1979 w123 300D

bought a great running car with bent tie rods. apparently some zero of a tow guy at some point had hooked up to them to tow the car... i dunno but anyway, i was less than pleased with the shop that did the work. the work seems fine, but getting the car in (and especially out of there) was a hassle to say the least.

the car drives nice, steers nice - but i am a little paranoid about every creek or other sound i hear from under the car.

so the other day i got to looking under there while i was doing some other work. I was a little surprised and somewhat concerned by how close the tie rod ends come to the inner tire. like really close. there is no evidence of any rubbing of any sort, but it just seems awfully close. like if i had a blow out or something i feel like it could catch.

now that i have given a good look under the car, i feel a little foolish having paid to have it done, but the car was new to me, and i lack some basic stuff (for the moment) like floor jack, jack stands etc.

is this normal?

i am going to try and get out to take a pic soon, but if any one has any thoughts or pics of tie rods installed on a 123 correctly - i would love to hear/see.

i did a pretty exhaustive search on tie rods looking for pics and text but found nothing that addressed my issue.

thanks in advance

Scott

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1979 Thistle Green 300D 272,xxx miles
1984 Orient Red 300 D 4 spd Euro Import - 189,xxx miles
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Lofat Productions
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What size are the tires?

Are the rims stock?

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89 300te 222,222
92 300e 190,000

yes, stock rims and tires.

here are a few pics of the parts and position in question

Attached Thumbnails

     

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1979 Thistle Green 300D 272,xxx miles
1984 Orient Red 300 D 4 spd Euro Import - 189,xxx miles
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Lofat Productions
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Would it be possible for you measure the distance between the tie rod and the tire in mm.? That way someone could measure theirs and see if the distance is the same. Lot of parts are close to other moving parts. Just look how close the brake calipers are to the wheels on lots of cars.

hmm, i am not sure that i have a measuring devise that measures in that small incriments.

I will take a look at several different tape measures i have laying around and see.

close moving parts normally freak me out, but seeing as how it is close to rubber which can expand and contract... i will try to take a measurement or two.

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1979 Thistle Green 300D 272,xxx miles
1984 Orient Red 300 D 4 spd Euro Import - 189,xxx miles
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Lofat Productions
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I've got a number of those T-Shirts (feeling foolish) LOL. Sorry, couldn't help it...

The more you hang out here Lofat, the more you'll find yourself DIYing. Put some tool acquisition costs in the ole budget - the more you tackle, the less you'll want/allow somebody else to touch it.

How do I know, you might ask? I now have 3 MBs in my drive/garage, all acquired in the last 8 months and none is a daily driver!

Could somebody point me to the antidote please?

Welcome & happy wrenching!

Kevin

Are your wheel bearings clearances on spec.?

I had very light occasional (not steady -- more likely the result of the shifting under cornering loads within the range of minimum wheel bearing clearance added to the sidewards flex of the sidewalls) contact between the tire sidewall and the rubber boot on my '85 300TD when I switched to 225/60 X 14 tires on the original 6" ET30 rims without spacers -- with the stock 195/70 there should therefore have been about 15mm (more than 1/2 inch) clearance and with a more reasonable size 205/70 tire there would still have been about 10mm. To get a clearance reading on these things, try passing a drill bit sideways through the gap as a clearance guage -- 6mm or 1/4 inch should be plenty.

If I recall correctly the tie rod ends are close to the tire/wheel. What I am wondering is your tierod on the bottom when it should be on top of the arm?

Haasman

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'03 E320 Wagon-Sold
'95 E320 Wagon-Went to Ex
'93 190E 2.6-Wrecked
'91 300E-Went to Ex
'65 911 Coupe (#302580)

Good idea - this is what I will do.


?!? That is a good question... i think what i need to do is take a look under another 123 and see what is what. Being that I am new to these cars I wasn't sure what it was suppose to look like, but I suspected that it wasn't right.

I am going to the pick and pull this weekend and take a look under another 123. If it turns out that they screwed up I will likely dispute the charge for their work (placed on my card) through my bank before taking it back to that shop - even know they should be fixing it.


You are correct - this is starting to happen already just from reading all the great info here and the combined aggravation of dealing with incompetant shops.

I do plan to pick up some tools starting this weekend. my friend a couple towns over is very car handy - and had a lot of German casr exp. He also rents a warehouse/loft space and his friend/land lord has a drive in bay and lots of good stuff.

Thanks for the replies and info - it is appreciated greatly!

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1979 Thistle Green 300D 272,xxx miles
1984 Orient Red 300 D 4 spd Euro Import - 189,xxx miles
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Lofat Productions
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With stock diameter 14" rims the tie rod end will interfere with the sidewall of a tire which is too big or mounted on a rim with too much ET (positive -- inward -- offset) but with 15" rims, as are often swapped onto W123s from later models, if the width or the + offset is too large, the tie rod end will interfere with the lip of the rim's beadseat or just tear off the balance weights in some cases.

lofat

chk out this site


McGarrett

Can any one else confirm that this is incorrect from the pics I snapped?

If they installed the tie rods incorrectly then I will clearly need to fix this, which if I am correct will mean that I will also need to get it re-aligned....

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1979 Thistle Green 300D 272,xxx miles
1984 Orient Red 300 D 4 spd Euro Import - 189,xxx miles
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Lofat Productions
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Right on - that is a good site, I spent a while looking around there this morning. booked for future reference.

__________________
1979 Thistle Green 300D 272,xxx miles
1984 Orient Red 300 D 4 spd Euro Import - 189,xxx miles
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Lofat Productions
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Well I think I was wrong.

After looking at the different sites, I grabbed this picture (sorry about the picture quality) and the tie rods attach at the bottom.

See below-

Haasman

Attached Thumbnails

 

__________________
'03 E320 Wagon-Sold
'95 E320 Wagon-Went to Ex
'93 190E 2.6-Wrecked
'91 300E-Went to Ex
'65 911 Coupe (#302580)

cool - i was freaked out for a hot second as i was not interested in visiting that shop again.

I spent some time at the pick and pull today and had a chance to get under a few of our cars today looking at voltage regulators and noticing the tie rods too.

so my ques ton is answered - the tie rods go super close to the tires apparently.

(Y)

__________________
1979 Thistle Green 300D 272,xxx miles
1984 Orient Red 300 D 4 spd Euro Import - 189,xxx miles
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Lofat Productions
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -