My mechanic drove a 500 converted he said it was the worst and most unstable Mercedes he’s ever driven. That’s enough for me.

 

I don't doubt your mechanic's account. But it's very likely that he simply drove a car that either had poorly chosen components, or the owner had set the damping extremely soft.

There is no reason for an R230 equipped with coilovers to be inherently "bad" and unstable. Sure, if you choose inappropriate spring rates and damping, you're going to have a car that is not good. But the R230 suspension doesn't have anything about it that would make coilovers categorically incorrect for use. It basically has upper/lower controls arms, front and rear, in fairly traditional geometry. Nothing in the suspension design requires active, computer controlled spring rates and damping. It's not like an exotic military aircraft that requires computer assistance for stable flight.

If spring rates and damping are properly selected, a coilover-converted R230, fitted with sway bars, will handle about as well as any 4200 pound GT** ever has. It will never handle like a lightweight sports car, and it never did; even with ABC, an R230 is going to get smoked in the turns by a 911, or for that matter a Miata.

With traditional spring/damper suspensions, the tradeoff has always been "comfortable ride" versus "maximum handling performance". If you want a soft ride, the handling suffers; if you want sharp handling, the ride is less smooth and comfortable. The "magic" of ABC is not that it has ride comfort or handling performance that surpasses anything in its weight class, it's that the suspension automatically switches to optimal settings for handling or comfort every few milliseconds based on the road surface and how the car is being driven. The "magic" is that ABC provides excellent ride comfort and handling performance at the same time, where other cars can only provide one or the other.

**Regardless of the fact that "SL" was originally an abbreviation for "sport leicht (light)" or "super leicht" (depending on which MB documentation referenced) and the first W198 SL was the premier sports car of its era, by the 3rd gen R107 the SL was clearly much more of a GT than a true "sports car".

 

I had Strutmasters and the car felt like crap. It was actually scary to drive. I didn't feel comfortable going over 40-50. Braking took longer and the car felt unstable.

I've been on the fence regarding coilovers. I see a lot of great reviews and I like how you can adjust ride and comfort level. I wish I knew someone local who has them installed so I can test drive to get a feel before dropping $$$

For now I'm going to ride it out until it goes bad. The car has been dropping on the passendger side after 3-7 days so i think my valve block is on its way out.

part of me wants to trade it in and upgrade to a 2013+

I dunno.....for now I have other crap on my mind like the passing of my mother.

 

Sorry for your loss.

I'm confused that you said you had Strutmasters but now are talking about your ABC system going bad. Are we talking about two different cars? Not sure how you can go back and forth unless you just capped off the ABC when you replaced the struts. Is that what you did?

 

I purchased the car site unseen from North Carolina. The car inpsector informed me that the struts had been modified and that it has Strutmaster installed. I didn't know how bad the car drove until I got it. All the original components were still installed- I just needed to purchase ABC struts from Ebay. I spent money to go BACK to ABC. Also replaced the pump.

 

Wow, this thread took a wild turn and grew a life of its own.

 

Ran into this series from an experienced mechanic on inspecting and diagnosing R230 ABC issues. Provides another data point in decision making strategies. I found his analysis on age-related failures interesting.

Also appreciated the insight from his aviation-related comparison (he is both a commercial pilot and an A&P, which I can relate to - a private pilot myself)

The link gets you to the first video in the series, and the remainder of the sequence autostart.

 

he ended up switching to coil overs- which suck ***!

 

The major point of this video series was that his inspection activities allowed him to determine that, after around 18 years, the hoses that comprise the ABC system begin to deteriorate from the inside out, creating multiple potential sources of failure and providing a never-ending source of fluid contamination.

The decision? If he keeps the car, practicing preventive maintenance would lead him to either replace all the rubber hoses (and fix other ABC defects he found), or swap it out for coil-overs.

There is no emotion in the process. Either decision results in a vehicle with a working suspension. One preserves the factory system at a cost that equals or exceeds the value of the car and continues the exemplary performance of the ABC system, the other replaces it with a much less expensive solution that provides very acceptable, although less exemplary, performance. He picked the path that he liked and he is very happy with his decision. Someone else might take the other approach.

It was the process, not the conclusion. End of story…

 

I'm not concerned about the maintenance aspect of ABC, but I can understand how many are squeamish about it.

The greater concern to me is the continual increase of parts becoming NLA from MB.

On a clean car / starting point, I would preserve the system for as long as feasible.

If I picked up a project car with a compromised system (e.g. too much contamination in the system to reliably flush, damaged hard lines, etc.) then I would consider the alternatives.

In any case, I'm always glad there are options in the aftermarket considering MB's embarrassing degree of parts discontinuation.

 

I ahve the same 2009 SL 550 with coil overs. I'm In Miami, who dis you use to fix the RED warnings

 

I agree with @HLG600 .
The most critical "discontinued" part is the ABC pump. Another member here mentioned he had such bad luck with rebuilt pumps that he gave up and switched to coil-overs.
The struts seem to be quite long lasting and several small shops offer rebuilt ones.
The accumulators are readily available as rebuilt ones from places like FCP Euro for reasonable prices.
Some of the hydraulic hoses are still available from MB, but I hear many are not. Not a huge problem as even small cities will have Hydraulic repair shops which can rebuild them with the MB specific ends. Often cheaper than buying new. (Think of all the farmers, tractors and construction equipment that need hydraulic lines repaired.)
Sure, the cost of labor to make repairs could be the deciding factor, but many repairs are reasonably DYI. I guess replacing the rear hydraulic lines is less DYI as the subframe has to come out.

All of the MB people I know say to keep the ABC system as long as possible.

 

There are reliable pump rebuilders - ABC Tiele in Germany for one. abcteile24.de
The accumulators in ours are not rebuildable like the Citroen DS spheres are. You can get new ones from Corteco via FCP and others.

 

Thank you @Tom Manning for the link to a reliable ABC pump builder, but of course that means shipping to and from Germany. And the correction that the accumulators sold by FCP under the Corteco brand are new; I thought they might be rebuilt.

 

Their site seems to be down now - been that way for a few days - hope they haven't gone under.