MB Sprinter Emission Recall
We have an RV that is built on a 2015 Sprinter chassis, 3500, 4X4. It has a lot of stuff on it, so the total gross weight is right around 11,000 lbs. We have 50,000 miles on the van and have kept track of every drop of fuel in a log. For reference, I calculated the fuel consumption for the last 1000 miles before the van was put away in the fall before the pandemic. It was mixed highway and local driving, and the average was 14.6 mpg. The high and low fills were 13.4 and 16.2 mpg. We did do a lot of this driving at 72 mph which lowers the mpg.
Several weeks ago, the emission recall was performed. It took several days because they said it took 10 trials to get the new software to load. After the upgrade, I took a 229 mile trip where I was careful to drive 68 mph on an interstate. The consumption was 16.7 mpg. I was very disappointed because the acceleration at highway speeds, passing for example, was sluggish. I noticed that the torque converter was locked except when the transmission shifted. This locked torque converter was not my memory. But I had not driven the van for 18 months. My other cars clearly use the torque converter to provide acceleration before they downshift.
Three weeks after the initial upgrade, we received an urgent message from the dealer that they needed the van back right now. It turns out that MB corporate in Germany gets a log file from every of these emission recalls and checks them out. Ours apparently did not pass.
It took several more days in the dealership to get it right. The dealer told us that they had to get multiple sets of software from Germany to get one that worked.
After the second trial we took a trip of 535 miles, two tanks, and got 14.9 mpg. As we were getting ready to come home, we noticed a front tire did not look good, so we were careful to drive 65-68 mph on the way home and got 16.4 mpg.
I cannot really detect the mph has changed due to the emission recall without more miles. But, after the second software load, the driving seems to be improved. I think the torque converter is still locked except for shifting. But the shift points seem to be changed so the engine revs higher and has better acceleration than we remember from before the pandemic. I would like to say that I drove it to the dealer and noticed the change before and after. But since we did not travel during the pandemic, I cannot make that statement.
Bottom line: drive-ability seems improved; fuel consumption does not appear to have changed; however more driving will prove or disprove that.
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