SL R230 - SRS, Wiper, Comand / Command, Roll Bar, Airbag Light, Clicking

beast900

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Hi Malcolm,

Over the weekend I removed the passenger wheel and arch lining and can confirm that drainage pipe you mentioned was completely blocked, I would say at least 1litre of water must have drained from it when I cleaned out all the muck. I also noticed two rubber ends that go on the chassis were split so I have repaired them, so there is a chance a bit of water has been getting in there too.

I see now that the rain water must have been getting in through the bonnet vent on the passenger side and in turn was not draining, am I right in thinking this water has been getting into the cabin through cabin heater? I could not see any sign of water getting into the car, only the pool I found under the carpet on the passenger side. I removed the panel under the passenger glove box as well as the passenger foot plate to see if I could see water but nothing.

Am I looking in the correct place? Could water be getting in anywhere else? Do I need to check the carpet under the drivers side too do you think?

The CAN wire's look ok no sign of any corrosion, and I can confirm that I have had no warnings / errors over the last week while the carpet has been dried out.

Thanks in advance.

Antony.
 

television

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The drivers side seldom suffers, if you have no silly warnings, then you can say job done, the effect of just damp plays havoc with the CAN circuits.

The designers of the these water spouts do not have a clue about just one leaf going down is enough to block the drains, maybe they live in high rise flats with underground parking.

I think that you can say "job done"
 

beast900

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sounds good to me!

fingers crossed that sorted now! next on my list, replace the front discs as I am getting vibration on light breaking, just need to get one of those SBC computers to deactivate the system form ebay first. :)
 

television

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I just disconnect the rear battery and key out of the car.
 

beast900

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yeah I have read of people doing that, I will go down that route then, and save £40 odd :)
 

television

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I have STAR as well, but things can go wrong. having cut 3 fingers off once I play safe now
 

merk350

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I had exactly the same syptoms on mY 2005 SL 350 SRS /Clicking noise,Wipers intermittent /command would go off for no reason,eventually the air bag control module blew as well ,Iwas told by my local indie that the Igniton fault was the most probable cause.I wish I had took it in earlier and had the EIS done would have saved £££££££ on the air bag module.
EIS is not cheap approx £500 +
Hope this helps
 

beast900

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Morning Malcolm

Over a year ago you helped advise me on some problems I was having with my 2005 SL (R230).

Basically water was coming in from the bonnet into a blocked drain pipe which led to water getting into the passenger footwell and causing havoc with my passenger SAM as all those connections where getting wet / damp.

A year or so later the problem has returned, with a couple of other little issues which I am hoping you can help with.

At the weekend I removed the passenger seat so I could get the carpet as far back as possible to ensure its completely dry (as I am not convinced that my last efforts got rid of the water completely)

I was wondering can you tell me how to disconnect the three connectors under the seat? the Blue and Yellow one come out easily enough, but I can’t seem to get the larger black block out, I also see the hydraulic cables going to the lumbar support controls, do you know how these are disconnected?

I have the same question for the connection blocks under the carpet of the passenger footwell, I want to spray the cables with some WD40 or similar but again can’t seem to work out how these clip off without running the risk of damaging anything.

Here are my symptoms anyhow :

1. From time to time, i get the roll bar light on the dash, SRS warning, and rapid clicking from behind the seat along with rapid flashing from the passenger airbag lamp. This can then lead to the command system displaying - system unavailable. ( I am pretty much convinced this is due to moisture though)

2. My radiator fan seems to come on as soon as you start the engine from cold, but only spins slowly, I am not sure how long its been doing this as it is pretty quiet from the cabin. I have been trying a few things out, for example disconnecting the engine temperature sensor triggers the fan’s to go into full speed which is very loud, and would be the behaviour I would expect. Also with the temp sensor disconnected the dashboard reads the engine as being cold / zero which leads to me to believe the temp sensor is ok.

For the time being I have the radiator fan disconnected, and have a message saying “coolant - visit workshop” on the dash, which I am not too concerned about as its pretty cool at the moment.

Can you tell me if the passenger SAM controls the radiator fan in anyway? is it possible this water problem I have been getting could be linked to that?

3. I have a really weird issue with my window wipers, they work fine unless I indicate left, they simply stop working until I stop indicating, this does not happen when indicating right, or even when indicating left pressing the stalk half way so I just get three indicator signals.

Again since the wipers are on the SAM, could this problem be related to the water? I have had the wipers pack into all together in the past, or is there a chance the indicator stalk is severing a connection when full left indicator is activated?


And lastly I have a totally separate issue which I do not think is related to the above, and this is “lumpy power steering” the car almost judders from left to right (if that makes sense) rather than a smooth motion, I have jacked the car up and moved the wheels full lock to full lock with my hands and I get the same symptoms, do you have any troubleshooting tips I could try or have you come across anything like this in the past?

Thanks for your help in advance.

Best Regards

Antony
 

merk350

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See previous post,It eventually blew the airbag control module,so one EIS and one airbag control module later problem solved no issues since.Not cheap though.
hope this helps
 

television

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Morning Malcolm

Over a year ago you helped advise me on some problems I was having with my 2005 SL (R230).

Basically water was coming in from the bonnet into a blocked drain pipe which led to water getting into the passenger footwell and causing havoc with my passenger SAM as all those connections where getting wet / damp.

A year or so later the problem has returned, with a couple of other little issues which I am hoping you can help with.

At the weekend I removed the passenger seat so I could get the carpet as far back as possible to ensure its completely dry (as I am not convinced that my last efforts got rid of the water completely)

I was wondering can you tell me how to disconnect the three connectors under the seat? the Blue and Yellow one come out easily enough, but I can’t seem to get the larger black block out, I also see the hydraulic cables going to the lumbar support controls, do you know how these are disconnected?

I have the same question for the connection blocks under the carpet of the passenger footwell, I want to spray the cables with some WD40 or similar but again can’t seem to work out how these clip off without running the risk of damaging anything.

Here are my symptoms anyhow :

1. From time to time, i get the roll bar light on the dash, SRS warning, and rapid clicking from behind the seat along with rapid flashing from the passenger airbag lamp. This can then lead to the command system displaying - system unavailable. ( I am pretty much convinced this is due to moisture though)

2. My radiator fan seems to come on as soon as you start the engine from cold, but only spins slowly, I am not sure how long its been doing this as it is pretty quiet from the cabin. I have been trying a few things out, for example disconnecting the engine temperature sensor triggers the fan’s to go into full speed which is very loud, and would be the behaviour I would expect. Also with the temp sensor disconnected the dashboard reads the engine as being cold / zero which leads to me to believe the temp sensor is ok.

For the time being I have the radiator fan disconnected, and have a message saying “coolant - visit workshop” on the dash, which I am not too concerned about as its pretty cool at the moment.

Can you tell me if the passenger SAM controls the radiator fan in anyway? is it possible this water problem I have been getting could be linked to that?

3. I have a really weird issue with my window wipers, they work fine unless I indicate left, they simply stop working until I stop indicating, this does not happen when indicating right, or even when indicating left pressing the stalk half way so I just get three indicator signals.

Again since the wipers are on the SAM, could this problem be related to the water? I have had the wipers pack into all together in the past, or is there a chance the indicator stalk is severing a connection when full left indicator is activated?


And lastly I have a totally separate issue which I do not think is related to the above, and this is “lumpy power steering” the car almost judders from left to right (if that makes sense) rather than a smooth motion, I have jacked the car up and moved the wheels full lock to full lock with my hands and I get the same symptoms, do you have any troubleshooting tips I could try or have you come across anything like this in the past?

Thanks for your help in advance.

Best Regards

Antony

The seat connector is all one lump the clamp just slides sideways and its off.

The vacuum seat connector levers of with a 8mm open ended spanner, or a sharp pull.

I will post back on some other things
 

television

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The fault on the fan could be the fan control unit.
 

beast900

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Hi Malcolm & Merk350

Thanks for the replies, I really hope i don’t have to replace the EIS I have seen thats a pretty expensive part to replace, and with the car being a 2005 model with 80K on the clock I would be tempted to get rid of it if the problems start getting worse, but fingers crossed for now :)

Just a little update for you, I am all dried out now and will be putting everything back together at the weekend.

The plot thickens a bit in regards to the radiator fans, basically if I turn the internal cabin heat controls to off, the fans stop straight away, then if I turn the cabin heat back on, they start again.

is the fan control unit in anyway linked to the internal cabin controls? I take it this problem has nothing to do with the water ingress / SAM which causes the Comand system to go offline, flashing airbag light etc?

Any idea on the window wiper problem? could the stalk be severing a connection when the left indicator is clicked into place?

Also does anyone have any ideas what to check for initially in regards to lumpy steering?

Thanks in advance, I would be at a loss without this forum

Best Regards
 

television

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This is just not easy, I still think that there could be some damp in the CAN connectors and or Wake up passenger side. The car should really go on STAR.

The faults you have are not what we call plausible faults.

I will check to see if the air con has any connection to the engine fan as it does on some other models.
 

beast900

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I think your right about the Star, I will take it down to a local guy who charges £35 to read it,

as for the AirCon linking to the engine fan, i would be interested to hear what you find out.

Thanks again
 

beast900

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Hi TV,

just a quick update, I can now confirm the radiator fans only engage when the A/C is switched on, on the internal cabin controls, if you get the chance can you confirm if this is by design?

they don't spin very fast, but it has got me wondering :)

Thanks in advance
 

television

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That is OK, as long as not going full power in Winter. In the very hot weather it can/will go much faster.
 

beast900

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Great stuff, thanks as usual for the quick reply.

All the best :)
 

Tervan

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I have the same problem as bryher on my SL500. I have no water or moisture issues. No problem with the auto headlights. If I start the car & the SRS comes on , I may have to restart it several times before it finally stays off. Most of the time it remains off , but , once in a while it will come on while driving and the fore mentioned problems occur. They replaced the fuse panel , fuse link , ME control unit and front SAM. Connections are all fine. The work was all done by MB in London Ont. at a cost of about $1200 give or take. Has anyone else had this problem and had a successful repair?
 

television

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I have the same problem as bryher on my SL500. I have no water or moisture issues. No problem with the auto headlights. If I start the car & the SRS comes on , I may have to restart it several times before it finally stays off. Most of the time it remains off , but , once in a while it will come on while driving and the fore mentioned problems occur. They replaced the fuse panel , fuse link , ME control unit and front SAM. Connections are all fine. The work was all done by MB in London Ont. at a cost of about $1200 give or take. Has anyone else had this problem and had a successful repair?

You must take the car back to let them sort the real fault.
 

michscho

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its the same

Hi folks, weel seems like i am not the only one with the SRS/roll bar/command etc. thing.

the problem comes on from time o time and now its more often, so i need to sort it out. Acording to what i have read here i should check the passengers side. Ok i will but i was a little lost when i have read about some drainage pipes. Could you explain further or when i take down the carpet it will become obvious. Someone written here something about cutting something any pictures??

thanks and excuse my poor english

Mike
 


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