Your C240 observations are exactly what I pictured the experience to be like after noting this power curve!!! If I suddenly switched to a C240, I am certain that my disappointment would not lie with the engine. (brakes, suspension and tires are another story )

 

Hey gang,

All's good, and no problems...I didn't take any offense, but after re-reading my post, I did notice I was being biased towards the C230K. But it's nice that we're all able to discuss things, and the way I look at it, I've learned more about the engines and their efficiencies from everyone posting in this thread. Your comments on the durability of the C240 were great, and it goes to show how well they're built. Which has to be at least one of the reasons I see so many C240's in my area.

No problem either costerdock. I didn't take any offense. You just made me take a look at my post again from a different (non C230 owner) perspective, and made me realize what I wrote. The C240 has many positives. And comparing it to a C230, each one caters to a different market segment. No problems

Thanks. I guess I could have worded my post a bit better though.

Well said

Cintoman

 

Your engine power/torque graph looks about right. The 2.6 engine comes in different forms. There were also lower capacity C240s. Interesting you post a pic of the E240 - It's a popular car in South Africa, Europe & Asia although not as popular as those with larger engines in SA. We have an altitude problem. I find your comments on brakes, suspension & tyres interesting. Most cars sold in South Africa (& Europe for that matter) are tweaked for local market preferences and the C is no different with stiffer spring and damper rates (especially rebound damping) here than those sold in the US. US Drivers seem to like a softer set-up & OEMs oblige. I used to have a global job and lived in Dallas for a number of years & subsequent to that I hire vehicles frequently when visiting our San Ramon HQ. I find the suspension set up on many US spec vehicles to be lethal compared with the same car in this market. The level of compliance is just too much for me - man you can get into trouble fast. You might find the suspension spec on SA cars a bit hard. I have no complaints about brakes on my car although I don't pretend to be very hard on them. I seldom trigger the ABS. Our local Auto Mags do a standard 10 consecutive crash stops from 100 Km/h and the C240 came out looking fine. Of course suspension setup can have an adverse effect on braking. When it comes to tyres - my car came fitted with Continental Sport Contact 2s - they were the biggest crap I have ever experienced. Bum handling, rough, noisy, lousy turn-in etc. I tolerated them for under 20,000Kms & replaced them with Michelin Pilot Exalto PE2s 225/50/16 - what a transformation, like a different car - quiet, smooth & highly responsive. Car has just reached 45,000Kms & I'm just as happy with the Michelin's as the day they were fitted. Happy motoring!

 

Thanks for sharing your experiences. My C230 came fitted with Michelin Pilot Sports and I replaced them with 2nd generation Pilot Sport PS2s. I agree with your Michelin preferences, the Exalto is an extremely well rated tire in it's class. Do you think a 17 in wheel would improve your driving experience even more? Perhaps you can find some 2nd hand C230 sport wheels for your car when your exaltos need replacing.

As for brakes, I live in a mountainous region and use them extremely hard. On the weekends when I drive for recreation, I find them overheating occasionally. I know that any car Mercedes makes will be able to emergency stop 10 times with no trouble. Even a non sport model is still a Mercedes after all!! But agressive driving on roads with steep inclines requires an extra bit of braking ability; this is a type of situation where I would prefer a C230 Sport.

Again, thanks for your comments. I was wondering where I might come across an E240.

 

Yes - I think going up in wheel size will improve matters. I have an itch to fit a set of CLS 500 18" wheels. They bolt straight on & their offset is right (only need different length bolts). I think they look great on the car. I'm not one for non OEM wheels.

OK - your brake gripe is high temperature fade - understood! Yes I think I would bolt on a set of Brembo's if I had that problem. Our line up in South Africa is different than yours - we don't have a Sport. We have Classic, Elegance & Avantgarde. Then you can order the, so called, Sport Pack fitted to any of them. Having the plant on our doorstep in East London makes it easy to configure cars the way customers want them. Are the drilled rotors & same sized badged calipers really much better? Here it's considered more of a cosmetic issue but not a serious upgrade. I've never made the comparison so I don't know but my motorsport experience tells me that you would need a more substantial brake upgrade to be really meaningful.

Sorry can't help you with an E240

See another forum member's car with CLS 500 wheels. Pity he does not have Bi-X headlights

 

why not just go with ceremic pads to reduce brake fade?

 

While I don't suffer brake fade in the moderate conditions I drive I intend changing to ceramic pads just as soon as my extended factory warrantee runs out in 8 months time to get away from the horrendous black brake dust all over my front wheels. If you go to ceramic pads in South Africa it immediately renders your warrantee null & void. I think you guys are better off in the US because you have certain Common Law rights that don't allow the OEMs to behave like this.

Do you have any experience to share with good ceramic pads & how they might or might not contribute to rotor (disc) wear & noise?

 

I meant the ceramic comment more toward e34m20. c32used bought a set of ceramic's for his c32 and have said nothing but good things about them. Looks like he's had them for about 7months now and said there were not any problems with the rotors.


I'm probably going to get a set of ceramics once my front pads go. Mostly for the brake dust issue and little better stopping power.


Here's the link to the review.


https://mbworld.org/forums/showthrea...hlight=ceramic

 

Yes - understood & thanks. I just jumped on your reply to him because you appear to have experience & when I did a ceramic pad search I got a whole lot of threads that went off at a tangent to the subject at hand. The dust problem drives me mad. My car spends most of it's life in urban conditions & first set of front pads were changed at 45,000Kms service a couple of weeks back. I could literally wash my front wheels dailly. In today's high tech world I can't understand why OEMs persist with such messy pads. I know I'm not the only one that hates the black dust!!!!!!!!. I lived in Australia for 5 years and had a Holden Berlina as a company car. Big heavy 3.8 litre V6. It did not foul up it's wheels with brake dust.

 

I've had that problem on every car I've bought, but depending on the design of the wheels, it's been bad, good, or hardly noticeable. It depends on how the air vents around the wheel. My Honda Odyssey shows way more brake dust than the C240 4MATIC. If I get to get new wheels next year, I might see more dust that I do now.

 

Hi Chris - yes I understand that it's a matter of degree & ventilation & whether the wheel disturbs the aerodynamic skin effect or not & what that turbulance does. Some also depends on colour & thus visibility of the dust I imagine & whether it adheres or not. In my early life I had 5 Alfa Romeos in a row & no brake mess problems. It might be bad memory or my imagination but I'm convinced the problem became noticeable after asbestos was banned from friction materials (don't get me wrong - I'm delighted it was removed)

 

I agree today's brake pads seem to generate more dust than the old asbestos ones. I had several VW's back in the days of asbestos pads, and they stopped well, but generated a lot less dust. The new ones are dustier.

The auto manufacturers are still experimenting with brake formulas. BMW's seem to generate a lot of brake dust too. This is simply the price we pay for good stopping characteristics and fewer toxins in the air. Yes, I am annoyed by the dust, but I do not want to return to the old asbestos pads.

 

No - we certainly don't want asbestos back. I think BMW & Merc both have their genuine pads made by Ate so likely they are similar friction material.

It's the reason I raise the ceramic issue. If ceramic pads were the panacea of all braking ills the OEMs would use them - Why don't they??? They obviously have some issue with them.

 

well think about it, how much do you pay the dealership to change your brakes? If they put ceramics stock, then the dealerships would lose service revenue. Most dealerships make most of there money off service, rather then the car.

Most average people dont know when there rotors are going bad, so they just go off of when the car makes the low brake metal grinding noise and change both.l

 

On much more expensive cars (i'm thinking super car and ultra-luxury) there are ceramic brake options from the manufacturers. I agree that part of it is service cost, but I think that it's also manufacturing cost. They still need to meet their margins, and ceramic products cost more, and if they kept prices the same, the margins would not be as good.

 

Sure - Aston Martin, as an example, use ceramics on their top models & you put up with noise until hot. If you don't like that then options are available. Honda motorcycles use some ceramic pads on plasma coated discs. I think we are being a bit cynical about Benz cost cutting. You could well be right about the C class - but the S class and even the Maybach shower their wheels with black dust.

 

Surely not - Do you think that most people ignore the brake wear indicator?

 

thats what i meant, people change both rotor and pads when they hear the low brake indicator. You dont always need to change you rotors, depending on how aggressively you brake, only your pads may need to be replaced.

Most people dont really know, so they change both. Its more revenue for the dealership.

if you have ceramics, most people are not going to know when they need to change there rotors.

i dont really think its cost. Mercedes can easily make it a $1k option and get away with it. Just most people dont really need it for everyday driving.

how many people actually take there c-class on the track or through twisty canyons? its probably less than 1% of the buying customer base.

 

I'm talking about when the brake wear indicator comes on, on the Dash! Long before metal to metal contact

 

My front rotor is 13.6 inches, surely this is far larger than the standard w203 (non sport). In fact, this is even larger than my friends w202 C43 AMG front rotor which is 13.2 inches. These are both very large sizes for passenger cars. I think that whatever combination of equipment the American market c230 Sport Sedan has affords it a significant brake improvement over a C240 or c320 luxury sedan. It's kind of difficult to compare these American models with the ones on the rest of the world. The C230 Kompressor was ONLY available as a sport model in the USA.

 

My car is still on its original pads and rotors at ~30,000 miles. Once the car tells me the brake pads are thin, I will throw all four rotors and all my pads in a nearby Walmart dumpster.

To replace them, I'll be getting all new EBC rotors which are slotted and "blind drilled" (aka dimpled) for the front and rear, plus all new EBC Red Stuff pads (utilize ceramic materials). In the installation process I will flush the brake fluid and bleed the entire system at all four corners.

Funny enough though, the brake fade I experienced while on my favorite mountain loop was actually a fluid fade. My brake fluid was boiling and I didn't notice any significant loss of brake friction (kudos to rotors and pads) until the point that my brake pedal started to travel to the floor. My brake pedal still travels a little bit further than normal even now from this episode.

The section that overheated my brakes is an extremely long, curvy decent that overheats lesser cars brakes under normal driving. Let alone anything resembling spirited driving!

The real point of my post, and the answer to your question is "yes and no"
Yes I am going to get some ceramic pads and No, this is not going to keep my brakes from fading.

New fluid with less water contamination will help my fading problem. I am not sure, but I hope my car uses DOT5 spec.

 

I think there is some confusion on this topic, getting some ceramic based pads for a w203 basically has NOTHING to do with ceramic braking systems on Porsche, Ferrari, etc cars.

I'm not 100% sure, but on these cars I think the Rotor is the ceramic part, and I bet the pads aren't even ceramic. This is like a $10,000 option on a Ferrari.

When I get my "ceramic" EBC pads, I will certainly not be telling anyone that I have ceramic brakes. Why? because I don't.

 

IMHO, brake pads are way too hard these days. In an effort for less dust and more pad life MFGs are using pads that are ultra firm. The problem is that they wear the rotors at a higher rate; especially if you actually use the brakes!

My rotors are grooved severely and very worn down, rotors are expensive and should not need to be replaced as often as they are.

I want some nice soft gentle pads that have an extremely high coef. of friction at all temps. I could care less about brake dust and pad life. I'd rather replace pads at 10,000 mile intervals than replace the rotors at 30,000. Plus I wash my car every week, so brake dust is okay by me.

Sorry for so many sequential posts, I had a lot to say in re: to this topic.

 

Absolutely! - Aston's Carbon-Ceramic Matrix brakes are quite a different thing & the disc itself is made from the Carbon-Ceramic Matrix material. All these things are a variation of the carbon on carbon racing brakes theme - nevermind which the supercar manufacturer is. Certainly way off a commercial ceramic pad running on a steel rotor. & I think we are taking this thread way . Probably my fault.

 

go for PORTERFIELD brake pads.
About a 75% reduction in brake dust, and much longer lasting brake pad than OEM.

Carlos

Saprissa