C230 upgraded to SL55 wheels
07-23-2009, 09:42 PM
#1
Newbie
Thread Starter
Join Date: Jul 2009
Posts: 10
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
W203 C230
C230 upgraded to SL55 wheels
Hey all,
Just join this forum and found good information on how to put on these 03 SL55 AMG Wheels onto my 2006 W203 C230 Sedan.
Wheels specs are 18x8.5 +33 front, 18x9.5 +30 Rear.
Tires are 225/40 in the front and 245/40 in the rear.
No rubbing and not even close to any rubbing at all.
Here is the pic after installation (Stock suspension):
You will need these different bolts (On the left) to fit the wheels:
By the way, if anyone need the used 17" Sport package wheels looks like this, let me know located in So Cal. Don't know how much they suppose to cost PM me with an offer.
50% Thread in front and rear tires are pretty much done.
Sample pic of the wheels: (Not my wheels just samples)
Just join this forum and found good information on how to put on these 03 SL55 AMG Wheels onto my 2006 W203 C230 Sedan.
Wheels specs are 18x8.5 +33 front, 18x9.5 +30 Rear.
Tires are 225/40 in the front and 245/40 in the rear.
No rubbing and not even close to any rubbing at all.
Here is the pic after installation (Stock suspension):
You will need these different bolts (On the left) to fit the wheels:
By the way, if anyone need the used 17" Sport package wheels looks like this, let me know located in So Cal. Don't know how much they suppose to cost PM me with an offer.
50% Thread in front and rear tires are pretty much done.
Sample pic of the wheels: (Not my wheels just samples)
07-24-2009, 02:09 AM
#5
Super Member
Hey all,
Just join this forum and found good information on how to put on these 03 SL55 AMG Wheels onto my 2006 W203 C230 Sedan.
Wheels specs are 18x8.5 +33 front, 18x9.5 +30 Rear.
Tires are 225/40 in the front and 245/40 in the rear.
No rubbing and not even close to any rubbing at all.
Here is the pic after installation (Stock suspension):
You will need these different bolts (On the left) to fit the wheels:
Just join this forum and found good information on how to put on these 03 SL55 AMG Wheels onto my 2006 W203 C230 Sedan.
Wheels specs are 18x8.5 +33 front, 18x9.5 +30 Rear.
Tires are 225/40 in the front and 245/40 in the rear.
No rubbing and not even close to any rubbing at all.
Here is the pic after installation (Stock suspension):
You will need these different bolts (On the left) to fit the wheels:
Neofelis, I would strongly suggest you double check your installation of those wheels to make sure everything is safe.
See the photo of the old longer lug bolt,... it has 39.9mm shank (the part with thread from base of R12 ball seat to end of threaded bolt),... notice the first 6 threads are rather clean (not rusty) because when bolting wheels on Mercedes, you need to turn bolt for about 6 rotations to get the 80 ft lb torque. That's how deep your lug bolts need to go! This is what holds your wheels to the car!
The shorter lug bolt has about 24.1mm shank,... which I suspect might be a bit too short.
Here in Canada, we use the long lug bolts with 39.9mm shank on our factory alloy summer wheels,... and use the short lug bolts with 24.1mm shank on our winter "steelies" (non alloy - plain) wheels.
Neofelis, when you use the shorter lug bolts with 24.1mm shank on your new SL55 wheels,... are you getting 6 full rotation of those bolts when you bolt on the wheels?
This is important,... because if these bolts are not going in deep enough (6 full rotations of the bolt) and torque to 80 ft lb then your SL55 wheels are not securely bolted to the car! In which case, at high speed driving, you may feel vibration coming from the wheels,.... and you might eventually notice a really nice SL55 AMG wheel passing by you on the highway one day! 
Please double check your wheel installation! If the lug bolts are too long, the rotors or whatever is behind it will get damaged,... if the lug bolts are too short, the wheels can fall off at high speed and hard cornering.
NOTE: Mercedes C class uses M12x1.5 threaded bolts and I believe they only come in 2 shank length,... 24.1mm (short) and 39.9mm (long). Mercedes SL55 uses M14x1.5 threaded bolts with about 28mm shank,... meaning, your old M12x1.5 threaded bolt (for C-class) with 39.9mm shank would have been 12mm too long,.... and your new M12x1.5 threaded bolts (for C-class) with 24.1mm shank is about 4mm too short.
And thus I would suspect you are only getting about 3 or 4 full rotation of the bolt during installation. If you get more rotation, you will over-torque and damage the thread and thus compromise safety further.Unless, Mercedes make M12x1.5 threaded bolts with about 28mm shank,... it's going to be a real pain finding them,... anywhere. It's hard enough finding standard Mercedes lug bolts outside of Mercedes,.... you might need to get a set of the long M12x1.5 threaded bolts with 39.9 mm shank and cut it down to about 28mm shank.
07-24-2009, 02:23 AM
#6
Newbie
Thread Starter
Join Date: Jul 2009
Posts: 10
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
W203 C230
SunnyRay,
Thank you very much for the information you provided. I will definitely check the lugs out. I bought a set of lug bolts from RAD aware of the SL55 wheels uses different bolts, this is what I got:
RAD lug Bolt 12mmx1.5 26mm Shank, R14 Ball Seat, 17mm Hex
Please let me know if those are the right ones that I needed I looked at the installation and those new bolts seems to be the right ones.
Thank you very much for the information you provided. I will definitely check the lugs out. I bought a set of lug bolts from RAD aware of the SL55 wheels uses different bolts, this is what I got:
RAD lug Bolt 12mmx1.5 26mm Shank, R14 Ball Seat, 17mm Hex
Please let me know if those are the right ones that I needed I looked at the installation and those new bolts seems to be the right ones.
07-24-2009, 05:43 AM
#7
Super Moderator
This is very wise advice - 6 full threads is a must or Too long within reason is OK on the front - on the rear they will foul the parking brake mechanism. We have steel spares in SA and many idiots forget to use the shorter bolts provided by MB only to seize the rear hubs before things are fully tightened. The steel spare has a large bright sticker warning of this but people here can't read
Your bolts look too short for an alloy wheel - check
Too long within reason is OK on the front - on the rear they will foul the parking brake mechanism. We have steel spares in SA and many idiots forget to use the shorter bolts provided by MB only to seize the rear hubs before things are fully tightened. The steel spare has a large bright sticker warning of this but people here can't read Your bolts look too short for an alloy wheel - check
Trending Topics
07-25-2009, 01:25 AM
#8
Super Member
Neofelis, when I saw the shorter lug bolts I was freaking out because I thought you were using the much shorter factory Mercedes M12x1.5 threaded bolts (for C-class) with 20.6mm shank (the part with thread from base of R12 ball seat to end of threaded bolt) which I believe would be about way too short.
I did not realize you were using aftermarket non-OEM lug bolts,... namely *RAD lug Bolt 12mmx1.5 26mm Shank, R14 Ball Seat, 17mm Hex. Are these the right ones?,... are they 100% perfect? NO. The seat is wrong. And you should double check shank.
Mercedes C-class (W203) have two bolt sizes:
-long- M12x1.5 thread, R12 ball seat, 39.9 mm shank, 17 mm Hex (this is the long one you have pictured, to be used on all Mercedes Factory Alloy wheels SPECIFIED for C-class)
-short- M12x1.5 thread, R12 ball seat, 20.6 mm shank (in an earlier post I thought these were 24.1mm but they should be 20.6mm), 17 mm Hex (this is short one, to be used on "steelies" non-alloy wheels,.... you should have 5 of these with your spare tire in the trunk)
Mercedes SL-class (W230) have only one bolt sizes for both steel and factory alloy wheels (as you can see in original photos, lug bolts sit very deep in SL wheels vs lug bolts of our C-class wheels):
M14x1.5 thread, R13 ball seat, 26.7 mm shank, 17 mm Hex
Since you are trying to put on factory OEM SL-class (W230) wheels onto C-class (W203), you MUST use lug bolts have M12x1.5 thread of C-class (W203), R13 ball seat of SL-class (W230) wheels and ideally have a shank length that is not too long and not too short. The Hex size doesn't matter too much,... ideally you want 17mm since these Mercedes have 17mm Hex.
How do you figure out shank length that you need? Is that 26.7mm shank length used on SL-class cars ok? SL-class uses M14x1.5 thread vs M12x1.5 thread for C-class,.... so that 6 full rotation rule will be off.
NOTE: Whenever you are bolting on Mercedes factory OEM wheels to the Mercedes cars they are designed for using the factory lug bolts designed for those wheels (ie: when everything is stock) you should always use a torque wrench and torque the lug bolts to 80 ft lb. But for whatever reason, there might not be a torque wrench around,... in that case count rotation of the lug bolt, 6 full rotations will give you about 80 ft lb of torque, that rule applies to basically all Mercedes with factory OEM Wheels and correct factory lug bolts.
Back to figuring out your correct shank length,... use your old lug bolts (-long- M12x1.5 thread, R12 ball seat, 39.9 mm shank, 17 mm Hex) and place them in your old 17" Adharaz wheels and measure how far the threaded end of the lug bolts stick out of the wheels when its full seated in the wheel hole. (I think it should be about 12mm.) Whatever you measure,... that is the length your new lug bolts should stick out of your SL wheels,... when the new lug bolts are properly seated in your SL wheels.
This is what you got:
>RAD lug Bolt 12mmx1.5 26mm Shank, R14 Ball Seat, 17mm Hex
12mmx1.5 threads are correct, shank you should double check with above suggestion and add thickness of SL wheels at wheel holes, 17mm Hex is fine,.... but R14 Ball Seat is wrong,... should be R13 ball seat on SL class wheels!
What is R12, R13, R14 ball-radius seat? The seat is that part of bolt right beside Hex towards threads. On Mercedes lug bolts it is ball shaped. How big is this ball? R12 means 12mm radius, R13 means 13mm radius & R14 means 14mm radius.
Take a look at your photo of the lug bolts, old long lug bolt have R12 ball seat (C-class W203). The shorter RAD lug bolt you got has R14 ball seat, it is quite a difference between R12 and R14. Ok, so you got R14 ball seat when you should have got lug bolts with R13 ball seat (SL class W230 wheel uses R13),... is that a big issue,... YES!
The R14 ball/radius seat is larger than the R13 ball/radius seat these SL-class wheels should use. This larger R14 ball/radius seat would prevent the bolt from sitting properly in the wheel hole and prevent the lug bolt from going in all the way! Imagine trying to fit the top of your adult size head into a bike helmet made for a little kid,... your head will only make contact around the edge of the helmet, but your head won't fit all the way in and it won't be a snug fit. There will be a gap between the top of your head and the inside centre of the helmet,... How much protection will this undersize helmet offer the adult? When the adult get into an accident the helmet will likely fall off,... and offer no protection at all,... when the adult needs it the most! When you try to fit the larger radius R14 ball/radius seat into your Mercedes SL-class wheels designed for R13, there is a little gap at the base of the seat,... this gap will mean the lug bolt will NOT bolt in as deeply as it should. Also, these RAD lug bolts with R14 ball/radius seat are NOT making full contact to your SL wheels designed for R13 ball/radius seat,... at each of these SL concave wheel holes, only the outer edge of the concave wheel hole is making contact with thes R14 Rad lug bolts.
The R14 lug bolts are only contacting your SL wheels along a very thin rim of the R13 wheel holes,... instead of being fully seated inside the entire R13 sized ball seat of the wheel holes. This very small contact area are highly stressed,... and they are not engineered for that. They are engineered to have the pressure distributed throughout the ball seat area.
Take your SL wheel off the car and put Play-doh into one of the wheel holes,... now put your RAD lug bolts with R14 ball seat into that wheel hole as far as it'll go, then take out the lug bolt and examine the play-doh that is still left in the wheel hole. See all the play-doh that's still in the R13 wheel hole of your SL wheels,... technically, there should NOT be any play-doh there because the seat of your lug bolt should have full contact with the ball seat shaped wheel holes WITHOUT any gaps! The remaining play-doh represents where all the gaps are!,... which is everywhere along the ball seat of the wheel hole except that thin line along the rim of the wheel hole! Notice near the shank there is about 4mm deep of play-doh,... that is a 4mm gap at the shank, meaning your lug bolts will go into the car 4mm less than it should!
If you look at your old longer M12x1.5 39.9mm shank R12 lug bolts,... notice the first 6 threads are rather clean (not rusty) because when bolting wheels on Mercedes, you need to turn bolt for about 6 rotations to get the 80 ft lb torque,... this part of the bolt is about 12mm long,... the first 2mm at the tip of the bolt just guides it in and really does not make contact,.... meaning only about 10mm of this bolt is what really connect your bolted wheels to your car! This is what the engineers at Mercedes-Benz have determined is safe for your Mercedes. How much less can you go under this 10mm of bolt contact can you go without compromising your safety?
When you take that RAD lug bolt off,... I suggest you use a marker to draw a 15mm lines along the thread from the very end of the bolt,... actually, make two of these 15mm lines at opposite sides of the bolt. Insert this bolt back in to 80 ft lb torque,... take it back out and examine the marker lines to determine how deep it went. Is it about 12mm like the old bolts? Remember to take off about 2mm,.. and this is how much contact there is holding your SL wheels to your car. Is it near the 10mm that the original bolts had,... are you comfortable with that?
The perfect lug Bolt for your SL55 AMG wheels on C-class would be M12x1.5, about 26mm Shank, R13 Ball Seat, 17mm Hex
Audi & VW tend to use lug bolts with R13 ball seats,.... not sure about their thread & shank sizes.
Neofelis, if you ever notice any,... and I mean ANY vibrations coming from any of your wheels, especially driving at high speed or sharp cornering,... safely pull over and check your lug bolts!
I did not realize you were using aftermarket non-OEM lug bolts,... namely *RAD lug Bolt 12mmx1.5 26mm Shank, R14 Ball Seat, 17mm Hex. Are these the right ones?,... are they 100% perfect? NO. The seat is wrong. And you should double check shank.
Mercedes C-class (W203) have two bolt sizes:
-long- M12x1.5 thread, R12 ball seat, 39.9 mm shank, 17 mm Hex (this is the long one you have pictured, to be used on all Mercedes Factory Alloy wheels SPECIFIED for C-class)
-short- M12x1.5 thread, R12 ball seat, 20.6 mm shank (in an earlier post I thought these were 24.1mm but they should be 20.6mm), 17 mm Hex (this is short one, to be used on "steelies" non-alloy wheels,.... you should have 5 of these with your spare tire in the trunk)
Mercedes SL-class (W230) have only one bolt sizes for both steel and factory alloy wheels (as you can see in original photos, lug bolts sit very deep in SL wheels vs lug bolts of our C-class wheels):
M14x1.5 thread, R13 ball seat, 26.7 mm shank, 17 mm Hex
Since you are trying to put on factory OEM SL-class (W230) wheels onto C-class (W203), you MUST use lug bolts have M12x1.5 thread of C-class (W203), R13 ball seat of SL-class (W230) wheels and ideally have a shank length that is not too long and not too short. The Hex size doesn't matter too much,... ideally you want 17mm since these Mercedes have 17mm Hex.
How do you figure out shank length that you need? Is that 26.7mm shank length used on SL-class cars ok? SL-class uses M14x1.5 thread vs M12x1.5 thread for C-class,.... so that 6 full rotation rule will be off.
NOTE: Whenever you are bolting on Mercedes factory OEM wheels to the Mercedes cars they are designed for using the factory lug bolts designed for those wheels (ie: when everything is stock) you should always use a torque wrench and torque the lug bolts to 80 ft lb. But for whatever reason, there might not be a torque wrench around,... in that case count rotation of the lug bolt, 6 full rotations will give you about 80 ft lb of torque, that rule applies to basically all Mercedes with factory OEM Wheels and correct factory lug bolts.
Back to figuring out your correct shank length,... use your old lug bolts (-long- M12x1.5 thread, R12 ball seat, 39.9 mm shank, 17 mm Hex) and place them in your old 17" Adharaz wheels and measure how far the threaded end of the lug bolts stick out of the wheels when its full seated in the wheel hole. (I think it should be about 12mm.) Whatever you measure,... that is the length your new lug bolts should stick out of your SL wheels,... when the new lug bolts are properly seated in your SL wheels.
This is what you got:
>RAD lug Bolt 12mmx1.5 26mm Shank, R14 Ball Seat, 17mm Hex
12mmx1.5 threads are correct, shank you should double check with above suggestion and add thickness of SL wheels at wheel holes, 17mm Hex is fine,.... but R14 Ball Seat is wrong,... should be R13 ball seat on SL class wheels!
What is R12, R13, R14 ball-radius seat? The seat is that part of bolt right beside Hex towards threads. On Mercedes lug bolts it is ball shaped. How big is this ball? R12 means 12mm radius, R13 means 13mm radius & R14 means 14mm radius.
Take a look at your photo of the lug bolts, old long lug bolt have R12 ball seat (C-class W203). The shorter RAD lug bolt you got has R14 ball seat, it is quite a difference between R12 and R14. Ok, so you got R14 ball seat when you should have got lug bolts with R13 ball seat (SL class W230 wheel uses R13),... is that a big issue,... YES!
The R14 ball/radius seat is larger than the R13 ball/radius seat these SL-class wheels should use. This larger R14 ball/radius seat would prevent the bolt from sitting properly in the wheel hole and prevent the lug bolt from going in all the way! Imagine trying to fit the top of your adult size head into a bike helmet made for a little kid,... your head will only make contact around the edge of the helmet, but your head won't fit all the way in and it won't be a snug fit. There will be a gap between the top of your head and the inside centre of the helmet,... How much protection will this undersize helmet offer the adult? When the adult get into an accident the helmet will likely fall off,... and offer no protection at all,... when the adult needs it the most! When you try to fit the larger radius R14 ball/radius seat into your Mercedes SL-class wheels designed for R13, there is a little gap at the base of the seat,... this gap will mean the lug bolt will NOT bolt in as deeply as it should. Also, these RAD lug bolts with R14 ball/radius seat are NOT making full contact to your SL wheels designed for R13 ball/radius seat,... at each of these SL concave wheel holes, only the outer edge of the concave wheel hole is making contact with thes R14 Rad lug bolts.
The R14 lug bolts are only contacting your SL wheels along a very thin rim of the R13 wheel holes,... instead of being fully seated inside the entire R13 sized ball seat of the wheel holes. This very small contact area are highly stressed,... and they are not engineered for that. They are engineered to have the pressure distributed throughout the ball seat area.
Take your SL wheel off the car and put Play-doh into one of the wheel holes,... now put your RAD lug bolts with R14 ball seat into that wheel hole as far as it'll go, then take out the lug bolt and examine the play-doh that is still left in the wheel hole. See all the play-doh that's still in the R13 wheel hole of your SL wheels,... technically, there should NOT be any play-doh there because the seat of your lug bolt should have full contact with the ball seat shaped wheel holes WITHOUT any gaps! The remaining play-doh represents where all the gaps are!,... which is everywhere along the ball seat of the wheel hole except that thin line along the rim of the wheel hole! Notice near the shank there is about 4mm deep of play-doh,... that is a 4mm gap at the shank, meaning your lug bolts will go into the car 4mm less than it should!
If you look at your old longer M12x1.5 39.9mm shank R12 lug bolts,... notice the first 6 threads are rather clean (not rusty) because when bolting wheels on Mercedes, you need to turn bolt for about 6 rotations to get the 80 ft lb torque,... this part of the bolt is about 12mm long,... the first 2mm at the tip of the bolt just guides it in and really does not make contact,.... meaning only about 10mm of this bolt is what really connect your bolted wheels to your car! This is what the engineers at Mercedes-Benz have determined is safe for your Mercedes. How much less can you go under this 10mm of bolt contact can you go without compromising your safety?
When you take that RAD lug bolt off,... I suggest you use a marker to draw a 15mm lines along the thread from the very end of the bolt,... actually, make two of these 15mm lines at opposite sides of the bolt. Insert this bolt back in to 80 ft lb torque,... take it back out and examine the marker lines to determine how deep it went. Is it about 12mm like the old bolts? Remember to take off about 2mm,.. and this is how much contact there is holding your SL wheels to your car. Is it near the 10mm that the original bolts had,... are you comfortable with that?
The perfect lug Bolt for your SL55 AMG wheels on C-class would be M12x1.5, about 26mm Shank, R13 Ball Seat, 17mm Hex
Audi & VW tend to use lug bolts with R13 ball seats,.... not sure about their thread & shank sizes.
Neofelis, if you ever notice any,... and I mean ANY vibrations coming from any of your wheels, especially driving at high speed or sharp cornering,... safely pull over and check your lug bolts!
SunnyRayToronto
03-24-2013, 01:01 PM
#18
Banned
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: USA
Posts: 391
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
a Tank
"The perfect lug Bolt for your SL55 AMG wheels on C-class would be M12x1.5, about 26mm Shank, R13 Ball Seat, 17mm Hex" In case you don't want to read trough the EXCELENT post by SunnyRayToronto. I'm thinking of doing the same set up. Love the look.
Last edited by Ribo89; 03-24-2013 at 01:06 PM.
