs since those should all interchange, but none of them still had the DPFs.  There was a yard in Texas that had a listing for a DPF on car-part.  I tried "request a quote" and calling, and yesterday I finally got a very helpful gentleman on the phone who sent someone out to go look at the remains of the car, but the DPF was gone.  There was someone with a DPF for an ML, but it was the wrong one - I can't recall if it was the 07-09 one or the 2012-? one, but either way, it wasn't right.  And then I found a facebook marketplace ad for a guy parting out a GL.  I got my wife to message him and turns out that he's got the DPF and he's about 2.5 hours from here, a little east of Columbus.  We settled on a price and I'm driving up there tomorrow morning to fetch it.  She pinged him either late Friday or early Saturday, he responded on Monday, we made the deal on Tuesday evening, and I'm picking it up Thursday.  That's the kind of timeframe I had in mind and the kind of timeframe that (apparently-not-actually-in)Baltimore-Guy could have used to his advantage to turn his parts into money.  Whatever.

Keeping my fingers crossed, but I'm going to try to get everything installed over the weekend so I can try to make an appointment first thing on Tuesday.

Got the O2 sensor and whatever else is missing on order?

eastsideTim said:

Got the O2 sensor and whatever else is missing on order?

Already ordered, bought, shipped, and stored.

I mean, I've had a month....  At this point the biggest risk is that I can't remember where I stored it!

(spoiler:  it's all in the back of the car)

Wae, It sounds like you're doing better than I am.

Viewers at home may recall me foolishly saying the truckcar would go in for service this week. Well... In classic MB style (an ownership experience like no other), they didn't return my call on Sat, Mon, Tues... Finally called me back this AM to schedule the work for the 1st of November. But, but, but To qualify for the BleuTec Settlement payout, the work must be completed and paperwork submitted by Sept 30.  In that case, they said to drop off the vehicle immediately and it would probably be done by the end of the month. That wouldn't be a problem, except in September we have an annual vacation GTG one weekend and a race weekend right after that.

The MB bluetec update hotline was very friendly and understanding, but couldn't do anything other than nudging the service manager at the dealer.

The Bluetec Settlement hotline literally would only read the settlement papers to me. I was seeking clarification on the word 'available'. If an AEM is not available by the filing date, then a different filing happens, possibly with a slightly greater payout. But does available mean the parts are in stock, or the service is available? Because they are offering an appointment in November to install the AEM, which to my ears means unavailable until November.

Oh well, at this point I'm dropping it off this afternoon and canceling vacation plans as necessary.

In reply to FJ40Jim :

I would try emailing Shelby: shelby@hbsslaw.com  She's Class Counsel and seems to have actual information.

In reply to wae :

BTW, I'm a little east of Columbus, if there's anything I can do to help get those GL350 parts.

It's a long story.  Steve_Jones is a mensch and I owe him big.  Installing now.  Words later.

Alright....  So the long story is that I found two different folks on FB marketplace that had the potential to have a DPF.  Somehow between my wife - who does the faceyspacing around here - and I, we managed to get our wires very crossed.  So I drove three hours to Dresden, OH to meet a guy who had a DPF that was completely wrong.  D'oh.

I had emailed the other guy the night before and told him that I found one close by and thank you, but I think I've got what I need.  He emailed back that it was no problem and if it didn't work out, he'd ship it to me.

Why didn't we lead with that a month ago?  Sheesh.  Steve_Jones was on board with picking up the DPF and shipping it to me, but the guy was just really hard to get a hold of.  He put in a ton of effort trying to help me run this dude down, and for that I am very appreciative! 

As soon as I started back home, I texted the guy and he agreed to drop it off at the UPS store.  It arrived today and I took it over to the shop to install it.

The threads on the NoX sensor bung are totally thrashed so I've got it just held in place with wire until I can figure out where to get a tap for those kinds of threads.  Everything else is installed, though and it's at least a ton quieter!

I've still got an O2 code, but there's a TSB out there about a place where wires are likely to get abraded or something, so I'm going to go look around for that.  It's also going back to limp mode because it says the DPF is clogged.  Because of course it is.  I don't know how much that matters, but I don't think I can initiate a DPF regen while the O2 sensor code is active.  So I'm going to try to fix that and then see if I can regen.

I was hoping that the O2 sensor problem was just a fuse, but alas, the fuse is fine.  So I need to figure out why the heater circuit is faulty or open.  I was able to solve the SCR system implausible code by re-tapping the NOx sensor and bung threads so that I could close that part of the exhaust up.  I was hoping that was also the cause of the DPF clogged and the "The lower limit value of component B28/8 (Pressure differential sensor (DPF)) was dropped below/not reached." codes, but those are still there and I'm still in limp mode.

I have the rest of the evening to myself here at the shop so I'm going to try to attack the 13AF00 and 15FD00 codes.  I can't help but think that they are related to each other.  The first thing I want to check is to see if I have the pressure sensor tubes reversed or if there is a leak there.  The tubes are different sizes, but I don't have any metric exhaust hose and I'm not about to pay $50 for 3 inches of rubber hose, so even though I have the hose sizes matched up on the sensor body, the hard lines were a difficult fit either way I tried it and it wasn't easy to see what I was doing.  It's also possible that I didn't get the hose on far enough or that the hose split when I was forcing it on.  The next possibility is that the DPF Pressure Sensor wiring was caught up in the wiring meltdown along with the O2 sensor wiring, so that might not be fixed properly.  Finally, of course, it's possible that the pressure sensor itself is faulty.

There's also a stored code for 124F00 - EGR positioner faulty, but I think I can get away with that one.

Okay, off to try to figure this out.

Hooray!  I'm an idiot!

I had the pressure sensor ports reversed.  Swapping them back made the 13AF00 and 15FD00 code go away and for a couple glorious miles I had no more limp mode!

And then the 124F00 kicked in and that threw me back into limp.  womp womp.

Hopefully tomorrow I can get a little time to try to fix the O2 heater issue.  And maybe I can just tune out the EGR....

This thread stresses me out lol

I don't think the O2 sensor fault is enough to put it in limp mode. It's the EGR positioner (124F00) that's doing it. Some people think the code is not accurately named, that it may be intake manifold flap positioner that is somehow malfunctioning.

You're so close to having this licked! I wanna say something encouraging, like "Run, Forrest, Run!"

Yeah, the O2 code is definitely not my limp problem - that code pops up immediately yet I was able to actually spin the tires a little!  Once it tries to activate the EGR, though, it's a different story.  I don't think I need to worry about the EGR code as much as the O2 one, though. 

Pulling the plugs for the MAF/intake temp sensors disables the EGR and takes the engine out of limp mode.  So that's fun!  I can at least drive up hills now at a speed greater than "hazard to navigation".  The 13AF00 message is back, though, indicating a clogged DPF.  I don't think that's a problem for me.  I'm focused entirely on the O2 sensor issue.  I back-probed the O2 sensor and determined that the heater circuit is only getting about 8-9 volts instead of the 12 it's supposed to get.  Checking pin 5 (positive) against known good ground, I get 12V.  Checking pin 4 (ground from computer) against known good +12V source, I still get 8-9 volts, so that tells me that I've got a bad ground.  So I need to work my way back from the plug.  I checked again from where my fixing started, and it's still low.  Next, I need to figure out where the computer is and check pin 77 there to see if I get good voltage.  If it's good there, then there's a wiring issue.  If it's not good, then I guess it's a CDI Control Unit issue.

Hi wae, you're a true hero to many. I for one will NEVER EVER complain about sensors or CELs on my Dodge Challenger R/T ever again. Thanks for letting follow along on your mighty quest.