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Mercedes SL 63 AMG Suffers High-Tech Systems Failure

Mercedes SL 63

Has Anyone Out There Had Similar Problems?

Tony Antoniades, interviewed in these pages recently Mercedes SL 63 AMG review about how much he loved his new high tech Mercedes SL 63 AMG, is having second thoughts.

Driving into work this week the transmission suddenly stopped working, forcing the Chairman of RDF Group, the Brighton, Sussex-based provider of software solutions to the banking industry, to coast to the side of the road. The engine was working, the brakes and steering too, but the engine wouldn’t communicate with the gearbox via the fly-by-wire system.

Antoniades was left in a dangerously exposed position in the £110,785 machine, and Mercedes Rescue said it would take three hours to get there. Wouldn’t you know that when Antoniades turned the engine on again after about 15 minutes the problem disappeared.

Later, a Mercedes service assistant said “next time” the problem happened to leave the engine running, so that he could find out why. Apparently, turning the engine off and then back on wipes the system’s memory.

The assistant also said, according to Antoniades, that this might be a problem set off by potholes in the road.

If that’s the case, then expect an avalanche of problems because of Britain’s third world roads for the latest cars which have so-called fly-by-wire technology. This is short-hand for systems which use mainly electronics and wires to link command functions in vehicles from the accelerator to steering and brakes, and made famous by the film of the Airbus A320 sinking into the forest at the end of the runway at Mulhouse, France in June 1998.

If anyone out there has suffered a similar problem in a Mercedes please email neil.winton@btinternet.com

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4 Responses to Mercedes SL 63 AMG Suffers High-Tech Systems Failure

  1. Eddie c January 9, 2017 at 12:29 am #

    Just experienced that same issue. It would not shift from park to reverse or drive when I started it today. Left house in another car for 3 hours and the SL 63 worked fine. No idea why.

  2. robert ferreira November 27, 2022 at 5:18 pm #

    We picked our Sl63 in August. Has been in the shop for a total of 19 days so far. It is still in the shop and they don’t even contact us anymore. I wonder if we will ever see it again?

  3. Richard Colletti July 13, 2023 at 9:12 pm #

    Bought the SL63 AMG 5/27/23, put about 200 miles and has been in the shop to this day. Absolutely no help or answer to the electrical problems from Mercedes. Checking into Florida law at this time as Mercedes sold this car with problems from the day I picked it up.

  4. Richard Colletti August 27, 2023 at 3:08 pm #

    Bought 2023 SL 63 about four months ago and the car has been the shop except for the 200 miles I drove the car. Now after two lemon law notices to the state attorneys office they put me in touch with a third parry (Attorneys) to buy me out before the car lemons and devalues about 100,000.00 . Problem is they don’t want to include any costs like Insurance, loss of work and the 20 time I have been back and forth to the dealership.

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