Total Complaints
1 filings
MERCEDES-BENZ 129 · model year
1 NHTSA complaints. A VIN lookup is required to determine whether a specific vehicle has an unrepaired recall.
NHTSA overall rating
Not crash-tested
New Car Assessment Program
The 1997MERCEDES-BENZ129 carries 1 consumer safety complaint in NHTSA's Office of Defects Investigation database for this specific model-year cohort. Within that volume, owners reported 0 crashes, 0 fires, 0 injuries, and 0 fatalities. No NCAP 5-star crash-test rating is available for this model year in the federal database.
The most frequently selected component label in reports for the 1997 129 is visibility with 1 filings. Complaint categories reflect owner reports and intake categorization; they do not establish a defect pattern or cause.
NHTSA currently has 15 investigation files overlapping the 1997 129. Owners comparing this cohort against neighboring years should read the complaint-by-year trend as report volume, not a causal diagnosis. Use the related-complaint feed and the official recall lookup when researching a specific vehicle.
Total Complaints
1 filings
Crashes Reported
0 reports
Source
NHTSA ODI
Federal complaints database
At or below the fleet median complaint volume.
| Component | Count |
|---|---|
| VISIBILITY | 1 |
THE INSIDE REARVIEW MIRROR HAS INADEQUATELY SIZED SPRING CLIP POSTS RESULTING IN EASY BREAKAGE, WITH LEAVES THE MIRROR VERY LOOSE, DISTRACTING AND UNUSABLE IN DAILY DRIVING. THE SNAP-ON MIRROR GLASS SURROUND TRIM WITH THE AFOREMENTIONED SPRING CLIP POSTS IS MARKED WITH P/N 129 811 0635, AND WOULD HAVE A LIKELY PRICE OF AROUND $15, HOWEVER MERCEDES BENZ ONLY SUPPLIES THE MIRROR ASSY @ $942. TWO M/B DEALERS AND AN INDEPENDENT M/B GARAGE SAYS THIS MIRROR IS USED ON MANY OF THEIR PRODUCTS, AND THE CLIP BREAKAGE IS VERY COMMON. THEY ALSO INDICATED IT WAS RARE/NEVER THE CASE WHERE A CUSTOMER WOULD SPEND $1000 (INCL LABOR) TO FIX THE PROBLEM, THEREFORE THIS COULD BE A SIGNIFICANT ISSUE IN TERMS OF SAFETY AND DRIVER DISTRACTION. AT THE DIRECTION OF THE 2ND M/B DEALER, I CALLED M/B NA AND THEY BASICALLY SAID THEY HAD NO INTENTION OF MAKING THE POTENTIALLY DEFECTIVE PART AVAILABLE AS A SERVICE PART... EITHER SPEND THE $1000 OR DRIVE AN UNSAFE CAR. *TR
Mileage: 43,134
Data vintage: August 2026. Sources: NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) complaints database, NHTSA recall campaign API, NHTSA NCAP crash-test ratings, and NHTSA FARS for fatality cross-reference.
Every figure on PlainCars is rendered directly from NHTSA complaint and safety data, no number is typed in by an editor. This year-specific record is rendered from NHTSA ODI, recall, and NCAP rows for the 1997 MERCEDES-BENZ 129; no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of August 2026.
Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.