RichardK's nice sensible 4x4 – Friede - 2002 Mercedes ML55 AMG - servicing and fix-list

[RichardK]

About 30 years ago... just a random interjection into the thread.

I knew so little then. This cursed Metro (the reason I won't buy pale metallic blue cars) cost hundreds in repairs and still fell apart.

Which makes the £200 16 spark plugs, a load of synthetic oil and a couple of filters for the ML seem quite reasonable really.

[RichardK]

Car names are important to me, I know some people mock and they have every right to, but you don't get to over 180 cars in 31 years without some sort of weird mental connection and I definitely assign personality/spiritual energy/moods to them; this stuff is only relevant to the people who have a similar mechanical empathy and anthropomorphism. We project all sorts of extra stuff on our pets, why not cars?

Anyway, the Mercedes was stubbornly refusing to accept a name. I tried a few while driving – John Henry, Henry Lee, a couple of scifi names... nothing. Eureka Maru? Nah.

Checked the list of spaceship names to see what I'd used already (not that I can't reuse a name)...

FRIEDE.

Not used that. German, prototypical (1929 Fritz Lang film showcased many examples of reality when space travel started to take place), and it means peace. Rocket from the film Frau im Mond. 

So the ML is named. Friede gets to share a drive with Lilith.

[RichardK]

You know that thing where you've just got a car and don't know it well, so you take really cautious little trips?

Needed to go to Tesco, and I'm sure I spent more getting there (Clay Cross is not far at all) than I did on dinner, but I had to know – would the ML start and drive after a few days sat? Would any fluids have escaped?

Got in, turned the key...

 

 

...and drove to Tesco, parked, got food, got back in, drove home, parked. No weird or unusual noises, no odd behaviour. EXCELLENT!

What a lovely beast.

It does have very battered interior bits, and I'm of two minds - the seats look /repairable/, like, they were made by an American OEM in the old-school of American car engineering so everything comes apart and can be fixed, but also everything is not very high quality. The fronts are fine, it's the backs, and I made it worse when moving things pushing more of the carpet off the glued panels.

But what I can't tell is how 'fixable' the carpet bits are, and how 'special' the black leather on the AMG is vs. the leather in a normal one. There's a two-seat bench - which is arguably the most battered - for £80 in Wolves and I think I'll get that but will be very sad if actually the carpet is peeling off and the handles are breaking, 'cause I may as well fix what I have. It does appear to have the weird little pad from under the armrest intact though.

Parking sensors don't work, but I can consistently park it with the bumper about 3-5 inches from a wall or similar object. How? It's got proper Merc lights with a pattern that works as a kind of rangefinger when reversing. The 500 SEC was the same, and it's one of those things I really wonder how many people know and use because I'm pretty sure that's why Lucas etc. reversing lights had the glass cast in the way it was.

I'm building myself up to attempt fixing the sunroof (and entirely worried about how that could go if I get it wrong), and when we were checking the car out @Dan_ZTT found a wire in the side compartment – I found a corresponding plug for it. I don't think it's a sunroof motor as that's in the overhead console (which I need to remove anyway to fix the trip computer and ensure I'm properly crying about the fuel economy if I want noise). There's also the back of the fuel filler pipe and I can feel some large ring-shaped pieces, one of which is loose, so I'm now very curious about that.

Now, here's the other dilemma:

While we were sat in the car negotiating, the clincher was that I'd been chatting to a very nice Cayenne seller who had a £3500 car and was listing the faults - that list arrived just as I was mithering over taking the ML and clinched the deal for the Mercedes.

Said Cayenne got offered to me for much less, and I thought that as I don't need it as working transport, the list of faults was tolerable. I could get it (it drives and is MOTd, it's all annoying things - though at least one of those annoying things is a £900 parts bill right off as the rear airbags are 3-4x the price of front ones), and I thought a series of videos - in my lovely big garage, well lit, with my professional broadcaster friend's help and advice on making them, about a £2K Cayenne V8 would be potentially interesting. Not profitable, but worth the effort to build my reputation as an automotive writer/used car person.

Making videos would mean getting rid of the Spitfire – which to be fair has deteriorated so much since the video of it driving about, and the time I first saw it, that it really just needs everything either rebuilding, remaking or replacing, I've kept it in stasis but the rear suspension/driveshafts etc. are just a solid ball of rust, the rear of the tub is filler and holes, etc. – and would also mean spending money AND having another car to move.

So here's the question: I do, already, have a gargantuan, cost-as-much-as-a-house-new high-performance German SUV. The idea of the £2K Porsche, the £2K Cayenne, feels very marketable and for some reason a similarly cheap Mercedes-AMG (or correctly, Mercedes-Benz ML 55 AMG) or W163/ML/M-Class doesn't feel as appealing as a thing for people to watch.

Am I wrong? Would videos about restoring/fixing/running 'one of the UK's cheapest AMGs' or whatever actually have as much appeal as 'I bought a £2,000 Porsche Cayenne and it went exactly as well as you'd expect'.

The goal of videos would be to explain to people how to use their own time and patience to avoid hideous garage bills, and point out that the Cayenne /body/ lasts well, so it's worth fixing the bits attached to it as long as you're not paying a garage thousands to trial-and-error repair it.

And then the footnote to that is: 'Does anyone ever donate/click the patreon/ko.fi/etc.' links on such videos to offset the costs of producing them?

[Crackers]

Everyone is doing cheap basket case Cayennes on YouTube at the moment - keep the ML. 

[RichardK]

13 minutes ago, Crackers said:

Everyone is doing cheap basket case Cayennes on YouTube at the moment - keep the ML. 

That's the advice I needed – I tend to not look at video myself, I hate it, and it's the pressure to make something that is pushing buttons. If the market's saturated I don't doubt I could write a good script and storyboard with good advice, otherwise I wouldn't try, but I'll give it a go with the ML instead.

Thing is I actually hate the prevalence of youtube, the lack of 'diagrams and actual engineering info' and the inherent narcissism the platform encourages. But I like providing advice and guidance and clever fixes for stuff 😕

I'd keep the ML regardless - the only 'transport' justification for the Cayenne is spending summer getting it right, and having it on the road and working at the time the ML's MOT runs out.

[RichardK]

In advance of getting some new EBC grooved/dimpled discs and yellowstuff pads to stop the Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee of shame every time I stop, and some Pirelli Scorpion Verde tyres....

See if the wheels are worthy of flinging £300 a corner at.

Note: a set of used 19x9.5J AMG split rims in this style  is €1,995 from a German Merc reseller...

[RichardK]

Now, the bodywork...

Front arches are going. Rear arches are going. This is not unexpected, but given /what/ this is and what it can do... can anyone weld in repair panels on the rear properly?

There are a few hundred ML55s left in the UK - about 170 on the road out of 495ish sold/registered.

And this thing cost as much as a house new.

It's on IKEA duty today, someone was 3/4 hovering with a vehicle joining on a slip road so I hoofed it to give them an empty lane and get in front of the klingon. What a noise. Like an F1 car, it just screamed up; pulling away from lights it digs down and roars when you want it to shift, and it has the traction to shift.

85% of AMG G-wagen experience for 5% (ish? I CBA working it out) of the price.

[Schaefft]

ML55, similar to many other performance cars you can pick up for cheap, are really only this cheap here. That means chances arent too bad that you can switch around wheels, mirrors and other random stuff unique to those cars, sell it in Germany (although much harder now from here post-Brexit) and basically own a free car. I bet this ML55 wouldn't be much different.

[RichardK]

I've no intention of breaking it unless something major detonates! But I do want to tidy it up a bit if I can, fortunately most of the interior trim is shared with later higher-spec normal MLs, just the bodykit, brakes, dampers and running gear differ.

I can't even find any evidence that the diffs/gearbox/springs are significantly changed!

[RichardK]

I have moved.

It is a weekend. It is warm. And the day is mine.

So:

But first, I need a time machine. Someone needs a small bit of hurt applying...

Mercedes ML55 AMGs have buffalo leather.

Except:

(Look at the headrests).

Aaaargh.

The third row are also perforated but they don't have white stitching, so I have front and 2-seat original, single-seat MB Individual/limited edition, and third row "Other".

I am sure the individual seat was simply replaced with 'a black leather one' because the mechanisms are evil and complex, but I seriously doubt I'm going to find the right one to replace it

I'm rebuilding the rear seats and boot trim fully in summer, so I will strip and rebuild the bench.

Also 90,000 miles service was in 2009. I think it will appreciate this attention... Or repay me by going wrong. Odds welcome on this!

[RichardK]

If you ever wonder why I hate garages, I've seen the bill for fitting this suspiciously-not-Mercedes looking lap belt - and the piece of trim seemingly trashed in the process.

Do that to one of my cars, and you're sourcing and paying for a new bolster section.

And that's why garages hate me

[RichardK]

Should just be extra clear: I am happy with this car - and no shade on any previous owners here. It just pisses me off that the reason a £72K super-SUV is peanuts in the UK when it still works /just fine/ is because of things like garages breaking shit and not be accountable, charging for work that's not done, etc, etc. and then people not caring about maintaining their cars because what difference does it make anyway.

I'm pulling it apart in anticipation of rectifying things like this - I like it. A lot. If I could afford the £12K one on eBay and it were genuinely £12K-good, I'd have it.

[RichardK]

Yeay!

Argh!

Spot the difference...

The sunroof switch is different, too...

[RichardK]

So the scores of the AMG:

Serpentine belt done - arms scratched tae fuck. But done. Pollen filter - it had none! Done. Many leaves removed. Air filter done, air box cleaned and loads of waxoil dumped on inner wing (and over the side of the battery tray).

Trip computer - the module has a volumetric alarm sensor and that is why it says on/off. The computer may work. I can't work out how to diagnose further - the display backlights are blown but they're soldered on; the trip computer only part is the same in that regard but the computer part works.

Sunroof:

No, it's not fixed, but how many brave points?

On the manual cog it can be opened and closed. The cables are greased and working. The deflector is fucked and stuck down with rust, that's going to be difficult to replace I bet.

So... fuse seems okay. Need to check the power to the motor.

Seatwise - the garage basically butchered the rear bench to take a three point belt out and fit a lap belt. Rear carpet unstuck all over, broken lever, cover not reattached. You can buy a whole rear bench for £80 on eBay,

So, I've bought the aforementioned £80 seat and will transfer the buffalo leather trim over.

Weighing up keeping the third row as I'm not sure it's how the car started out, it's missing the trims to tidy up the boot panels and it's a different seat trim, but if I remove them I'll get the filler panels.

The last little point - when I used the horn I got one peep.

It has two horns!

I shall fix.

It's also getting the headlights polished.

Injury count = six times clouting my shins off the Sixfire's front chassis legs. I need to sort the garage out.

[timolloyd]

Just caught up with this thread. Love the attention you are giving it. And fully concur with others that this could be much more watchable than more Cayenne nonsense.

[RichardK]

I'll probably have done everything interesting to it before finding the inclination to make a video!

Today it's raining and I forget that while last years' surgery made a massive difference, I am still... not disabled, but 'worn out' with shitty arthritis in that ankle. So a computer day.

First job: What should Friede have, according to the numbers on the A-pillar.

Chassis number confirms that the car was made in Alabama (Tuscaloosa) - the internet is FULL of delights when you google VIN number info but it's dead simple for an ML aside from Graz ones being pre-2002 - WDC = MB USA (Chrysler, back then), 163 for M-Class, 174 for AMG, 2 for RHD, and A for the Tuscaloosa plant in this context (X marks a Graz built ML).

Friede was made on 13th June 2002 and 'released' on 6th July, finished in 040U Black with 561A Exclusive Black Leather (the Buffalo leather I keep going on about. I think it just means 'black leather with double stitching and no perforations'. At least I hope so because that's the description of the replacement  seats I found, but they mentioned ML270 in the listing).

Note that there's no mention of third-row seating and I wonder if having third-row would normally disable the sear side airbag option...

Code    Description
241    FRONT SEAT LH ELECTRIC ADJUSTABLE WITH MEMORY ✔️ 
242    FRONT SEAT RH ELECTRIC ADJUSTABLE WITH MEMORY  ✔️ 
245    TRIP COMPUTER / COMPASS ❌ – present, not working – this module has been replaced once already, A1635405211 - I need A1635408211 to fix
249    AUTOMATICALLY DIPPING INSIDE REAR VIEW MIRROR  ✔️ 
293    SIDEBAG IN REAR LEFT AND RIGHT  ✔️ - well, I assume it's there
345    RAIN SENSOR  ✔️ 
352    COMAND  ✔️ 
414    ELECTRIC TILT/SLIDE SUNROOF IN GLASS VERSION  ❌ – present, but not working
423    5-SPEED AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION  ✔️ 
461    INSTRUMENT WITH MILES IND. AND ENGLISH LEGEND (I think you mean German-American LEGEND!)  ✔️ 
472    ELECTRONIC STABILITY PROGRAM (ESP)  ✔️ 
500    OUTSIDE REAR VIEW MIRROR LH AND RH FOLDING  ✔️ 
500A    LEATHER, EXCLUSIVE ❌ - rear seats damaged, one is the wrong trim
524    PAINTWORK - PRESERVATION  ✔️ - didn't preserve it well enough
551    ANTI-THEFT/ANTI-BREAK-IN WARNING SYSTEM ❌ - may still work, but the overhead panel to disable the interior sensor misbehaves at the very least, this is why I need the A163520 5211 type computer, it has the break in sensor
580    AIR CONDITIONER  ✔️ 
600    HEADLAMPS - CLEANING EQUIPMENT  ✔️ 
612    XENON HEADLIGHT  ✔️ 
614    BI-XENON HEADLAMPS FOR RIGHT-HAND TRAFFIC   ✔️ - these do appear to be still fitted as I think Bi-Xenon means high/low beam
617    LAMP UNIT: XENON HEADLAMPS ASSYMMETRICAL  ✔️ 
618    BI-XENON HEADLAMPS FOR LEFT-HAND TRAFFIC  ✔️ 
669    SPARE WHEEL / FOLDING WHEEL ❌ - WAIT DID THIS HAVE THE FUNKY SPARE WHEEL CARRIER?! Looking about I think the ML55 would have the spare wheel in the side of the boot on a post-carrier with a box to cover it; that's obviously long-gone but would explain the missing bolt in the boot floor.
723    TRUNK COVERING ❌ - lost, like tears in the rain
791    AMG-WHEELS: 18 INCH ALL-ROUND ❌- yeah, those are long-gone, it's on 19s that the ML55 facebook group got excited about
802    CHANGE OF MODEL YEAR, THE LAST FIGURE SHOWING THE NEW MODEL YEAR   ✔️
810    SOUND SYSTEM  ✔️ 
816    RADIO REMOTE CONTROL - STILL PRESENT!  ✔️ 
819    CD CHANGER (present, but I want to swap it for the MP3-capable model)  ✔️ 
833    ADDITIONAL PARTS FOR GREAT BRITAIN VEHICLE VERSION  ✔️ - tiny union flags for some, sad memory of not paying stupid taxes for parts from Germany for others
840    DARK TINTED GLASS  ✔️ 
848    ELEC. SIDE WINDOWS  ✔️ 
873    SEAT HEATER FOR LEFT AND RIGHT FRONT SEATS  ✔️ 
984    COC DOC., DELETION OF VEHICLE REGISTRATION DOC.  ✔️ 
M113    V8-GASOLINE ENGINE M113  ✔️  ❤️❤️❤️
M55    CAPACITY 5,5 LITRE  ✔️ 
U49    STYLING PACKET (M-KLASSE)  ✔️ - I need to fix this - cracked rear bumper, foglights rusty
U62    HEAD IMPACT PROTECTION  ✔️ 

[RichardK]

49 minutes ago, RichardK said:

669    SPARE WHEEL / FOLDING WHEEL ❌ - WAIT DID THIS HAVE THE FUNKY SPARE WHEEL CARRIER?! Looking about I think the ML55 would have the spare wheel in the side of the boot on a post-carrier with a box to cover it; that's obviously long-gone but would explain the missing bolt in the boot floor.

Parts:

A1638900232 (or A1638900932) - frame, bolts to floor in boot.

This may be trickier to find than I'd like, as it seems most ML55 owners I've found on forums just chucked the lot once the cars reached the age, well, I guess this will have when having extra seats flung in.

 

[Schaefft]

Great to see the attention given to what is a special vehicle after all. As things more and more shift towards tiny engines and EVs it'll only continue to stand out more from the crowd.

[RichardK]

Like anything I have the weakness is welding - it needs a lot of bodywork sorting to live, and I'd love to think it could be done but as yet, I've never learned, never found anyone willing to do the work to the way I'd want it done, and eventually time overtakes me so I'll probably end up wasting money on fripperies and making sure it has the right seats and working computers while the floor vanishes beneath it.

I'm not asking the world from welding, really. All I want is to get the same quality and care I see so many enthusiasts apply to their own cars - and to put my own care & attention into stripping the trim and bodywork panels, and refitting. But it seems you either hand the thing over and get billed loads for what usually - IMO - end up being bodges (you should see the NSR sill on this), or the car vanishes into the garage's work queue and ends up 10x worse than when it started.

In 1999/2000 I committed to spending £4000 having my FE Ventora rebuilt - it had bad floors and so forth, but I bought a MASSIVE pile of NOS panels for it, took them to the garage I knew in Kelso where I had seem them weld up their own rally cars with strong floors and good finishing, and left it. Bear in mind that shabby as it was, I drove it there...

They lost some of the rare panels. They reversed into it clearing snow. They piled snow on it. They stole the rare steering wheel. They shuffled it around the yard, but never did a thing with it other than take it from 'someone wants to spend money saving it' to 'well now it's definitely scrap'.

I would pay for this to be welded. I desperately wish I could weld but given my depth perception and ease of frustration if things don't go right, I doubt I'd manage it, But it's a separate chassis, four-wheel drive, AMG-powered 4x4 truck - it must, SURELY, be restorable and worth putting the energy into.

[RichardK]

As for the shift - yeah. What excited me about the Cayenne, the Range Rover I had last year and this (BMW X5 4.8iS is rare but I count them too) is that the shift to people buying V8s (at least UK-wise) got stamped on in 2006 so by 2010 most models have gone, this is one of AMG's last NA 'ain't no substitute for cubic inches' engines though obviously there are bigger and better older NA and newer forced-induction V8s to have, they're considerably more money.

In 10 years the idea that a couple of grand would get a working, MOTd, road legal and safe (I had no hesitation jumping into it and driving to Scotland and back on a bank holiday weekend and it rewarded me with a very pleasant, relaxing drive) car of this class will be as jolting to car enthusiasts as "Oh yeah I used to just grab a Capri for £150 if I wanted a silly banger" or "Remember when you could buy a Ferrari 412i for Mondeo money, or a Ferrari F40 sat in a showroom for LESS than the new asking price?".

And sure, I'm a G-Wagen fan. I will never not want a G-Wagen V8, I've driven three, done serious miles in a G 350d and an AMG G63, and I understand all of their flaws but still love them. But the ML? It has a proper chassis, it is a proper AMG, and yet it handles 'going fast' or fast cruises better than any G-Wagen (maybe the newer one is getting there, but the newer one is independent front suspension) without needing skyhooks and science to make it safe. For most uses it's arguably the superior vehicle, and loses out purely for not being the veblen good, the status symbol (which IMO enhances the superiority – I don't want a G because it's a symbol of wealth, I want the engineering and HATE that most of them are bought purely as a way of showing that you can afford stupid money on a car then driven in cities and never used for their designed purpose).

Even the Cayenne is easier to respect than the G in that regard – sure, most people buy it because 'it's a Porsche' but Porsche made the car lots of aspirational consumers wanted. If the G-wagen were on that route you'd be able to buy a £45K G250d to annoy the Grenadier; the V6 Cayenne was basically a VW 'R' SUV Van Den Plas/Ghia and priced a tolerable step up (before options at least).

We'll be looking at blown-up Ford EcoBoost STs and 'so that's how you got 421bhp from a four-pot' neglected A through E-classes in 2035 and they'll just be scrap, because no-one's changing their attitude on how they maintain and fix cars in the UK. If anything it's getting worse, I'm finding it really hard to track down W163 bits partly because all the online resources for EPCs and other references have just evaporated, dominated by AutoDoc and its many SEO-devouring app-promoting shitty clone shites.

[RichardK]

Success!

A complete buffalo leather rear bench set - £75 for the invidual seat, £80 for the bench, with good carpets, working mechanisms and centre three point belt.

I would have swapped over already but I am mildly worried about the prospect of the floor bolts causing drama, so waiting until a clear day. Then I will clean & feed etc. the leather and it'll be very nice...

Compared to this, particularly...

[Dan_ZTT]

On 4/22/2023 at 12:47 PM, RichardK said:

If you ever wonder why I hate garages, I've seen the bill for fitting this suspiciously-not-Mercedes looking lap belt - and the piece of trim seemingly trashed in the process.

Do that to one of my cars, and you're sourcing and paying for a new bolster section.

And that's why garages hate me

In slight defence of said garage, that piece of trim was actually broken off already when I got the car, possibly had been for some time

The belt - there was just a piece of cut off belt webbing, they said they couldn't get a correct Merc replacement (thinking now that's maybe because it would originally have been 3-point not lap? and maybe been changed if/when it was converted from 5 to 7 seats?) so I just bought a cheap generic lap belt from ebay and they put that on to do the MOT. In hindsight it'd probably have been easier to just remove the rear bench for the test... 

[RichardK]

It is three point - I'm less horrified if that bit was already broken, but they presumably had to pull the rear panel from the seat to remove the shoulder part - I found the trim piece from the belt under the driver's seat!

The replacements look promising, I'm just hopeful I can actually lift the old one out - I had to swap the pull-releases. It's giving me an excuse to vacuum everywhere (and ponder how the carpet should fit - boot under floor, which has a nice edge, or boot over floor with just a flat edge).

[RichardK]

Okay, Let's do this thing...

Bloody hell that seat is heavy.

People might say buying a V8 Mercedes these days is a sign of losing your marbles.

Lies.

I found them.

[Six-cylinder]

51 minutes ago, RichardK said:

Okay, Let's do this thing...

Bloody hell that seat is heavy.

People might say buying a V8 Mercedes these days is a sign of losing your marbles.

Lies.

I found them.

What No Money!

[Schaefft]

Bonus Lego!

[RichardK]

Looking better!

[RichardK]

4 hours ago, Six-cylinder said:

What No Money!

Not even a penny. I did find A Mysterious Goo on the passenger seat bolt. I'm afraid of it.

[Cavcraft]

Looks these are 'normal' auto boxes rather than tiptronic? The latter would be good for the ML320, it seems to take forever to accelerate when on the move.

 

I bet it is lovely to drive, they seem a very understated car and a nice place to be in.

[HMC]