minnesotawagon

Hey all!,
I am the proud owner of a 1989 mercedes 300te wagon! it has 120,xxx miles on it and i love it! Im not too sure of previous work it has had done on it, so my question is, when cornering is body roll normal for these? i sometimes experience a severe body roll on on or off ramps from the highway, and also what can i do to fix this?? sway bar? how hard is it to install/cost?? sorry for all the questions! im only 17!
Thanks in advance!

Saijin_Naib

Body roll is VERY normal on the w124 chassis, and despite how terrifying it might be, is very easy to control, predictable, and as far as I could tell, of minimal negative impact upon handling.

Yes, you can fit thicker swaybars, stiffer springs, and stiffer dampers.
I have done all three, and my car is a completely different beast now in terms of handling. Of course now I scrape going everywhere, so I suggest going stiffer without going lower if at all possible.

RBYCC

At 17, just drive a bit slower and decrease the entry angle of the turn and you'll never have any body roll...

Easy to do and costs nothing....

Handling anomalies are usually more then 80% driver input....

Saijin_Naib

Plus this way you'll learn how to be chauffeur/limo driver smooth. Not a bad thing at all

minnesotawagon

at 17 thats not always possible so, what is the cheaper/easier option a thicker sway bar? or stiffer springs? and which is easier to install as i am a simple drive way mechanic!

RBYCC

At 17 and obviously not familiar with the 124 platform you need a reality check...
Suspension is not something a "driveway" mechanic can easily install...

You can't pick and choose what you're going to replace as the parts have to work in concert with each other...

Parts alone will be over $1K...

Your existing S124 platform has limits and as I stated earlier best to learn how to drive ( not on the street ) to at least 7/10....the more you learn the the better a chance to become a safe 9/10+ driver...

Do what Brett (Saijin)has been doing..find local Auto-X events...

All the suspension in the world will not make you go any faster if you don't know the basic techniques...
You'll just think you're faster because you have a bit less body roll !!!

The driver is the input and can drastically change the output in handling !
You have to know before you enter any bend how you will approach it ( braking, speed, entry angle, line, exit point )...too late once you enter to make adjustments...hence the body roll.
Sounds very "race driver", but once you condition yourself by learning some basic driving techniques you will drive smooth as you are instanly "thinking ahead"...not to mention the "bonus" of getting a great many more miles out of your brakes and tires....

Saijin_Naib

I'll echo Ed once more. For a time, all I had installed was the stiffer front swaybar, but with the rear still stock and no other handing-related modifications.

The car was certainly driveable, but the tendency to pendulum was much increased. This made it both incredibly fun to throw around in Autocross (drift-king status), but also made driving the car a bit more tricky on rough terrain and over poor roads (bridge joints at highway speed, etc).

I did none of the work myself, so I can't speak to ease. I understand that relatively speaking, the front sways are far easier to put in than the rear, and require much less labor overall.

However, like Ed stated, this is neither going to be cheap nor easy. Around 1k is pretty much what I spent to the dollar. Sure, you might save some money if you wrangle them in yourself, but I don't make it a habit to do any work on a car that relates to safety components, especially if I have not been trained in that job.

I suggest you look over other threads on this forum from people who have done this upgrades, and start to form an opinion about what you want to do.

Before you even begin that, do you have a firm idea of what you want out of the car? Are you sure that what you want will be accomplished by this modification? Nothing is worse than throwing money at the wrong solution for the problem you have.

I'm 95% happy with the route I've taken the car. It is a joy on smooth pavement, looks great, and handles much more stably. However, I can never take my car on another dirt rally, driving in the winter just got more difficult, and I scrape at least 5 times a day, and bottom out my shocks at least as much.

Be VERY careful you are ready to take the bad with the good on a modification path like this one.

This is a video of my car completely stock:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=6Tf4Vy4p3S8
You can see severe roll in the chassis.

This is a video of my car with upgraded front/rear bars:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=xMQJQhLbkDE
The car still exhibits much chassis roll, but gives me much more confidence when throwing it around.

This is a video of my car with upgraded front/rear bars, H&R Sport Springs, and Koni Yellow shocks (4/5 stiffness):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=cyG082PNMA4
The car exhibits minimal chassis roll, and is incredibly planted. Stiffer tires would likely alleviate much of the roll.

Wigman

Body rolls, especially Wagons are inevitable. Like Sajin n RBYCC says have to learn how your car handles and i was your age before not too long ago, i've borrowed the 300 TE I'm owning right now, drove it around like a mad man and nearly flipped it over (poor road with no shoulders) thats pretty much when i learned that cars like my wagon and some others with plushy suspensions are cruisers/tourers and not meant to drive fast n furious drift style without dumping your firstborn as your down-payment for suspension upgrades. Benz parts do not come cheap unless there's a honey hole of retired w124 chassis' sitting around somewhere.

besides when you learn how your car handles and refine your driving, you'd be adding more than 100k-150k miles to your 120k. 'sides Wagons were meant to look good at cruise speed. my wagon's over 200k miles on original suspension components, minus the shocks.