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In need of driveshaft center support rubber mount for SL600
1294102381 or 1404101181. Both supposedly discontinued and not available anywhere. Anyone have a spare or know someone who has this part? Just did flex disks on my car but had to skip both the center bushing and bearing. Still have a bad knocking noise underneath I’m pretty sure is due to this.
Any help or knowledge of a different part number that will work is appreciated.
I remember swapping that out when I rebuilt my drive shaft about 10 years ago.
Doesn't the installed one get destroyed when you try to remove it and the incorporated bearing from the driveshaft?
I think I got mine from AutohausAZ.
I just looked at the price for new flex discs, $260 ugh.
that’s what my mechanic said when I asked if we could reuse the black rubber bushing and just install the new bearing. So I still have on my car the original rubber bushing and bearing. Driveshaft is knocking real bad.
any idea of another part number that works? This part isn’t available anywhere in the world as far as I know
I've taken care of my SL600 for a while now and have worked with some fine folks at a local dealership.
I've gotten some pretty rare replacement parts in the recent past.
One of the tricks is they list the car as VOR (vehicle off road) and leave the parts request open for a few months. Dealerships all over the world view the request and sometimes someone somewhere rechecks their inventory and the part shows up. That's OK if the part you need is a driver's side secondary air pump hose or front ADS II pipe seal as it transitions from the wheel well to the engine compartment. But, if the vehicle is truly off road, that's not so good.
You might have to scavenge one from a junk yard and hope for the best.
190E 2.6L 1989, 190E 2.6L 1988, BMW 535dXdrive 2014, BMW 428i 2015
Also try the classic center in San Diego or Germany. I'm surprised this part is NLA. I just bought one (a couple months ago) for my '89 W201 from the dealer.
And yes the rubber is a one time application part, very hard to press in. I tried to freeze the bearing and could push it in 3/4 of the way. Later a press tool was used to go all the way.
So you want to replace the two in pairs. Make sure you have a new bearing handy when you do source the support. I think there is also a third ring piece, make sure you have that too.
I believe that comes with the bearing.
I thought I had a few parts left over from the driveshaft rebuild of 13 years ago. Turns out, I do.
My flex discs need replacing (right side of the picture) and I was rummaging through one of my parts boxes and found a few nice items.
Bearing support 1404100781
Bearing for the support 0089814325
Driveshaft centering bearings 1244100732 and 1244101032 (rear and front?)
Cautionary tale. The pile of green dust in the unopened bag is a transmission grommet like the one the the left.
I'm showing the parts in order to let folks know about the different number for the bearing support. This bearing support might not work on our cars because I either ordered it wrong or it was mis-sent. Or I though I needed it and didn't. Who knows, it might be good. Either way, I will be pulling the driveshaft sometime in the near future to change the flex discs and will take a look at the installed bearing support.
I'll report back to this thread and let everyone know if this is a good alternate number for the 1997 SL600 cars.
I don't know why I have 3 driveshaft end centering bearings, maybe because they are too hard to replace and I didn't install them.
I'm not exactly lazy, but I will only work so hard on a particular repair.
190E 2.6L 1989, 190E 2.6L 1988, BMW 535dXdrive 2014, BMW 428i 2015
I know beggars can't be choosers but for such a vital part I would think twice about a "Febi". Their parts are sometimes shall we say "not a good fit"
For example the only "non" dealer part I have in the car is a Febi belt tensioner, made in Germany. It looks like a high quality replacement but the center hole was misprocessed and a bit small for the bolt to go thru.
So I drilled it wider and it is fine. Their ignition lock tumbler is absolutely garbage. It was already loose brand new, and lasted 5 years, and replaced by the Mercedes one. The original had lasted 20+ years, 150K miles.
I assume a failure of the center support will have catastrophic results.
Certainly it is great to have the part numbers.
My 2 cents worth....
Last edited by dolucasi; Oct 20, 2023 at 08:07 PM.
190E 2.6L 1989, 190E 2.6L 1988, BMW 535dXdrive 2014, BMW 428i 2015
Yeah, Febi's made in Germany parts appear to be of decent quality as I have witnessed too. It is their far east parts that are at risk. Not sure where your center support was made but it is good to hear that is a viable option.
I had a similar issue with my 600. I had a light roaring noise from the drivetrain when decelerating that slowly was getting worse over time. I thought it was the center support bearing going bad. But once I pulled the drive shaft, I checked and the bearing was fine. Talking with my friend a seasoned MB tech he told me that a common issue these are 129s have is with the U joint. Seems the angle of the flex on the driveshaft is so slight that the u-joint does not get much of a workout thus the needle bearings in the joint develop flat spots. One way to check this is with the driveshaft out the joint should move extremely easily, in his words flopping around like the head of a dead chicken. If went moved very slowly by hand you feel any resistance what so ever you have a flat spot. I was told I can make noise from a bearing sound up to a knocking sound. As we know, the U joint is not replaceable but to there is a way loosen the joint by using a bench vice and hammering on the yokes such as you would if you were replacing the joint. Several good whacks on each yoke will push the caps out every so slightly and free up the joint. After hammering my joint it noticeably looser. This fixed my problem. Maybe it will help yours.
I thought I had a few parts left over from the driveshaft rebuild of 13 years ago. Turns out, I do.
My flex discs need replacing (right side of the picture) and I was rummaging through one of my parts boxes and found a few nice items.
Bearing support 1404100781
Bearing for the support 0089814325
Driveshaft centering bearings 1244100732 and 1244101032 (rear and front?)
Cautionary tale. The pile of green dust in the unopened bag is a transmission grommet like the one the the left.
I'm showing the parts in order to let folks know about the different number for the bearing support. This bearing support might not work on our cars because I either ordered it wrong or it was mis-sent. Or I though I needed it and didn't. Who knows, it might be good. Either way, I will be pulling the driveshaft sometime in the near future to change the flex discs and will take a look at the installed bearing support.
I'll report back to this thread and let everyone know if this is a good alternate number for the 1997 SL600 cars.
I don't know why I have 3 driveshaft end centering bearings, maybe because they are too hard to replace and I didn't install them.
I'm not exactly lazy, but I will only work so hard on a particular repair.
hello! can you let use know if that part number fit for the center bearing support?
So last week I had the diff mounts and driveshaft center support replaced. Knocking/thudding is gone. Though my mechanic said the diff mounts was the fix.
The original center support pulled off my car 1294102281. When I look up the part in the Mercedes dealer system it doesn’t exist. Epc tells me 1294102381 is what should go on my car. Strange stuff. No references to an upgrade to any 140 part number despite someone in a Benzworld thread buying and using 1404101181. The mercedesbenz.parts site says that fits our cars and still is “available”
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