jvakos

I thought my coil overs were creaking but it turns out the issue is with these diagonal struts are loose under the car and slightly bent. I removed them last night to inspect and seems the bolt that screws into the steering rack mount point wont tighten because the hole has been stripped.

I cannot get the diagonal struts to attach properly with that one bolt point being loose and rattling/creaking...

QUESTION - is it safe to drive the car without these 2 diagonal struts installed or are they required from a safety perspective? I may try a Timesert thread insert but still have to deal with the struts being bent and warped which may impact how snug I can get them attached.

I drive the car about 2k miles per year just leisure driving so the use is limited and not aggressive. Here are photos from the MB DSB on the creaking from these diagonal struts which is an easy fix assuming the holes arent stripped where the 5 bolts screw into which is the problem I'm dealing with here. See this =AT06e8x9GFN4HP86jiFP1q57FezZc_FEYv-4K8KiXcOlJae6r7snVcYy_2XjwJNcd8XkgtsYdd-n2uEoZgJt_DFW0znQHSaXaiBZ9fR-rn6kNTt3xJCNU1p0e4pNxtPPscHPu1wbkUa7c3nFMcfTGixAwF AgpoqOkdm1jQdqFAKmU2_qUFuLoZzR197UBt2vuL3K5uoKTAL8 RllEf9gehSFx6qtlhf6kYbLKRLa1_lZQpkxt]https://www.tsbsearch.com/Mercedes-Benz/P-B-46-20-60B

Attached is the MB DSB doc on this in PDF format.

Thank you for any input here....

ldeem

The bolts at the steering rack tread into aluminum and are easy to strip. You can drill them out for larger bolt, use a helicoil or through bolt them as there is room to get a nut on the opposite side. I'd probably try helicoil first.

jvakos

@ldeem thank for that suggestion and is probably what I'll have to do. Those diagonal struts are pretty thin so how much benefit do they really provide to body roll vs just removing them?

ldeem

I don't know about body roll but there is another set in the back. Assuming they work in tension the 4 acting together would create a rough horizonal truss (I am a structural engineer by profession). Removing them probably wouldn't be noticeable for regular driving but if you ever hit something hard or had some other usual loading they could be critical to structural integrity of the car. looking at it another way the 4 struts were added at extra cost by the design engineers. They would not have done so without some reason.

brucewane

FYI - the R230 workshop manual specifies that these diagonal struts are to be tightened with the car's weight fully on the wheels.