Awesome, time to take mine out and spray it black. Haha

 

I had a friend do this and painted it piano shiny black...came out great

 

Great idea!

 

I went to anaheim hills MB to get the part - chrome ring only....nope. They were not able to find it in their parts catalog. Anyone else have luck finding this separate part?

 

Just took mine out. Previous owner must have spilled a couple of cups of coffee or coke throught the years. Spent more time cleaning everything then taking the cup holder apart and spraying the ring black. Used some grease espically on the bronze roller that is in there. Pops up like I never knew it could. Thanks for the great write-up as I would not have attempted this without it.

 

Just did this tonight but decided to strip the chrome off and spray it flat black. Looks 10x better and MUCH cleaner than it was with the chrome parts installed. I will say this though, when you get to the small screws that are holding the chrome piece in, it was a 10mm torx screw and not a 15 for that one. Awesome write up

 

I'm curious to see how the paint holds up to the wear and tear of a cup going in and out. Hopefully it will hold up and not wear the paint off.

 

Well I put a few coatings on, then let it dry, coated it again, and the let it dry, then coated it again! I maybe did 10-15 coats of flat black so I'm sure it will hold for some time. I honestly cant even begin to explain how much better it looks!

 

My '06 just started peeling off. Here's the part number I found for the cupholder:

A 203 680 39 91 (with or without the "A"--try both ways)

There's also an "upper bracket" and a "lower bracket" and I'm not sure what that means, nor could I find a part number for those. I might order both, since they're only $3 each.

Great post--big thumbs up to vdemon for the pics!

 

An epoxy spray (for appliances etc.) would certainly be hard enough with 2-3 coats. I've used it on the threshold/saddle of a door frame and it stands up to enormous wear and tear from foot traffic, so it might work well for the peeling cupholder. I'm going to give that try and I'll let you know how it looks and functions.

 

I removed mine today, and all was exactly as described in vdemon's excellent post (thanks again!) except for the removal of the inner piece from the top part of the cupholder. In mine, the tabs on the side of the main cupholder top did not release the inner piece, instead there was a series of 4 plastic clips in a small circle at the bottom of the inner piece that locked into the main cup holder.

To remove it, look for the tabs at the bottom of the main cupholder. These can be opened by inserting a small flat head screw driver. Or, you can also pry them open from underneath and simultaneously pull the inner piece out. Be careful, they're small and fragile. (See attached picture or pdf)


Also, when I got the chrome coated piece out, I scraped off all of the flaking chrome-colored coating, which was not easy, but I got most of it off (in the visible places anyway). Be careful though, those flakes are razor sharp and I cut my finger while doing that. It may not be real chrome, but it cuts like it is!

I just put my second coat of epoxy on, and the formerly flaky chrome piece is looking really sharp. I'll post pics of the finished product as soon as it dries.

 

+1
I'm gonna take out my chrome piece and paint it. now to decide black or red?

 

The black epoxy spray that I used blends in nicely because everything else is black. I'd stay away from the red--you don't want to draw attention to whatever minor DIY imperfections may appear.

Either that or spend the $60 and get a new unit, which should last 5 years before the chrome coating starts to flake off.

 

3 months later checking in, paint still looks fresh and has resisted a TON of wear and tear

 

Stupid question, does the 01 c240 comes with a pop up cupholder like that shown?

 

I don't believe the Euro models do.

 

Does anyone have any pics of a painted finished product, and what paint they used?

 

That's good news. Thanks for taking the time to follow up with your results!

 

Here's some pics of mine, and the epoxy I used as well.

 

I just finished working on this... I used Krylon for Plastic (Satin Black) on the white plastic.

Here is an image of it after I've re-installed it.



For the screws holding the silver cup ring, it's T10. T15 for the screw underneath the rubber cover on the lower cup holder.

 

thanks vdemon311 for the write up with pics. looks 10x better black and hopefully last longer then the chrome.

 

When I went into the dealership to check on this part, it was the rubber tray for the top cup holder. They did not know about getting just the chrome trim ring.

I would like to keep the chrome ... on my car there is enough chrome trim throughout the console that I think it would look better chrome than black. A fallback option is to try to have my existing piece re-chromed (which I'm finding is very difficult) and last resort buy a new cupholder for $85 (which now appears to be the going price in the US).

Thanks. John

 

maybe this would help.

 

Sorry, that's the rubber tray. I went through this exercise at the parts counter at the local dealer ... and I just called the Freehold NJ dealership and got the same story from them. The guy I spoke to said he's been there for over a year but doesn't remember having the chrome rings available as a separate (even undocumented) part.

vdemon311, if you could shed some more light on how you got that chrome ring ...

Thanks. John

 

The photos in this post were very useful in diagnosing why my cup holder wasn't rising. I'm missing that long, rolled-up spring which is visible to the left of the "under" shots. I guess it must have popped out at some point, but goodness knows where it is now. If anyone has one of these spare from a previous cup-holder, let me know? Thanks.