Automotive News: M-B removing some electronic functions

Automotive News: Mercedes ditches glitches with electronics

In a 20-minute speech at an innovation symposium, Mercedes-Benz's Stephan Wolfsried railed against overloading cars with electronic functions that have no use for the customer. The carmaker electronics chief then said Mercedes had removed 600 electronic functions from its cars, and plans to get rid of more.

About time they woke up!

Reply to
T.G. Lambach
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Sounds like good news. But I wonder what kind of functions they mean. They are increasing in other directions, e.g the cabrio softtop.

DAS

Reply to
Dori A Schmetterling

one thing that they're getting rid of is the vented seats

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Reply to
127.0.0.1

Really? I like those!

Reply to
Thomas J. Paladino Jr.

Maybe they need to leave the alarm clock function then ;o)

300 Essie
Reply to
300 Essie

HEY !!! THEY better NOT get rid of the cooled seats!!!! That is one thing I want on my next car. Of course the kudzu kars won't get rid of cooled seats ...

mcbrue heatedly under the bridge in the trailer down by the river

96 S420
Reply to
MCBRUE

Like the stupid brake-by-wire "feature"? The only things I hear about them are horror stories where owners nearly get themselves killed or at least have fender benders because of them.

I understand the new SLK will not have this idiot feature.

Michael

Reply to
Michael Low

Mmm... a disclaimer I can envision... Do not use cell phone in the car... may affect brake performance...

Reply to
Tiger

snipped-for-privacy@ca.inter.net (Michael Low) haute in die Tasten:

Mercedes has officially announced, that after the CLS coupe-sedan there will be no further model with SBC brake. The reason for that is mainly, that you can provide most of the new SBC features with conventional brakes too.

In german car magazine ams I read that they are thinking of removing sparsely documented features like the "tunnel mode": If you press the air circuit switch button of the climatronic more than 3 seconds, the car assumes that you are in a tunnel and closes windows and sunroof.

I think in their deepest heart most people are not against such features, but they are afraid that they could become a point of failure, and mainly people find that today cars are less simple to operate than earlier cars. The former "one function - one button" style becomes obsolete, when you have too many functions, and BMW's i-Drive got bad reviews either. So they are going to reduche the bells and whistles - until Mercedes starts to lose in comparison tests, because others are better equipped;-)

Frank

Reply to
Frank Kemper

On 3 Jun 2004 09:05:22 GMT, Frank Kemper saß und schrieb:

Well put! I am NOT a Luddite, but maybe now BMW has finally declared iDrive (and the new styling) to be a mistake, the techno race between BMW and Mercedes can relax a little - thank goodness. Let's get back to useful, simple controls without the Nintendoness of a stealth bomber cockpit. The [useless] bells and whistles could still be offered as an option - maybe they could call it SuperHITech Pack ;)

300 Essie
Reply to
300 Essie

...but maybe people not only forget about them they never know about them...

I admit very red-facedly that the other day at the Merc dealer I was shown the feature of opening all four windows on my car when the engine is off and I am outside the car... just keep pressing the door-open button on the remote key fob...similarly for closing the windows... I have only had the car three years...

The service adviser said that there are quite a few features like that not realised by the owners.

The user manual is several hundred pages long, so who is going to read it from cover to cover? So long as I can find the gear lever and the light switches nothing else matters...

DAS

Reply to
Dori A Schmetterling

that is the fault of your dealership, upon delivery my dealer had a fella come and show me all the neat little features, he set up my home on the nav, adjusted the lighting and so on

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Reply to
127.0.0.1
127.0.0.1 haute in die Tasten:

Actually I never bought a brand new car, but that is definitely the way it had to be done. I can very well imagine that engineers could provide far more individual settings for almost any car, which could then "tailor made" for the customer: shifting characteristics of gearbox, throttle characteristics, light mode and so on.

This reminds me of my Minolta Dynax 8000i I once owned (in the US it was sold as Maxxum 8008 IIRC). The camera was equipped with a slot for tiny chip cards, and you could buy one custom functions chip card for 25 bucks or so. This enabled you to set the camera after your desires: Aperture setting in 1/2 f stops or in 1/3 f stops? Beep at low light or not beep? After rewinding, pull film completely into cartridge or leave a tip outsides? and so on.

The dealer where I bought the camera, said to me: Okay, I will sell you the card, but I can also set up the camera for you, and if you want to have something changed, you just come to my store and I'll be pleased to help you. I call that a high level of service.

Frank

Reply to
Frank Kemper

I collected my car from a Merc factory. A technician was with the car to tell me all about it and answer any questions when I came into the collection area. Maybe he told me about the remote window operation feature, maybe he did not. It was afternoon and I was quite keen to get away to a meeting some distance away, plus I was pretty excited at what was happening and so probably did not take everything in. This car was a substantial technological advance on anything I had had before, so there was a lot to take in.

So, no, it's not anybody's 'fault' except, perhaps mine.

DAS

Reply to
Dori A Schmetterling

and you should read your manual cover to cover, and then after driving the car for a month or so, read it again

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Reply to
127.0.0.1

...and inwardly digest and memorise all 200+ pages...

:-) DAS

Reply to
Dori A Schmetterling

much of the book is redundant, so it is as hard as it appears, you should know how to work your car

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Reply to
127.0.0.1

Jah! It vas der fault of der technician! He should haf beat it into you! Dat ist der vay dat he vas trained! If he had chust beaten it into you, you vould know how to run der kar like you should know! So dont be balming yourself, DAS, for der fault of der girly man technician!

mcbrue learnedly under the bridge in the trailer down by the river

96 S420
Reply to
MCBRUE

Zankyou so mutch...

DAS

Reply to
Dori A Schmetterling

"Dori A Schmetterling" haute in die Tasten:

Oh zhose krazy 'murricans...

Frank

Reply to
Frank Kemper

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