W124 unstable ride

[david8876]

Hi all,

My car is a W124 - N reg E220 with 102k miles on clock. When driving on the motorway, if theres even a light wind the car feels unstable and has a wobbly kind of feel. Sometimes it can be hard to drive in a straight line! Took the car to my local garage and they couldn't find anything that was loose or broken but said that changing the shockers might solve problem.... Replaced all 4 shockers with bilsteins and although the low speed ride is much better the car still doesn't drive well especially on the motorway. Does anyone have any ideas about what might be causing the problem?

Any help would be really appreciated! Also does anyone know of a good independent merc garage in Edinburgh?

 

[Chazchuzzlewitt]

mine old 300E used to be a bit wobbly on the 'freeway', especially in the rear. I changed the rear shocks which were knacked which helped a lot. I also changed the front & rear rear anti-roll bar links (cheap). Check all the rubber bushings and links in the suspension.

 

[david8876]

Hi, Is it possible to tell if one of the bushes is broken just by looking? The garage are insisting that everything is fine when I know its not! I'm thinking about asking them just to replace all the bushes - Is this a lot of work?

 

[Chazchuzzlewitt]

It is a fair bit of work, especially if it's sub-frame bushings as well- it's rather anoying as the rubber bushings are cheap, but the time + effort + tools needed are not!
where does it feel like it's unstable? front/rear/both?
Do you get any bad vibration in the car?

 

[david8876]

Hi, thanks for your reply!

Its hard to answer your question... the car just seems to wobble a bit, most noticably on the motorway. If theres even a little bit of wind it really affects the car. A couple weeks ago it was really windy and I had to slow right down to about 50mph beacuse it was so bad. Normally you can feel a strong gust of wind through the steering wheel in most cars - thats what my merc feels like alot even without much wind! I don't think its a steering problem because the road surface doesnt make any difference and the problem gets much worse when its windy. When driving around town the car handles okay and theres no vibration.

 

[Chazchuzzlewitt]

hmmm. obviously something is up. I'm not an expert by any means, but having had the same problem with my old car I know how frustrating it is. I'd say take the wheels off when you have a spare few hours and get in there checking all the rubber bushes, springs and supspension links for anything obvious.

If there's nothing obvious try taking it to a independent specialist.

The only other parts I had replaced that helped handling were idler arm bushes, and the steering dampner. Both are fairly cheap and quick replacements.
I had a severe pull to the right I was chasing which turned out to be the tyres + alignment after the PO was running around with bad alignment.

 

[david8876]

Hi again,

Have located a mercedes specialist - it's booked in for Tuesday and hopefully they can find the fault without too much expense. I just remembered that sometimes the car 'creaks' on the passenger side, I just thought it was because the car was old but maybe this has something to do with the problem?

 

[tom7035]

Possibly steering damper, but have the lower suspension balljoints checked also. If they are badly worn your steering geometry would vary, and they are also known to 'creak' when worn.
Cheers.

 

[Neophyte]

Wandering

My 190 is exactly the same as you describe - I'm surprised as it’s only got 98k on the clock (it's a '92 2.6) with full merc history (verified) but I think the last owner was a bit of an incompetent, not interested in cars. I'd have thought that merc would've picked any problems up? It's OK when driving slower or on twisty roads but just going in a straight line on the motorway I seem to be often correcting (it seems not to happen all the time which made me think it was the wind) the windier the worse. I thought I was being paranoid. I think I'll firstly go for some laser-balancing and then see how much it'd cost to do those little bits mentioned. Really annoying.

Any advice is welcomed.

Thanks

 

[JFB]

I would be very interested in the outcome of your investigations as my W124 E220 with 52k on the clock is exactly the same. She's fine and settled on motorway when flat calm but if there is as much as a draft from either side, the handling becomes suspect. It unerved me a couple of time and I am dreading a long journey in windy conditions. So any feedback would be appreciated but I think I will try having the shocks replaced as advised earlier.

Thanks

Jerome

 

[pascal]

After you get the suspension bits done, I would take it to a good tyre shop for a laser re-alignment, or maybe your specialist will be able to do that. W124's are notorious for going out of alignment, and when corrected (properly) they feel like a different car.

Pascal

 

[david8876]

Hi all

Thanks everyone for all the advice. I'll definately get the wheel alignment checked. The car has done just over 100k miles and its never been done! In fact the car has never even been near a merc dealership.... So anyway it will be interesting to see what the independent merc specialist comes up with - its booked in for Tuesday 13th April. I'll keep you's posted.

 

[david8876]

Hello again

Just had a call from the garage.... The mechanic said that there's nothing wrong with the car! He said that he checked over all the suspension and steering and can't find any faults. He says he's going to take the car on the motorway tonight to get a better idea of the symptoms.

Does anyone have any idea's? The problem is really bad and its so frustrating having a mechanic on the phone telling you theres nothing wrong.

 

[pascal]

Although the W124 is not as aerodynamic as more modern cars, I never had stability problems with either 2 I owned except in severe motorway cross winds.

Has this guy checked out the tracking fully on a laser tracking system. It may be that the 'Toe' or 'camber' on the front is off. W124s are not that easy to track. Can take up to an hour to do even with the specialist equipment.

 

[42731]

How are your tyre pressures?

 

[david8876]

The tyre pressures are all okay. I've not had the tracking checked yet, I think I'll see what mechanic says after test drive. Do I need to go to a merc dealer to get the tracking checked?

 

[paul65]

Hi all,
Had a simular problem with my 300te 4matic, it had a intermitant fault that when showed it self left me and any passengers in the car needing new underware. The fault was hard to describe but when it occured it was like the wheels had suddenly turned square, seriously bad steering wheel judder that bad it hurt my wrists to hold on to it,the car would not steer at all lasted approx 5-10 secs then car recovered and would be fine for weeks before next episode. Most episodes occured on country roads at approx 60-70mph. Took it to MB dealer no fault found,took it to MB independent no fault found! Read the forums on here decided to start with the cheapest fix first being the steering damper and bingo no more need to carry spare underware in the glove box!
So my advise would be to start with the possible cheap fix first, i have been told that the steering damper can cause all kinds of handling faults and is almost impossible to tell if its truely faulty/worn whilst still fitted to a car.

 

[pascal]

The tyre pressures are all okay. I've not had the tracking checked yet, I think I'll see what mechanic says after test drive. Do I need to go to a merc dealer to get the tracking checked?

Not unless you want to give them 2/3 hundred quid.
50 quidish seems to be what most of the Guys have to pay in tyre specialists with modern laser tracking computers. Plenty of links on this subject in the last month. Put the word 'tracking' or 'alignment' in the search at the top of the page and you should get some 'feelers'

 

[david8876]

Still no joy

Hello again everyone

Just been to collect the car, no fault found! The garage wouldn't take any money either. This is the second time a garage has spent a fair amount of time looking for the fault and saying 'no charge', after insisting that theres nothing wrong. Its getting really frustrating!!!

Anyways I've booked the car in to yet another local garage that has the laser alignment equipment so fingers crossed this will solve the problem as its driving me daft.

 

[pascal]

Don't forget to report back, David.

When the garage man drove it, did he think it felt wrong?