D@rthV@d3r

Hey all

I replaced my ABC system with a coilover. Hated to do it but no choice the whole system was failing and part are not even available for months. I bought this car used and unfortunately previous owners did not seem to have maintenance in mind at all.

So my question is what is available for this car as far as sway bars for the front and rear go? Also will they mount up? Meaning is it already have the ability to bolt on sway bars front and rear? Without the ABC system body roll is horrible so I am looking to fix that with swaybars.

Thanks

Dom

nath_h

I wasn't aware that there was a coil product out there to replace ABC...only seen Airmatic replacements. Would you share your links for the product?

D@rthV@d3r

https://www.strutmasters.com/collect...-module-mu54fm this is the kit. Here is the problem with the kit. No sway bars so you will have to add that which I am doing now so add another 1200 plus dollars to do that plus parts.

nath_h

Interesting. Please keep us posted on this project.

D@rthV@d3r

Will do!

INEEDIT

did you find a solution?

D@rthV@d3r

Still working on it at this point. We have rear sway bars in but the front is proving difficult. I will know more next week. As the car setup on ABC is different from airmatic so the airmatic sway bar would not fit as the housing of the transmission and how the motors is mounted will not allow for the sway bar. we have another one coming that looks like it would fit.
My mechanic also let me know if there is no front sway bar solution some adjustable shocks to stiffen and lower the front end might be the only solution. I was already looking at these in the long run anyways I just went strutmaster because that was a fast solution. https://titansuspension.com.au/produ...40054005891171 those are what I wanted in the first place but they have to come out of Australia. Will let you know next week once I see how that goes. I am praying to the old gods and the new that the swaybar that is on its way will work and I can do this upgrade down the road and not have to do it now.

INEEDIT

Lots of people on the forum also swear by the Yellow Speed Racing Coilovers. Adjustable system also. From the good ol USA. But it seems like you already invested in a system and are trying to make that work.

This guy used strutmasters and said they worked fine alone...
His email is in there if you want to reach out to him.

D@rthV@d3r

Yeah my problem is that those guys did not make a system for my car or I would have gone down that road for sure!

D@rthV@d3r

and as for my sturmasters I think it depends on what system you are coming off of. Coming off the ABC system the body roll is just really bad. We have the rear sway bar going in this week finally and I will see about the front later in the week.

nath_h

When you say body roll is bad...how bad are we talking about? Does the new setup work okay for normal driving, or are you having body roll problems when pushing the car hard around corners or whatever? My car is primarily a highway cruiser, and never gets thrown around. I don't need to change my car yet, but thinking ahead to solutions when the inevitable problems arise. I'm glad to see there are coil over options, because I was not aware of this for ABC until you posted about it.

INEEDIT

Dont quote me but I imagine for highway cruising you should be fine. The cars are heavy and the weight seems to be the concern when cornering and if the springs are suited for handling the weight on aggressive driving.


I come away from this video thinking its a good idea/alternative.

D@rthV@d3r

Well it was noticeable when making turns and I would say I am a spirited driver and like to take turns on the straight away it was not bad just making tunrns its noticeable. I invested another 1k in getting a rear swaybar in and that reduced it alot. We looked at a front sway bar but seems to be impossible. MB does not seem to make one but one that might work is off a S600 armored vehicle but it was a bit too pricey for my taste and we are not sure it would work. Parts alone for the front sway bar was around $1300. So I think I am going to live with this as it sits for a bit and eventually will change the front struts to titan ones.

D@rthV@d3r

yea i think if you do not care about handling in turns too much its just fine. If I were to do it over again I would go with the titan setup however as it gives more flexibility with 30 click adjustments on those shocks vs these just being fixed and you get what you get. I will also say the front sits a bit higher now then before but they say that once the springs settle that will change.

INEEDIT

Front sway bar off the next gen S class wont work? I thought I read that somewhere.

D@rthV@d3r

not that he could find he said for some reason the sway bar that was designated to fit that car would not so as he looked around for possible fitments that was what he came across. I will say with just the rear alone its a huge difference already and I could probably live with how it rides now but I know once I can recover from this part of things I will go with the different shocks. He also said that if I would be able to lower the front a bit it would help but since the strutmasters are non adjustable we cant do that.

D@rthV@d3r

If you find out more about the next generation S class one being a viable solution let me know as I would not be opposed to that either.

nath_h

I've been researching doing this project. I don't need to yet, but it would make sense to do eventually. Strutmaster videos make this look like a simple process, at least without doing a sway bar. Did you do this yourself, and was it as easy as the SM video shows? SM says sway bars aren't necessary...after a little bit of time driving your car, how are you feeling about it now?

INEEDIT

I emailed VVK (https://vvk-usa.myshopify.com/) and I asked them about perhaps making custom sway bars for W215 and they said the below. Maybe they are working on all iterations as well.

"This is Santi. I actually was recently in a conversation with Sean about the CL cars and he did let me know that he is working on a sway bar solution for these cars. Unfortunately it's a little early in the process for him to really have answers many of the specifics in terms of pricing, development and availability date"

That was taken from the email I received. Hopefully this solution comes out soon and the community has a place to go to when they finally give up on their ABC suspension systems.

nath_h

Any more updates about how your system is working? And, from where did you source the rear sway bar? My ABC is still working okay, but at 15 years old I know it's coming for me.

Blkvip

jeez i asked vvk few years ago about the 216 chassis and got the same response. id be in a cl63 tomorrow if they came out with a sway bar and coil over kit. i hope they do plenty of interest it seems from the 215 and 216 owners.