glocati

Happy Ending... Glad it worked out !

infected

Wow that's scary. Glad they're covering everything.

Midnight Koop

thanks... very true, with only 100k miles... i should probably keep her longer b/c i probably wont get anything. if i put her on sale with all the mods, maybe i'll get lucky and can bank a decent price with the right buyer. i'll have to give it some thought.

thx

thanks, it was like an out of body experience when he told me the "$6100 repair"... i'm just glad i was persistent with questions and read up on the forum a bit. kind of a shame how their natural reaction was to force payment at first when it happened to be an obvious recall-related issue in the end.

C350_Coupe

Great news, i never really seem to get lucky like that, i always seem to get the crappy end of the stick when it comes to deals like this, glad you did better

Midnight Koop

got tired of the layer of green pollen and did a quick wash yesterday... however, it was back when i got into my car this morning





not much new going on except Thule wheel carriers on top.

will hopefully install the glasspack and resonator this week...

C230 Sport Coup

I thought I had seen that you were selling your car in the classifieds? Hope not.
You know those racks eat gas eh?
Unless you have the car fully packed all the time, you can just as easily toss 2 bikes in the back if you pull the front wheels off.
I only use mine when I'm going on a trip and need the rear cargo area for luggage etc.
The rest of the time it's much faster load and unload in the rear (and safer if you need to park for a while) than the racks.
I lose about 3-5 mpg with the racks on and it seems you never take yours off.

MBfinatic

Your car looks good. Bring it down south so we can do a shoot of it!

infected

Looking great like always!

glocati

Looking clean as usual !! Is she running well after the repairs? Hope that is all behind you now.

Midnight Koop

I was entertaining the idea for a while... but its hard to find a local that will swap an entire exhaust. Since no one was really jumping on it, I decided to keep her for now.

and you're right about the rack... I did notice a drop in efficiency, but I don't like throwing 2 bikes in the trunk b/c of my audio (sub/amp). Plus, a couple of my bikes are worth a few G's each so I'd rather throw them on top than in the trunk. I should've taken it off for the winter, but I kept my car in storage so I didn't see the need. Plus the rack is sexxy and I like the look, even if i lose a few mpg

I need to! Got some family there I've been meaning to visit... I'll let you know if I head over this summer.

Thx!

Yeah, so far so good (fingers crossed). I got a P0420 the other day, but cleared it and no CEL since. I just gotta find some time to install my resonator and glasspack to reduce the noise/rasp, but work has been keeping me busy.

Midnight Koop

Finally made time to do this, here you go...






On the Car:



BEFORE SOUND CLIP
-Exhaust Components: Kleemann Headers --> Kleemann Cat --> Straight Pipe (Deleted OEM 2ndary Cat and OEM Resonator) --> Remus Muffler

AFTER SOUND CLIP
-Exhaust Components: Kleemann Headers --> Kleemann Cat --> Vibrant Ultraquiet Resonator --> Cherrybomb Glasspack --> Remus Muffler

My Impression
Metallic Rasp/Rattle - 80% gone during high revs
Drone - 99% gone during highway cruising
Tone - Deeper at idle and around town

I think you can hear the differences in rasp between the clips, but the rest is more noticeable driving around town and cruising on the highway. The best is that my car grumbles only when I want it to (when I accelerate quickly), and the rest of the time its deep and low key. Overall, I'm very satisfied.

C350_Coupe

Sounds and looks good, i wish i could get a straight bolt on replacement setup like that for mine, but apart from it being restrictively expensive, i'd struggle to get it through the anual emmisions test, and also the insurance company would screw me for extra premium because here they consider changing anything as a good excuse to void a policy, unless you notify them at which point they bend you over for more cash, and to top it all off, it is a legal requirement to carry insurance from one of these thieving companies ! .... i swear they would consider changing a tire valve for a chrome one as a modification if they could get away with it

FrankW

Sounds good.

Midnight Koop

thanks man. those insurance restrictions sound pretty horrible... i'm just glad the secondary Cat doesn't have any O2 sensors, so hopefully I wont have any problems with emissions. However, in case they peak underneath... I might have to paint over the red glasspack.

thanks!

Midnight Koop

after almost a year of no posts... just wanted to update that the car has been holding it down pretty well and is close to 110k miles. i plan to hopefully keep her through gradschool... so another 4ish years.

the only complaint i have is the P0420 CEL (from the custom exhaust), but I've been ignoring it and only clearing it for inspections.

here are a couple scrub pics of my move back in August.





(i miss my CLS wheels)

johnand

Coupe is still looking great!

Midnight Koop

thanks johnand! i hope yours is treating you well too.

tommy

Switch out that Kleemann cat for a Magnaflow one and you wouldn't have to worry about that CEL anymore.

110 mi is nothing - you should be able to eek out 4 more years with little problem, I'd imagine.

Good to see you back here - don't be such a stranger!

Midnight Koop

i might do that... throw a link to the part and i'll check it out.

i'll try to be on here more... i am always in need of a study break.

Midnight Koop

Just ordered myself a set of Koni Yellows, H&R springs, & #4 Pads... Will post before and after pics.

Any recommendations on the firmness setting for the Koni's?

I'm also going to uninstall my camber kit and go back to stock camber arms. They've been on my car about a year with no issues. Since I'm sticking with 17'' wheels I have no more need to mess with the camber. If anyone is interested on picking it up PM me.

samaritrey

I have the rear koni yellows and have them 1 1/2 turns from firm and love them installed them about a week ago. That said one of my old rear shocks had no oil left in it so anything is better. I am using tein springs and my front shocks are Renntech so while not a perfect setup the car actually drives really well.

When you install the rear shocks you do have to drill out the shock covers and you have to make sure it is not to big or it looks like you would have issues with the cover falling down the shock to far. I could not find the correct size and had to improvise so you may want to email/call koni and find out the correct size bit you need so you don't have to drive all around town to find it.

tommy

I currently have mine 1 1/2 turns from full soft; had it at 2 turns this past winter, and was too harsh. That's all around, btw. I guess I should try all kinds of combos, but it's too damn hot.

If you have crappy Bose sub, the passenger side rear strut will be very hard to get to - I picked up a flat metal tool from Koni's website, and makes the adjustment much easier. Though I just looked through it, and can't find them on there anymore. There is something from Dali Racing that looks promising; no experience with it, though. here

Midnight Koop

Thanks for the input... Any idea how many total turns are possible? I'm just curious how far off you both are from each other. If there are only 3 turns total, then I guess you would be both on the same setting

Thanks for the advice Trey. I'm not exactly sure what this means... but I will contact Koni and see if they have any installation advice. I just assumed that it could be installed without any modification.

Did you do it yourself? or take it to a shop?

tommy

LOL, this reminds me of that old "how many licks to the center of a Tootsie pop?" commercial.

I only took it to two; I'll try after work today, and let you know. I agree - probably not too many total turns are available.

I had mine installed by my indy; they never said anything about having to modify anything to fit. For all I know, they did, but they're annoyingly anti-mod, so I would have probably heard some b1tching about it when I picked up my car if they did have to do something.

samaritrey

Maybe only some cars need the dust cover hole enlarged? I don't know how many turns the shocks can take but for some reason think it was 6.