road wander

[gregbenz]

My recent purchase -85 300 D w/ 145,000 miles likes to wander left or right mostly at higher speeds. Any ideas on where to start for fixing ? I'm thinking front-end alignment maybe ? This is my first benz and I'm liking it a lot (so far).

[fantom71]

I too have that problem. If it were an alignment problem, would it not pull only in one direction? I am asking this, not making a statement (I am a total novice to car repair and have learned more on this board over the last month than in my previous 35 years of life...).

[Pete Burton]

I recently replaced my front sway bushings (where the bar si mounted to the upper control arm) they were not doing much in a straight line, that's for sure. I feel better stability now, hopefully it's not the placebo effect.

[Brian Carlton]

You fellows need a competant shop to go through the front end and look for obvious loose joints. Some shops are incompetant and can't find a loose ball joint if it hit them over the head and other shops will see original joints on a vehicle with 150K on the clock and they'll tell you that you need $1500 worth of work before any alignment can be properly done.

The key is to find an honest shop that will only fix the worst culprits. Then you can properly align the vehicle and fix the "wandering".

Lower ball joints and/or lower control arm bushings will generally put the repair out of reach financially, unless you do it yourself. I was shocked to see some of the shops quoting 6 hours for just the lower ball joints. With patience, and the spring compressor (rented from this site), the cost is about $125.00 in parts and tool rental.

[Pete Burton]

and if you are just doing the upper ball joints and/or upper control arm bushing, you don't need to touch the spring, at least on the SD

It's time to raise the car in the air safely and use the four P's; Push, Pull, Pry and Prod on all the suspension components. For wandering pay particularly close attention to the idler arm, but check EVERYTHING front and rear.

For the person talking about inside tire wear, those two wheels are toed out. Tighten the wheel bearings, then set the toe on zero and that problem will go away.

Good luck,

[bigbillyboy]

my 1985 300d does the same thing and it also wears the inside of the tires down significantly faster than the rest of the tires. I have been told it needs new upper control arm busings, lower ball joints and tie rod ends. It looks like there is a lot of slop in all those things on my car. I have the parts on order and am planning on doing it just as soon as can. If it makes a difference, I'll let you know. There seems to be a wealth of information on this board about how to do all the work listed above.

I guess I would jack it up and check all of the above as well as the steering idler busing to see if any of those have play. That way you can tell if the components need to be replaced prior to an alignment.