Electrical auto side steps - long

Mansory Electrical Auto Side Steps — Long Variant for Mercedes-Benz G-Class W465 Gronos

The W465 G-Class is a tall vehicle on a tall platform. Door sill height to ground at curb sits in the 600-650 mm range with the standard 22-inch wheel package, and that figure is what the side step is engineered to bridge. The fixed running board solved the problem in the old way — a single bar bolted permanently to the rocker, always extended, always cutting underside clearance, always reading visually whether the door was open or shut. The retractable auto step solves the problem in the modern way: the plank is there when the door opens and folds back flush against the rocker the second the door closes. The Mansory Electrical Auto Side Steps — Long variant for the W465 Gronos is the full-rocker version of that solution. The deployed plate runs the entire length of the rocker panel from the front wheel arch to the rear, so the foot lands on a continuous step regardless of whether the front door or the rear door is the one being used; rear passengers get the same finished, lit, motor-deployed surface that the driver gets, with no climb-down across an exposed rocker between door zones.

Long Variant Versus the Short — Full Rocker Coverage

This is the long board, not the short. The long variant runs the full rocker length wheel-arch to wheel-arch as one continuous deployed plank: the deployed surface is unbroken from the front of the front door opening to the rear of the rear door opening, with no exposed rocker between the front and rear step zones. Buyers who prefer to leave the rocker silhouette visible forward of the front step and aft of the rear step — for example to keep visible-carbon rocker trim or a body-colour rocker accent reading as designed — should look at the short auto side steps instead, which cover the door zones only and stop short of the wheel arches. The long variant is the choice for buyers who want the maximum stepping area, want the visual continuity of one full plank when the doors are open, and want rear-seat passengers to step on a finished surface rather than navigate an exposed rocker section between the doors. Function — auto deploy on door, auto retract on close, IP67 sealing, anti-pinch, off-road suppression — is identical to the short variant; the difference is plate length, motor-torque scaling, and stowed thickness.

Dual-Motor Drive and Torque Scaling for the Longer Plate

The long step plate is heavier than the short — approximately 12-14 kg per side versus the 7-9 kg short variant — and it is also longer in the rotating arc, which means greater rotational inertia and a larger leverage moment for the motor to swing through the deploy stroke. Carrying that mass on a single motor with the same gear ratio as the short would either slow the deploy time unacceptably or push current draw past the harness rating. The long variant therefore uses one of two drive configurations depending on order specification:

• Dual-motor configuration (standard): two synchronised worm-gear motors, one at each end of the cradle, sharing the deploy load. Each motor is identical to the short-variant unit; the controller drives the pair on a master-slave protocol with sub-millisecond timing tolerance so the plate deploys flat without leading-end or trailing-end lag.
• Single-motor high-ratio configuration (option): one larger motor with a higher gear-reduction ratio carries the plate alone. Stroke time is preserved at 1.6 s deploy, 1.4 s retract — slightly longer than the short variant by design — and current draw stays inside the 6 A peak budget per side. This option exists for installations where the rocker cavity volume at one end is constrained by other system additions.

The dual-motor approach is the default because it spreads the duty cycle across two units rather than one — each motor sees half the work, so the long-variant duty-cycle rating matches the short variant at 200,000 stroke cycles minimum despite the heavier plate. The synchronisation logic is built into the controller firmware: it samples both motor positions through integrated Hall-effect encoders and corrects any lead/lag within the same 200 Hz control loop used for anti-pinch torque sensing. A single-motor failure mode is handled gracefully — the controller detects the failed motor through encoder absence, disables the failed unit, and runs the remaining motor in single-mode at reduced stroke speed until service. The plate continues to function rather than locking out.

Plate Construction, Weight, and Retracted Profile

• Plate body: aerospace-grade aluminium extrusion in three internally welded sections, internally ribbed for stiffness across the full rocker length, anodised black for substrate corrosion resistance.
• Plate length: sized per VIN — the W465 narrow-body and Wide Kit variants have different rocker-arch dimensions; the plate is cut to fit between the wheel arches with a 12 mm clearance gap at each end to prevent contact during full-bump suspension travel.
• Plate weight: 12-14 kg per side fitted (versus 7-9 kg for the short variant). The added mass is concentrated low on the vehicle and within the wheelbase, so the centre-of-gravity impact is negligible.
• Tread surface: rubber-bonded grip insert with deep drainage channels along the full length; the longer surface uses a three-section grip pattern with subtle visual breaks at the door zones to telegraph the foot-landing positions.
• Edge profile: rolled outer edge with continuous inner-edge seal against the rocker face, so road grit cannot pack into the rocker cavity through the deployed step gap.
• Underside lighting: LED strip runs the full plate length, illuminating a continuous ground pool wheel-arch to wheel-arch when deployed; CAN-triggered, dimmable via the OEM cabin ambient lighting controller.
• Plate finish: matte black powder-coat as standard; optional accent line in body colour at the leading edge if specified at order.

The retracted profile is the engineering trade-off owners need to understand. A longer plate folds against the rocker as a longer panel, so the stowed extension underneath the rocker is taller in cross-section than the short variant — approximately 32 mm of vertical drop from the rocker face when stowed, versus 24 mm for the short. Underside clearance with the long step retracted is therefore reduced by about 8 mm relative to the short. In absolute terms the retracted long step still sits well above the lowest point of the W465 underbody (the front sub-frame and the rear differential are far lower), so the stowed step is not a clearance-limiting feature on either variant; the difference matters only for owners parking against very high city kerbs at full lock or for owners running portal-axle off-road conversions where every millimetre of rocker drop counts. For the overwhelming majority of road and gravel use, both variants preserve effective W465 ground clearance unchanged.

CAN-Bus Door Logic, Speed Lock, Drive-Mode Awareness

The deploy and retract logic is wired identically to the short variant. The controller listens to the W465 body CAN bus rather than running off door-jamb micro-switches, which is the engineering choice that separates this product from a generic aftermarket step:

• Door handle pulled (any of the four doors): CAN-bus message triggers the corresponding side; the plate rotates outward and downward to its deployed position in approximately 1.6 seconds (1.4 s on the short, slower on the long because the dual motors are deliberately rate-limited to keep the synchronised stroke smooth across the longer plate).
• Door open and stationary: the plate holds in deployed position with both motors unenergized and self-locking worm-gears preventing back-drive. Walking onto the plate, including stepping at the leading or trailing edge, does not cause sag or retract.
• Door closed and latched: CAN-bus latch-confirmed signal triggers retract; both motors run synchronised back to the stowed position in approximately 1.4 seconds.
• Vehicle in motion: a vehicle-speed signal above 5 km/h locks both plates in the stowed position regardless of door-handle input.
• OEM off-road or low-range mode active: the controller suppresses auto-deploy on door-open to preserve underside clearance during off-road egress. Force-deploy override is available via a long-press of the dome-light button.
• Per-door deploy logic (optional): by default both sides deploy together when any door on that side opens; an option flag in firmware allows door-specific deploy where only the half of the plate covering the opened door extends. Most owners disable this — the long-variant aesthetic is the full continuous plank, and partial deploy reads as broken.

The CAN tap is at the body-control module door section; the splice is non-cut OEM-spec and fully reversible. Controller firmware is field-updatable via OBD-II in the unlikely event of a future OEM message change, and the W465 message map used has been verified stable across the platform's first model-year revisions.

Pivot Bushings, IP67 Sealing, and Anti-Pinch Logic

The long plate rotates around three pivot points rather than two — a centre pivot is added between the door-zone pivots to support the plate stiffness across the full length. All three pivots use the same IP67-sealed bushing assembly:

• Bushing material: oil-impregnated sintered bronze running on hardened stainless pin, sized for thermal stability across -30 °C to +85 °C.
• Sealing: double-lip nitrile rubber seals at both ends of each bushing housing plus a labyrinth deflector outboard of the primary seal to break up direct jet impingement during pressure-washing.
• IP67 rating: 30 minutes submerged at 1 m depth without water entry per pivot — flood wades and high-pressure car washes do not reach the bushing internals.
• Service interval: sealed-for-life under typical road use; outer pivot grease nipple allows manual re-lubrication for salt-belt or off-road service.
• Pivot pin: 12 mm hardened stainless dowel at each pivot, retained by circlips, replaceable as a service part without removing the plate from the cradle.

Anti-pinch torque sensing operates the same as the short variant but with the dual-motor data fused: motor current at both ends is sampled at 200 Hz and compared against a learned baseline that includes a known mass-distribution profile across the longer plate. An obstruction at one end of the plate produces an asymmetric torque signature — one motor sees more resistance than the other — and the controller stops the stroke immediately, reverses to the deployed position, illuminates the door-jamb fault LED, and logs the event. Ice-bond recovery, kerb-strike protection, and child-foot pinch protection all work the same way: detect anomalous torque, stop, recover safely, log for diagnostic readout.

W465-Specific Mounting, Wiring, and Installation

• Mounting brackets: machined steel brackets keyed to the W465 rocker structural section at four positions per side (versus three positions per side on the short variant) — the additional mid-rocker bracket carries the centre-pivot load. No drilling; brackets bolt to factory-threaded inserts in the rocker rib.
• Power tap: 12 V draw via Mansory wiring splice block, fused at 12 A per side at the body fuse box (versus 7.5 A on the short — the dual-motor configuration runs higher peak current). Dedicated chassis ground stud at the rocker structural rib.
• CAN integration: tap at the door-control module via OEM-spec connectors, fully reversible.
• OEM module compatibility: verified against the W465 body-control module software up to the latest factory release. CAN messages used are stable across W465 model-year revisions; controller firmware is field-updatable via OBD-II.
• Reversibility: full system removal returns the vehicle to factory state without trace; warranty work on the door wiring is unaffected.

Installation sequence:

1. Remove OEM lower rocker trim: the W465 lower rocker plastic unclips and exposes the rocker structural rib used as the mounting surface.
2. Bolt the four mounting brackets to the rocker rib: M8 machined steel into factory-threaded inserts, torque-spec 28 Nm with anti-corrosion thread treatment.
3. Mount motor pair and step cradle: dual-motor units pre-assembled to the cradle; the cradle drops onto the four brackets, six M6 fasteners.
4. Run wiring: power tap at the rear door-jamb (the long-variant harness is 220 mm longer than the short to span both motors); CAN tap at the door-control module; controller sits inside the rocker cavity protected from spray.
5. Refit OEM lower rocker trim: the long-variant trim is the same OEM part number as standard; cutouts for the three pivot points are pre-machined on the Mansory replacement insert.
6. Calibration: first 15 deploy cycles are learning cycles where each motor logs its own torque baseline and the synchronisation timing is locked. Install is complete after this self-learn sequence.
7. Total install time: 5-6 hours both sides at a competent workshop (versus 4-5 hours for the short variant — the additional mid-bracket and dual-motor wiring are the time delta).

Visual pairings on a Gronos build:

• With the lowering kit: a lowered Gronos sits closer to the ground; the long auto step makes the deployed surface continuous along the rocker, which on a lowered car reads as a distinctive full-length plank when the doors are open and disappears completely when closed.
• With the aluminium exhaust tips: the rear of the rocker stays clean to read against the polished tip cluster when the long step is retracted.
• Versus the short auto side steps: the short variant covers door zones only with visible rocker forward and aft; the long variant chosen here is the unbroken full-rocker plank.
• With the rest of the kit: the full Gronos catalogue is at the parent Mansory Gronos kit page and the broader Mansory collection.

Maintenance, Compatibility, and Edge-Case Use

• Hand wash with the rest of the rocker; pressure-wash the deployed plate at the three pivot zones once monthly to clear road-grime out of the bushing region.
• Quarterly deploy-cycle test through the full fifteen-cycle synchronisation routine via long-press of the dome-light button — verifies dual-motor timing remains within tolerance.
• Annual inspection of the bushing seals and the dual-motor harness routing at a workshop visit; the system is sealed-for-life under typical road use.
• Salt-belt or off-road owners: re-grease all three outer pivots at the start of each winter via the dedicated grease nipples (NLGI 2 lithium complex grease). The mid-pivot grease point is accessed through a small service hatch in the rocker trim; total re-grease time is 15 minutes per side.
• Tread rubber refresh at the 5-7 year horizon; the long-variant insert is supplied as one continuous strip and replaces in 30 minutes per side without removing the cradle.
• Edge case — flat tyre on one side: with one wheel removed for spare-tyre fitment the deployed plate can foul the jack stand if the jack is positioned at the standard rocker jack point. The Mansory kit ships with a slim-profile jack-pad adapter that locates the jack 80 mm inboard of the deployed plate to avoid contact. Use the adapter for any jack-up of the vehicle.

The kit is engineered for the 2024+ W465 generation only. The W465 rocker structural rib, threaded insert layout, door wiring harness routing, and body CAN message map differ from the W463A — a W463A retractable step set will not bolt up. Verify VIN at order time. Fits all factory configurations of the W465 G-Class Gronos including narrow-body and Wide Kit variants, with or without the off-road package, with manual or automatic running-board option codes from factory.

Ordering and Lead Time

The system is built to order. Standard build window is 10-14 weeks from confirmed order to dispatch, including motor pairing, dual-motor synchronisation calibration, CAN controller flashing, and bench-cycle quality test of the synchronised stroke. Worldwide freight is arranged at ex-works or DAP terms; the kit ships as a fitted hard case with both sides, brackets, motor pairs, controllers, wiring loom, and the slim-profile jack-pad adapter set. Order specification at quote time:

• Vehicle VIN — W465 confirmation, narrow-body or Wide Kit variant, factory step-option code if any.
• Drive configuration — dual-motor standard or single-motor high-ratio option.
• Deploy logic — both-side together (default) or per-door selective deploy.
• Tread finish — standard matte black or body-colour leading edge accent.
• Lighting — standard underside white LED, optional dimmable colour-temperature variant matched to OEM cabin ambient.
• Pairing — long step alone or coordinated with full Gronos build sequencing.

Contact us to start a build:

WhatsApp +44 7488 818 747 — specification, dual-motor configuration choice, fitment by VIN
[email protected] — quote, lead-time, freight

FAQ — Electrical Auto Side Steps Long Variant for the W465 Gronos

Q: How is the long variant different from the short, beyond plate length?
A: The long variant runs the full rocker length wheel-arch to wheel-arch as one continuous deployed plank, weighs 12-14 kg per side (versus 7-9 kg short), uses a dual-motor synchronised drive to carry the heavier plate at the same duty-cycle rating, and adds a third mid-rocker pivot for stiffness across the longer span. Stowed thickness underneath the rocker is approximately 8 mm taller than the short variant so retracted clearance is fractionally lower, and total install time is one hour longer at 5-6 hours both sides. CAN-bus logic, IP67 sealing, anti-pinch behaviour, and off-road suppression are identical to the short variant.

Q: What happens if one of the two motors on a side fails?
A: The controller detects the failed motor through encoder absence and disables it; the remaining motor on that side runs in single-mode at reduced stroke speed (approximately 2.4 s deploy versus 1.6 s) so the plate continues to function until service. A door-jamb LED indication and a controller diagnostic code flag the failure for the workshop visit. The plate does not lock out — single-motor fall-back keeps the vehicle usable.

Q: Will the deployed long plate cause any problem when changing a flat tyre with the OEM jack at the standard rocker jack point?
A: Yes — without the supplied accessory, the jack stand can foul the deployed plate at the rocker jack point. Each long-variant kit ships with a slim-profile jack-pad adapter that locates the jack 80 mm inboard of the deployed plate edge, clear of any contact. Use the adapter for every jack-up of the vehicle while the long step is fitted. The adapter is a flat machined-aluminium pad that drops onto the jack head; no modification to the OEM jack itself is required.

Q: Does the dual-motor configuration draw twice the current of the short variant?
A: Peak current draw is higher but not double — approximately 9-10 A peak per side during deploy on the long variant, versus 4.5 A on the short. The controller staggers the motor-start by sub-millisecond intervals so both motors do not hit peak simultaneously, and the harness fuse is sized at 12 A per side to accommodate. Continuous current draw is zero in stowed and deployed states (self-locking worm-gears hold position without power), so the load on the vehicle electrical system is purely transient during the stroke.

Q: Can I switch from per-door deploy to both-sides-together deploy after install?
A: Yes — the deploy logic is a firmware flag, not a hardware difference, and a workshop visit can re-flash the controller to either mode in approximately 20 minutes via OBD-II. Most owners run both-sides-together by default because the long-variant aesthetic is the full continuous plank reading along the rocker; per-door deploy reads as broken when only half the plate is extended. The flag exists for buyers who specifically want the per-door behaviour, for example for street-side parking where the off-side step rarely needs to deploy.