A penny for your thoughts right now. You’re probably in shock as your mind tries to reconcile the words “Mercedes” and “avoid” in one sentence. We get it. After all, it’s a Mercedes-Benz we’re talking about here, the marquee that made good of the slogan, “engineered like no other car in the world.”
But not even engineering titans like Mercedes is immune to misengineering. It does happen. Just one little mistake and an otherwise fantastic product collapses like a pack of cards. Then the newswire tingles with recalls from dealerships and class action suits. Big problems often start from a tinny mistake, the little foxes.
Scroll down to the last subheading if you’ll rather leap straight to the fox that made the 2007 Mercedes-Benz S550 deserving of a boycott. However, even after this expose, you could as well decide that the 2007 S500 is still the used car for you, and we won't begrudge you for it. Nonetheless, let's dig in.
Analyzing The 2007 Mercedes-Benz S550
Don’t get us wrong. We don't mean the S-500 is a complete wack. After all, this was the land yacht meant to overshadow the 2006 BMW 750Li. Every S-Class is a proud descendant of the 1972 Mercedes-Benz W116 executive sedan, the original pioneer of the Special Class (Sonderklasse or S-Klasse in German) luxury cruiser.
Over the years, the series has come to embody the best of what the marquee has to offer in terms of performance, luxury, and technology. It's a favorite of big wigs around the world, including national leaders, business tycoons, and celebrities. When it isn't stretched and armored it is a full-sized sedan blending performance and luxury. The 2007 model marked the official arrival of the all-new S-Class series in North America, and it had the bells and whistles to challenge market rivals.
You could snag a used one today for less than $20,000, but it opened in the North American market with a $105,000 price tag. Let's drink and pretend all is well and focus on the 2007 S500's niceties. It has plenty we wholeheartedly approve of, starting with the spacious interior with ample legroom and power-adjustable seats. Speaking of the seats, it offers four different seat massage settings, the one feature that's enough to sell older executives who make up a good chunk of the S-Class's target customers.
It's hard to ignore the abundance of gadgetry that enhanced the car's premium quality. You get a superbly smooth ride in the 2007 S500, thanks to the powerful suspension and advanced traction control system. It’s got Merc’s superior and intuitive COMAND (short for Cockpit Management and Data) system interface that brings the audio, telematics, and telecommunications functions under a single knob on the center console and a display screen in the center dash.
We could go on, but we think by now you get the idea. The 2007 S-500 is not all bad until you look up her skirt.
Why The 2007 Mercedes-Benz S-500 Is A Bad Buy
The disaster-causing fox we’re chasing is none of the usual problems associated with S500s like HVAC blower motor failure, transmission drive selector module failure, and camshaft adjuster solenoid failure. The real disaster is the M273-coded tinny-little gear buried deep in the model's engine.
This little gear connects to the timing chain, and it's admittedly out of character to make this valuable little gear with inferior quality metal. That’s a disaster waiting to happen because the teeth can rot and fall out. It’s like Tyler Hoover over at Jalopnik bemoaned, “The first warning of impending death is a check engine light throwing camshaft timing codes.”
But what happens if you fail to address the issue promptly? Heaven forbids that the timing chain slips, as what follows is the piston smashing the valve. You know what that means? Your beautiful, curvaceous luxury Merc has just flatlined, with the solution being either a replacement engine or a new Merc altogether.
Either way, it’s no good for your wallet and mental health. Now you understand why we said, "you should avoid" this model. Still can’t resist that sweet deal at your local dealership? Follow these steps (courtesy of Hoover at Jalopnik) as soon as you get your new/used 2007 S500:
- Step 1: Remove the engine from your car
- Step 2: Remove the front cam covers, secondary air pump, guide pulley, thermostat housing, belt tensioner, oil filter case, vibration dampener, water pump, coils, valve covers, timing chain adjuster, and timing cover
- Step 3: Replace the gear
- Step 4: Somehow remember how all of this goes back together, then do that
The guys at the dealership should be able to help you with this process if you can’t. The odds are pretty good that you’d never have to deal with this problem but are you willing to take the chance? We’d probably never have known what hit us, save for the class action suit over safety issues related to the m272 and m273 engines. Yeah, we just used the 2007 version as the poster child for the 2006 to 2007 non-AMG Mercedes-Benz models with similar defects.
Plus, balance shaft issues are most common in 2004 – 2008 Mercedes models with M272 V6 piston engines. What then do we recommend to stubborn S500 enthusiasts who probably still want this car? Shoot for later models, making sure they don't fall in the affected engine serial numbers, Mercedes fixed the problem in subsequent models following the class action suit.