SunshineGirl

Hi Everyone!

Hope you all had a great holiday break.

I dropped off my car to have custom fenders made, a custom hood, front fascia and new fog lights installed. I am so excited!

The fenders are almost completed. He took my actual factory fenders modified them and then made a mold to pull a new part from. I am excited to see the hood come together next.
I also purchased the chrome led lights from the 2013 e class convertible to change out the round fog lights. I thought it would be a good time to make a change there since it is already in the shop.
I asked if it could be done, and he said sure! My hood will look similar to the SLK roadster, but I have two kids and can't get by with another 2-seater in the household.

I think i will have the brakes painted in the spring as well and either a new set of wheels or I may just get the current wheels chromed. Have not made up my mind yet. I don't understand why it has to be so complicated to change the wheels on the 550's! Kind of making me a little crazy. Besides, i am not fond of a lot of the styles out right now. I think wheels should be like jewelry, more sparkle is better!

Can't wait to start posting some photos!

Fatz

That's a lot of modding... Good luck. I am almost as excited as you, to see the pics..... My OEM wheels are being refinished. A bit like you, I wondering if there will be enough glit from them.

SunshineGirl

I am very excited, next week looks like a little break due to New Year holiday, but I can hardly wait to see how the hood turns out. It's really fun to have someone take ideas and just create what I imagine! I loved things about the SLK, but of course that doesn't work for me, so we are combining the attributes that I liked and see what we get.
If I don't like, I can always sell it and up grade to the Bentley convertible. Of course, I'll have to buy it used, but still very pretty cars too. ��

ChiCho55AMG

Thats A ****ING Great Start as a first thread here in mbworld, Good start , Good Luck Waiting for the pics

ChiCho55AMG

Rudeney

Let me know how the A207 (2013 E-class) LED DRL's work out. I did an LED DRL mod on my CLK, but the chrome trim on the Chinese LED bars I used is peeling and tarnishing, so I'm thinking of investing in the genuine MBZ parts. I'd like to know how much work is required to retrofit the A207 parts before I go spending $400 on it.

Klinh

Where's the shop location? If it look nice, I want the same mods for my Slk55. Thanks.

Nero Tenebre

Curious to see your results, I've got custom fender and quarter panels on my CLK

SunshineGirl

I will post the photos as I get them. The chrome trim parts were about 40.00 or so ea from Mercedes with the shop discount, so I would imagine you could get them for about 20% more. the lights were around 220.00 ea. They thought they were together, but turned out they needed to be ordered separately. They look to be high quality, but of course, I don't have them on the car yet. I doubt they would peel though. they look every bit as quality as any other mb chrome. They fit in that area really good, but I am going to change out the front fascia and I will have black chrome mesh there where it used to be black plastic. I think. Not sure if that will be too much, so it may end up flat black anyway, haven't decided on that for certain. He will show me samples before i decide when we get to that point.

The shop is MPD1 (www.mpd1.com) on the west side of Indianapolis, IN. He is making molds from mine to sell. They will be available to ship anywhere. I have to say, I will enjoy being the only one with them for a little while at least, but he would not do this unless he could sell them. He is very interested in doing something else besides GM vehicles as he is a Mercedes fan himself.

On another note, I see some CLK's with dual exhaust tips on each side. Who makes a exhaust like this? I like that! I will also have the rear plastic panel on the rear bumper painted to match the body color. I hate the black plastic as it seems to look dirty all the time. We also talked about building a chrome piece there underneath it like the newer models have. Not sure we will do this right now, maybe in the spring when I get the wheels done.

Rudeney

Dual exhaust pipes on the cabriolet can be done, but it's really difficult. There is a thread or two on the forum where it's been done:

https://mbworld.org/forums/clk-class...e-goodies.html

It's not true "dual exhaust" but at least you have the look of du\al (or really, quad) pipes.

NardoNZ

subscribed!! gimme those pics!!!!

SunshineGirl

Hi everybody!
Sorry it has taken me so long to post again.
After the getting the car apart in mid December, we found there was a little frame damage after all.The right side looked like it was down.
MPD1 does not do frame repair so we took it to another shop to have the straightening done. Get the car back two weeks later, on the lift and the right side of the crash bar is still down. So back to the frame shop for a new right front rail.
They proceeded to have my car for 5 more weeks! That's right, i can't even believe it myself, but they had it 5 weeks. one would have expected some serious
damage to have it take that long, but nope.
anyway, this put the whole project pretty far behind schedule, but hey.. think of all the miles i am not putting on her! lol

While the car was at the frame shop MPD1 worked on the new vented fenders. The goal was to make them look like the new SLS.
They used a new pair of OE fenders to modify and pull molds from.
the new fenders are trimmed and fitted to the car. Have not cut the holes for the mesh yet. They have a final program to CNC cut the billet grill bar vents Third times a charm LOL
The front fascia is going to be in for quit a few modifications, so they pulled a mold from the front and will proceed with modifications to it.
The hood is also underway with part of the original hood and part of an SLK fused to the middle. Love the look of the Mclaren and SLK hoods
Other than that, looks like it will be a few weeks in the making before I have any paintable parts, but it is getting exciting once again.
I am going to pick out some paint for the brakes maybe a powder coat. Any recommendations for getting the calipers powder coated? Still thinking that i will have these wheels chromed as every other option just seems more complicated
than it is worth.

So here is some pictures of my car after the "fender bender" before tear down, the frame repair and the development of the new fenders.

SunshineGirl

Here is some more pictures of the fenders and molds MPD1 made. In the last pictures you can see the fenders are fitted to the car. Once they got the new hood and fenders aligned they put on the nice new front fascia and getting it ready to pull a mold off off.

lowpost

Looking foward to the final results.

And just my 2 cents but brushed / satin > polished > chrome for our silver paint. Deep chrome lips are good though.

California

I've heard bad things about chromed wheels. This is just what I've heard over the years, especially regarding MB wheels. 1. That only MBUSA Dealers chrome the wheels on new cars, never come that way from AMG or OEM MB. This is because the chrome plating process doesn't really like to stick to aluminum alloy wheels. 2. Chrome plating holds in and retains heat that builds up in the alloys. 3. Chrome will always eventually peel. 4. Chroming somehow makes the alloys more brittle and less resilient and flexible on the road, in other words they break and bend more easily than more compliant aluminum alloy.

I've been investigating hypersilver paints and chrome paints for my new MB wheels, which I love. It looks as though my new oem MB wheels were at one time a CLK upgrade, but have never seen a CLK with them. Will post pics later.

Rudeney

There is a way to properly chrome alloy wheels. They have to first be thoroughly cleaned in an acid bath, then have a layer of copper clad onto them, then they can be chromed. This usually lasts as well as any chrome on the car. A better (and easier, even DIY possible) option might be to strip the OEM paint and coatings and just go with "raw" polished aluminum. This has become a more popular OEM option on new car. You get a nice shine and easier cleaning than paint, but no worries about chipping or peeling with chrome plate. Of course even the best polish job won't be as shiny as chrome, but it will give you a nice snappy finish as compared to the matte finish of the OEM paint.

SunshineGirl

I'm still looking into this with the wheel issue. The way I keep getting snags, I'll be lucky to have it back for summer!
The new headlights came and went back! They were awful quality, waiting on another set.
I wish there were more options on the wheel issue!
I guess these big brakes just don't clear with much!
If only I felt like spending $4,000 on a custom set of foose wheels. Lol just have to draw the line somewhere.

California

That sounds great

Patton001

I can only assume that with all of this custom work you are doing you take pretty good care of a car in general. If you care for chrome wheels they will last a long long time. I just sold a 10 year old car with the original chrome wheels in good shape. Just don't use anything at all abrasive on them. Even some chrome polish can have some abrasive. The only thing I ever clean them with it a soft old paint brush and Simple Green. I just used carnuba wax on mine to polish. I recently became aware of a product that you spray on your chrome wheels to help them shed brake dust. Brake dust is pretty toxic stuff on chrome wheels. I haven't tried it yet though.

I will soon be putting chromed factory wheels from LA Wheel on the CLK I just bought and I will just take care of them as usual. I will get many years out of them.

sweet jones

What do you mean by complicated to change the wheels on a 550? What makes it different? just curious

SunshineGirl

Due to the larger brakes on a 550 amg, not many of the standard wheels will fit "clear" the brakes. There just aren't many companies that make wheels this size probably because they won't sell enough.

I do take good care of my cars. I just sold my '99 e class and it still looked new. Loved that car and I got a lot of use out of it! My '05 e550 was junk by comparison and I only kept that one a short time. I'm very happy MB bought Chrysler out. They didn't do any justice to MB at all.

lowpost

I think you need to talk to another shop - that knows what they're talking about. There are lots of choices for AMG/BBK equiped. If you mean within a lower price range, that might be true that you have LESS choices. But you still have a lot of choices.

lowpost

Louie D

I was going to say the same thing as Lowpost said there are allot choices for our cars both OEM and REPS.. And regarding the big brakes i personal think they are small front is only 4 pots and rear is 2 pot.. I personal think a 6 and 4 be nice

Patton001

Louie, what springs do you have on your CLK? What size wheels & tires?