[110octane]

Hey all, I am a retired engineer (civil/mechanical) living in Alabama. I recently purchased a 2002 MB S430 for my wife. We are former Lexus LS 400 owners and we are enjoying the Mercedes. It is very quiet and handles (by my wife's standards) well. Surprisingly, it is not as quick on acceleration as the LS. I am not going to attempt to check out the upper limits of the speed range-I'm chicken. Both vehicles begin to kick it up around 100 mph and that's where I rarely go and that's my limit.
We have had some problems with the car. The trunk has refused to open (fixed the pancake cylinder with super glue and a hose clamp), a blown heater hose, bad catalytic convertor (bought an Eastern Convertor replacement $$$), and some cabin comfort control problems-the last item stumped the local experts. Also, had some trouble with the windshield washer storage tank heater lines-it gets hot here in the summer; Euro rubber rots....
Thanks for having me. Geoff

 

[SaleenS7]

Does your wife have the shifter set to S or W? If she puts it on S it will start off in first gear. W will start off in second gear. The transmissions on these cars will adapt to the way YOU drive the car... The car is probably used to 'relaxed' driving from the previous owner for so many miles. If you reset the transmission you will be starting on a clean slate and should notice a difference in acceleration.

Both LS400 and S430 have similar acceleration. Some say the Lexus is faster by a few tenths of a second. Mercedes says the S430 does 0-60 mph in 6.9 seconds but it all depends on many factors such as whether you are brake torquing, vehicle & driver weight, accuracy of equipment, and the testing conditions such as outside temp and elevation.

Anyway welcome to the forum.

 

[eric242340]

Hey all, I am a retired engineer (civil/mechanical) living in Alabama. I recently purchased a 2002 MB S430 for my wife. We are former Lexus LS 400 owners and we are enjoying the Mercedes. It is very quiet and handles (by my wife's standards) well. Surprisingly, it is not as quick on acceleration as the LS. I am not going to attempt to check out the upper limits of the speed range-I'm chicken. Both vehicles begin to kick it up around 100 mph and that's where I rarely go and that's my limit.
We have had some problems with the car. The trunk has refused to open (fixed the pancake cylinder with super glue and a hose clamp), a blown heater hose, bad catalytic convertor (bought an Eastern Convertor replacement $$$), and some cabin comfort control problems-the last item stumped the local experts. Also, had some trouble with the windshield washer storage tank heater lines-it gets hot here in the summer; Euro rubber rots....
Thanks for having me. Geoff

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[110octane]

Does your wife have the shifter set to S or W? If she puts it on S it will start off in first gear. W will start off in second gear. The transmissions on these cars will adapt to the way YOU drive the car... The car is probably used to 'relaxed' driving from the previous owner for so many miles. If you reset the transmission you will be starting on a clean slate and should notice a difference in acceleration.

Both LS400 and S430 have similar acceleration. Some say the Lexus is faster by a few tenths of a second. Mercedes says the S430 does 0-60 mph in 6.9 seconds but it all depends on many factors such as whether you are brake torquing, vehicle & driver weight, accuracy of equipment, and the testing conditions such as outside temp and elevation.

Anyway welcome to the forum.

She keeps it in "S." We have a lot of hills here in the Birmingham area and the lower range is helpful for this. The Lexus had much less throttle pedal resistance and therefore "jumped" with less foot effort. The MB is more comfortable and noticeably quieter. It will accelerate to our satisfaction, it just does it a little differently. We had the cruise control go insane one time, just out of nowhere on the interstate, jumped down a range and acted out of control. Removing the vehicle from the cruise mode and pulling to the side of the road (emergency flashers, little panic), shutting down, and restarting corrected things-at least as far as we know.