Mercedes-Benz Minibus in China to Be Taken Off Road for Repair

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, May 24, 2002

Mercedes-Benz Minibus in China to Be Taken Off Road for Repair

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China's State Administration of Quality Supervision and Quarantine Thursday authorized Xinhua to notify Chinese users of the Mercedes-Benz MB100 minibus to stop driving the vehicle because of a serious manufacturing flaw.

The administration also asked the users to send the vehicles to maintenance centers as soon as possible.

An administration official said the import of the 12-seat vehicle made in the Republic of Korea (ROK) will be suspended according to Chinese laws and regulations. The administration has asked Mercedes-Benz to recall the vehicles in line with internationally accepted practice.

MB100 has caused many accidents related to the defect in China

An MB100 which crashed, killing one person and getting injured two others in northwestern Gansu Province on February 29, was found to have had a brake failure.

After a careful check of the van belonging to a branch company of China National Petroleum Corporation, the administration found that the space between the exhaust pipe and axle shaft was less than required, which caused the exhaust pipe and the brake oil pipe to bump. The latter was then deformed, leading to fuel congestion.

It is found that the defect is common among vans of this model.

Unofficial statistics show that 2,076 MB100s have been taken for repair around the country since 2000. Some 11.37 percent of the surveyed vehicles have reported the same defect.

Eleven such vehicles in the provinces of Gansu, Helongjiang, Anhui and other places have found severe abrasion in the rear brake oil pipe.

More accidents related to the defect have taken place in areas where roads are of poor quality.

The ROK started exporting MB100s to China in 1998 and more than 5,000 of the 300,000 yuan (36,000 U.S. dollar) vans have sold in the Chinese mainland.

Source: Xinhua

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