Hey all. I installed the front end camber bolts on my 09 W211 yesterday to give me a little less negative camber. However, the directions were not that clear and I need help. It says not to tighten the new bolts too much or they will shear off the inner nibs on the control arms. So do I leave them slightly loose or do I have to torque them down with a load on them ? Also, does anyone know the torque spec on them ? TIA.

 

What? No! Don't drive around with loose suspension bolts.

I think what they are saying is don't tighten the nut using the nib to hold the bolt. Put a wrench on both ends, the nut and bolt.

Peter

 

BTW, I just looked it up and the torque is 80 Nm plus an additional 120 degrees. These are big bolts that need to be tightened.

Yes. You were correct in part. The MB instructions said don't tighten against the nibs. So make sure you have two wrenches. A big one to hold the bolt and a torque wrench to tighten the nut. Also, for 120 degrees, think of the MB star. The three points are 120 degrees apart.

Also, the nibs give you plus or minus a half degree of adjustment (as I recall). There is no fine tuning and if, like mine, a half degree isn't enough, You just take what you can get. Oh well.

Good Luck,
Peter

 

Why think about the star, when you can actually see 120 degrees on the nut? Every hex corner is 60 degrees apart. When ever I need to angle torque hardware, I place the socket to the nut, and using a sharpie I mark the socket and the part being torqued. Then I remove the socket and place it back on the nut two corners counterclockwise (if I need 120 degrees), and then torque the nut until sharpie marks align.

 

forgive me its been a while, but arnt those the bolts that need to be tightened when the wheels/suspension is under normal driving load?

 

Thanks for the responses but I am still not quite sure how I should be torquing these camber bolts. Is the car supposed to be under load in order to torque them down. I understand that the bolt must not turn but I need to know if the car must be under load or not. These directions are not clear on that part. Please help me understand this. Thanks

 

All the suspension control arms, that have a vulcanized rubber bushing, should be torqued to spec when suspension is on the normal ride height. If they are torqued on unloaded suspension, bushings are under tension on the ride height and will tear apart the bushing prematurely.
If you are working on ground, no hoist available, car doesn't need to be sitting on its tyres to achieve ride height, just use the floor jack to load suspension untill the weight is off from the jack stands.

 

Ok. Got it. I will load the suspension using ramps and then torque the camber bolts to spec making sure that I do not twist the camber bolts while doing so. Thank you !!