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10.0

really awful
Crashes / Fires:
0 / 1
Injuries / Deaths:
0 / 0
Average Mileage:
69,978 miles

About These NHTSA Complaints:

This data is from the NHTSA — the US gov't agency tasked with vehicle safety. Complaints are spread across multiple & redundant categories, & are not organized by problem.

So how do you find out what problems are occurring? For this NHTSA complaint data, the only way is to read through the comments below. Any duplicates or errors? It's not us.

1995 Mercedes-Benz SL500 engine problems

engine problem

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1995 Mercedes-Benz SL500 Owner Comments

problem #5

Dec 182018

SL500

  • miles

A D V E R T I S E M E N T S

Car can hardly run--without stalling-hard to start Mercedes dealer said to sell it because of wiring problems.

- Aliquippa, PA, USA

problem #4

Aug 042013

SL500 8-cyl

  • 140,000 miles
Wire harness shorted out due to naked wires with no insulation causing the harness to catch fire burning harness and frying the alternator. The cause was said to be wire harness deteriorated. Improper insulation on the harness.

- Adamsville, AL, USA

problem #3

May 202013

SL500

  • 103,000 miles
This vehicle has a bio-degradable engine wiring harness. These harnesses are deteriorating. My vehicle suddenly lost all power, no power steering, no nothing on a freeway and I was lucky that I was not killed. Mercedes and the dealerships both know that vehicles with this type harness are death traps. I wonder how many people have already been killed, but wiring harness was never investigated as cause of accident. Why are you not taking action against Mercedes? every vehicle still on the road should be recalled immediately if it has a bio-degradable wiring harness.

- Dunwoody, GA, USA

problem #2

Apr 092013

SL500 8-cyl

  • 43,890 miles
Was driving car and engine started to misfire, stumble and lose power as I was crossing traffic into a side road. Almost was hit from the passenger side by a large truck that was moving at me at over 50mph. I had left plenty of time/space to do this crossing properly. However, the car almost stalled out mid way across and I could not accelerate properly to get out of the way in a timely manner.. engine got slight surge just in time to avoid a collision. I managed to get the car to limp home. Started it up a few later and ran fine as I carefully drove it to the dealer for evaluation. Dealer mechanic found the wire insulation on the engine harness and the gas actuator where seriously deteriorated and exposing bare wires inside. Very expensive repairs costing over $3,300 parts and labor for these 2 repairs alone.. I think this defect would have show up much sooner on my vehicle except that I only drive the vehicle seasonally and the car has very low mileage at 44K. I collect many old cars and have never seen anything like this insulation defect on a 18 year old vehicle before. I do not think this defect is acceptable on a vehicle that originally cost nearly 100K. As this problem is well known and started showing up many years ago on other cars, Mercedes Benz should provide at least some relief to owners for the repair costs of their poor engineering.

- Rotonda West, FL, USA

problem #1

Apr 022012

SL500 8-cyl

  • 63,000 miles
Took my car in for service as it wasn't running properly (computer codes, stalling, etc) found out that in 1995 the Mercedes Benz company put biodegradable wiring. Had to send to germany for a new wiring harness ($1500) may have to purchase the other wiring harness in the near future ($3000). What kind of car company puts biodegradable wiring in their cars?? a Mercedes is known to last up to several hundred thousand miles, but not when the wiring starts disintegrating!! I have since found there are hundreds if not thousands of class action suits for this same matter against the Mercedes Benz company. They refuse to acknowledge the issue or the problem. Had I known of this, I would not have purchased the car in the first place!

- Peru, IL, USA

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