It's a 1985 300TD.
I just replaced the upper control arms and ball joints, all tie rods, lower control arm bushings, guide rod bushings on front and rear of arm, front sway bar bushings.
All but lower control arm ball joints, they were replaced by previous owner and fine.
The front tire on the drivers side leans in and the eccentric is adjusted all the way to correct this and I still need a few more degrees to correct it 100%
It drives great, however I would like it to be perfect.
What am I missing? Maybe the coil springs are worn out? Would that cause this?
But it's only on the drivers side, the passenger lines up perfect and the car sits level.





Notice the tire leans in at the top a little to far, and I just rebuild the front end.
Its .8 degrees out.Or was it 8 degrees out?
It was checked on a Hunter computerized laser Alignment machine.
He imputed the year and make of car into the computer on the alignment machine.
Everything adjusted perfect and the machine told the mechanic step by step what to adjust on my car. Incredible machine is all I can say.
But when he tried to adjust the bottom control arm eccentric there was not enough adjustment.

Having read a few threads - most people seem to blame this on upper control arm bushings.

Check out the rubber parts as well as the ball joint though

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1992 W201 190E 1.8 171,000 km - Daily driver
1981 W123 300D ~ 100,000 miles / 160,000 km - project car stripped to the bone
1965 Land Rover Series 2a Station Wagon CIS recovery therapy!
1961 Volvo PV544 Bare metal rat rod-ish thing

I'm here to chat about cars and to help others - I'm not here "to always be right" like an internet warrior



Don't leave that there - I'll take it to bits!

That much negative camber shouldn't hurt much.

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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.

It's all brand new lemforder parts on the front end. UCA included.
I did it myself. All looks fine.

Yet another victim of thread speed reading - sorry about that.

Who did the alignment after the suspension work?

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1992 W201 190E 1.8 171,000 km - Daily driver
1981 W123 300D ~ 100,000 miles / 160,000 km - project car stripped to the bone
1965 Land Rover Series 2a Station Wagon CIS recovery therapy!
1961 Volvo PV544 Bare metal rat rod-ish thing

I'm here to chat about cars and to help others - I'm not here "to always be right" like an internet warrior



Don't leave that there - I'll take it to bits!

Remember I was not there to observe what was done so I am fishing for possible.

The Lower Control Arm Bushings have to oriented a specific way before they are pressed in. The flat spots on the Bushings are supposed to be parallel to the Flat Spot on the Lower Control Arm where the lower Spring Mont attaches.

Before the upper and lower Control Arms Bolts that go through the Bushings were torque the Car needed to be sitting on the Ground with all of the weight of the Car on the Wheels.

Changes in the length of the Guide Rod; the Caster Adjustment also changes the Camber adjustment.
Changes in the Chamber adjustment done with the eccentric Bolt also changes the Caster.

I had trouble getting one of the Lower control Arm Bushings out as it was corroded to the Aluminum Sleeve. I did a lot of pounding with a 4 pound Hammer.
I also hit and ran over a 3 inch high Traffic Island at about 45 mph to the extent that the Curb hit the Alloy Rim and dented it the rear Trailing Arm cracked almost in 2 pieces.

It may be no coincidence that on that side (also the Driver Side Front) I could not get the Chamber correct. I think it is likely running over the Island ever so slightly bent the 2 Metal Eyes on the Chassis that the Lower Control Arm Bolt goes through

And then there is the Beating with the Big Hammer that may account for something also.

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84 300D, 82 Volvo 244Gl Diesel

After much thought and hearing from a few front end mechanics, I think it is the coil springs on the front have sagged causing this negative camber.
If I put a jack under the center support and jack the car up about 2 inches the tire
comes into perfect alignment with the eccentric all the way to where it is now.
If I jack it up 3 inches or so I would need the eccentric to mid way.
Give or take a 1/2 inch on both those raising the front end measurements.
This would also make the car sit more level front to rear since the rear sits a little higher, and I have the SLS adjusted correctly.
Thats at least my theory as of now unless someone has a better one.
The only thing that does not make sense is the right side is fine and the left side will not adjust out.
And the car left to right sits level.

Bottom line is "As the front end goes down the front tires go into negative camber."
True or False?

Did you replace the torsion bar bushings? This is a picture of mine....its bad....causing the tire to tilt and wear the inside on the drivers side....replace both and they are perfect now...even with my 35 year old suspension parts...

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Well it sounds like you are doing your own adjustments. Is that true?

If so what I think is happening is that you are disregarding the castor adjustment. Camber and toe is quite easy to set up if you are lucky with the castor adjustment (brake stay length) but if you've got that length wrong then you "run out of adjustment" on the inner LCA eccentric bolts.

If you are making your own adjustments then this long winded tale of mine might help =>

How I adjusted the toe in / out, camber and caster on my W123 300D

True (so long as everything is new and is working as it should)

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1992 W201 190E 1.8 171,000 km - Daily driver
1981 W123 300D ~ 100,000 miles / 160,000 km - project car stripped to the bone
1965 Land Rover Series 2a Station Wagon CIS recovery therapy!
1961 Volvo PV544 Bare metal rat rod-ish thing

I'm here to chat about cars and to help others - I'm not here "to always be right" like an internet warrior



Don't leave that there - I'll take it to bits!

That is an interesting thought.

They also sell diferent thicknesses Sprng Pads.

In the Factory Service Manual there is specs on adjusting the height. If the Mechanics had experience with Mercedes one wonders why the Mechanics would not know about the Spring Pads?

Also the area you do the alignment on is supposed to be flat.

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84 300D, 82 Volvo 244Gl Diesel

It was lined up at a local Indy on a laser computerized Hunter alignment machine.
The machine is awesome in regards of showing the mechanic what to do
To my car after he imputed the year make and model.
After the car was finished the computer told the mechanic what to
try to do to get the camber more inline.
Of course it also said to check for worn components.
The computer on the alignment machine even had detailed drawings of a
Generic looking mercedes front end and showed all the adjustments and their names to the mechanic.

Here is the link to the exact machine used to align my car.
http://www.hunter.com/alignment/hawkeye_standard/index.cfm








X

This is a picture of the anti sway bar is it not?
I'm not aware of it being called torsion bar on the w123, however I'm no expert.
Mine like the picture you have shown were not replaced at that spot only at the
UCA. And the sway bar had plenty of tension. The mounts seemed fine to me, however I will check further.
I would think that this part would not effect camber that much if any, however I will check it out, like said I'm no expert.

Sway bar, anti sway bar, torsion bar. All names for the same thing, IMO.

MB even calls it a torsion bar.

Attached Thumbnails

 

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83 SD

84 CD

But now my question is can this cause negative camber
by the mounts being worn at the firewall area of the sway/torsion bar?

There is not much out there about what it can do, I have read every thread I could about these because I was also interested in the torsion bar and if that was forsure what was causing my inner tire wear....All I could really find was that the torsion bar puts the arch in the uca's...

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