I took in my 2004 E500 with airmatic (factory height) to the alignment shop because it was pulling to the left, well after a couple hours the shop comes back and tells me the camber is -1.5 left and -1.8 right which I know is non adjustable and the toe is -1.0 left and -1.4 right and they also said it could not get it adjusted to factory spec which they said the adjustment was already maxed at it's limit. My question is:

1) Why at stock height is camber so negative?

2) Why can't the shop adjust the toe from having it pull to the left?

 

Toe usually does not cause a pull. wrong caster and/or camber setting can cause a pull. Many times its a defective tire. I had three new tires of a new set of 4 that caused pulling. They were Michellin pilot sport a/s plus.

 

Camber is adjustable on the e500. It requires 2 adjustment bolts for the lower control arm. Mercedes part #A000 330 0018. It doesn't offer large range of adjustment, but you can easily get a degree of positive adjustment.

If the camber is beyond spec after using these bolts and you are at factory ride height, then there is either excessive wear or damage. K-Mac makes a kit that will give you a larger range of adjustment for lowered suspensions, but at factory ride height, the adjustment bolts should be plenty.

Like homeofstone said, toe doesn't cause pulling normally. It can in rare instances, but it has to be way out of spec. Also, pulling is usually a combination of caster and camber numbers. You didn't mention what your caster numbers are so it's hard to properly diagnose the problem. And houseofstone is correct in that tires very often are the cause of a pull. If you rotate your front tires right to left and the pull changes, then your problem is tires

If your caster is within spec then the numbers you have supplied "might" cause a very slight drift to the left. In theory, a car pulls towards the more positive camber. But with both sides being negative, I doubt that .3 degrees less negative will cause a pull. Maybe a drift, but road crown will often offset that slight drift.

Your toe numbers will cause inner tire wear however. The total toe out is -2.4. That is unacceptable. Did they use a spreader bar when they checked your toe? It makes a difference and there is a reason why Mercedes requires the use of a spreader bar for accurate toe adjustment.

I would be concerned that your alignment shop wasn't aware that your car had adjustable camber options and that they didn't adjust the toe settings to factory specs. Especially, that they released your car with the toe that far out of spec.

 

I had the same issue with the these tires.

 

Thanks all for the insight, unfortunatly I have no idea what the caster was because the shop did not give me a copy of the read outs. Is there a chance all the bad settings are from components that need replacement ie. control arms, ball joints, rods etc?

 

Supposedly, Michelin has since corrected this problem with this specific tire.

 

The information is correct. Pull can be adjusted frequently with caster. Increasing caster on the side that pulls will help correct the problem. If it pulls left the left caster could be up to 1 degree higher to help with the problem. I also have caster bolts in my E500. I don't have an issue with Michelin's Pilot Sports they drive great for about 33,000 miles then become noisy and well worn.

Toe in wears inside/outside of tires but normally doesn't pull.

Camber can but it also causes uneven tire wear. Caster is my best guess for your pull issue if you are running the Michelin's