As I was accelerating onto the freeway, I heard a loud noise from my engine. I started losing power steering and my battery charger light kept flashing indicating a problem with the crankshaft pulley. Luckily I was able to get home safely. After safely driving home, I looked under the hood and noticed huge chunks of rubber parts inside. I took the car to the Mercedes dealership the next day and was told that the harmonic balancer had been damaged. When the harmonic balancer was damaged, it in turn ruined the oil pan cover and the timing chain cover resulting in a $2500 repair bill. The service manager stated he would write merceds to see if some of the costs can be defrayed and will be getting back to me. I highly doubt any substantial amount will be defrayed by the manufacturer. I am extremely disappointed in Mercedes and the E320.

- Okc, OK, USA

During normal operation I experienced total loss of steering assist and the engine quit running. I barely missed hitting several roadside obstacles and was nearly stranded in the middle of a high speed roadway. I am a woman of over 70 years of age and do not have the strength to wrestle a 3000 pound car around without power assist. I had great difficulty maintaining control and avoiding a collision. The car had to be towed nearly 20 miles to the dealership where it was out of service for approximately a month at a cost of $4500. The dealership told me that the car had a failure of the harmonic balancer on the engine which destroyed a large number of surrounding parts. The damaged parts were replaced and the balancer was also replaced. The old part has been requested from the dealer.

- Clarkston, MI, USA

1999 Mercedes-Benz E320T, 60K miles - crankshaft harmonic balancer (damper pulley) failed. Advised by mechanic to replace immediately, so as to avoid loss of multi ribbed-V-belt and concurrent loss of power steering, alternator and water pump function.

- New Orleans, LA, USA

Crankshaft balancer failure- Mercedes E320 1999 (from individual experiences of several Mercedes customers with 320 V6 engine on W210 platform and others). Around 72000 miles, my vehicle crank shaft balancer pulley started sperating a thick black rubber ring, which is sandwiched between the cranksfat and the serpentine belt pulley on the outside, belt burning smell and clicking noise which quickly turned into a knocking noise recognized as I was driving at very low speed, luckily. I parked the vehicle and checkd the engine bay, to find a fallen off piece of crank shaft balancer pulley (it made a thud when it came off while dirving). It could have easilycaused flying object damage if I were driving at higher speed. I took it to the dealer and got it fixed, worth 421 dollars. I was told that the crank shaft pulley is a common failure for this model engine and I was lucky that it did not 'totally' gouce the timing chain cover and oil pan. I have heard first hand incidences of others with similar model vehicles in the range of 1997 through 2001 having timing chain cover gouged off completely and vehicle becoming inoperable within minutes and causing mechanical damage to the extent of 20 to 25 hours repair needed, and over 25000 dollars needed on average.

- Annville, PA, USA

The engine main drive pulley broke off rendering vehicle inoperable. The failure happened on open road at highway speeds.

- Georgetown, TX, USA