Lowering an E320 coupe, need some advice.
 

Hello all, I have discovered that one of my rear OEM shocks not only leaked but completely rotted away, to just a dangling carcass. I knew something was amiss in the back but I didn't think it was that bad.

At any rate I will be swapping out the stock springs and shocks for H&R and Bilstein Sports as soon as they arrive from Germany. I already bought the MB spring compression tool. Is there anything I need to know? I keep reading about these bump pads...being primarily a Jeep guy, in that world the bump pads are just to limit how high the axles can go so that the wheel or axle doesn't smash into the chassis...but it seems in W124-land people use them to adjust the height.....is this correct or am I misreading?

I assume I will need an alignment after swapping out the springs due to the change in camber.....do I need to swap out anything else? For now I will be riding on the stock 15" wheels, eventually soon to be 17" AMG or S600 wheels.

Many thanks.

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Stolen from a thread on peach parts


http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/...fferences.html

"At the top, the springs sit in a metal cup that holds a rubber pad. For the W124, the pads are 8mm, 13mm, 18mm, and 23mm in thickness. I have read that the 5mm change in thickness of the pad causes a change of about 7mm at the gap between the fender and tire. I also read that Mercedes used different pad combinations to adjust the ride height for different options or other requirements like bumper heights. You can identify what pads you have by looking under the car and counting the bumps on the lip of the pads. 1-bump is the thinnest at 8mm and 4-bump is thickest at 23mm. The bumps are very small little bumps on the very end of the lip of the pads. They are relatively easy to see if the bumps happen to be facing toward you when you get under the car. If the bumps are rotated toward the body, it may be harder to see and count them. My car came with 3-bump all around when stock. I changed to 1-bump all around when I added the lowering springs, but then the back was too low so I went to 3-bump in the rear and kept 1-bump in the front. You can buy new pads at the dealer for just a few dollars each. The only problem is getting to the top of the springs, so that you can replace the old pads. It may be best to pay a mechanic that knows about using a spring compressor to remove the springs and the car may have to be re-aligned after you change the thickness of the pads. Ride height affects the camber."

The rear doesn't have camber adjustment so you might think about some kmac bushings otherwise there's a -2 to -3 degree camber. It's like that both in the front and rear so to save tires, you'd have to do off rim rotations. Alas the fronts do adjust to about -1.5 which is just about spot on for cornering.

Yup, pads sit on top of the spring, you can adjust stance. The struts have bump shocks on them to prevent bottom out.

The rear thrust arms are the first to wear out their bushings .... save an alignment. Same with tie rods and the ball joints.

Thanks so do the struts come with the bump pads or do I need to buy these seperate?

These Kmac bushings they will correct the camber change?

I just want to have all the parts on hand for this swap so I dont have to take my car off the road for more than a day.

Looks like a cheaper/better alternative might be to use adjustable camber rear arms?

i built a set of camber arms but haven't installed yet unfortunately.. instructions here: http://190rev.net/forums/showthread.php?t=37134

Thanks, I saw that....I was going to buy them premade but I think I will be making my own and use rubber bushing rod ends instead of hiems.

Make sure you change out the LCA bushings and possibly the sub frame bushings.
Adjustable camber devices can't correct potential negative camber from worn bushings.
A 1.5" drop with fresh bushings as below will not require adjustable camber devices even with 17x10 ET7 rims.

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