i have been repairing mercedes cars for many years, i have never owned a 124 or driven one at night. today i did, the headlight beams were directly on the ground infront of the car. are all 124's like that? i tried to raise them with no luck. seems dangerous

My chum's '87 300E is like that. I found it odd. Even the second gen DOT lamps on my SD now are better.

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I'm not a doctor, but I'll have a look.

'85 300SD 245k
'87 300SDL 251k
'90 300SEL 326k

Six others from BMW, GM, and Ford.

Liberty will not descend to a people; a people must raise themselves to liberty.[/IMG]

Must need aimed. Both of our 124's have, in my opinion, great headlights,,, even a lot better than the 129 I have.

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95 SL500 Smoke Silver, Parchment 64K
07 E350 4matic Station Wagon White 34K
02 E320 4Matic Silver/grey 80K
05 F150 Silver 44K

Agreed. Aiming it correctly is the key.

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joel

Prayers bring forth enlightenment.

124 lights are crap until 94/95 vintage.
..unless you have Euro....

Respectfully disagree Arthur. The TEs' lights are super, in my opinion, and the 93s' are almost as good. This is looking through a set of 60 year old eyes, and don't really enjoy driving at night any more.

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95 SL500 Smoke Silver, Parchment 64K
07 E350 4matic Station Wagon White 34K
02 E320 4Matic Silver/grey 80K
05 F150 Silver 44K

my oe's are crap..

my son's euros are great...

you need to see the two side by side to understand.

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1989 300ce 129k
( facelifted front,updated tail lights, lowered suspension,bilstein sports, lorinser front spoiler, MOMO steering wheel, remus exhaust,stainless steel brake lines). (Gone)

1997 s320 154k (what a ride). Sold with 179k miles. Replaced with Hyundai Equus

1994 e320 Cabriolet 108k



1972 280se 4.5 153k Owned for 12 yrs, sorry I sold it


[/SIGPIC]

According to your sig. your TE is a 95...hence it has the headlights Aurther was saying were not crap.

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Daily Driver: 02 E430 4MATIC
In the family: '03 E500 // '04 ML500 // 64 220SE

Sorry, but there is no comparison between the two... The later 124s have glass lens with Euro style focal cut-off aim...
DOT , pre 94 is junk...unless you are bird watching in the trees.

The original post asked if there is/was a diffence in 124 chassis lamps .
Of course ...there is, plain and simple.
..and the earlier 124s are are not bad cuz of Benz, they are bad cuz of the US/DOT not being hip on the superior lighting of EURO lamps... so , they made Benz adhere to their rules in order to import to US. ....Any 124/EURO has EXCELLECT lighting, right from the factory.
Fortunately , one can easily convert the earlier 124 mandated US/DOT system over to superior Euro. And if you have , as stated in my original post, a LATER 124 , it is not needed, as the DOT finally got hip to changing the rules and allowing Imports to have Euro style lens.
Even my 1967 250sl has Euro headlamps , so you can see how far advanced Benz was on lighting.. it was the DOT that gave us bad lighting, not the Benz design engineers..
If your 124 takes HB2-9003 lamps , it is the newer lamps style , .. if it doesn't , it is the earlier style DOT, which are very poor lamps.

Will accept your observations, but the 93 still suits me very well. Come to think of it, tonite I'll line them both up pointed at the garage and then maybe I can see the big picture. Thanks.

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95 SL500 Smoke Silver, Parchment 64K
07 E350 4matic Station Wagon White 34K
02 E320 4Matic Silver/grey 80K
05 F150 Silver 44K

My wife works in Napa and drives the backroads. She started out driving my 83 Turbo wagon which I refuse to sell. I had installed a set of European style Hellas. She loved those lights. They light up either side and way down the road. I bought a real nice 89 300CE with Alpine and six CD changer that cought her eye. Her only complaint is the sucky headlights. Anyone have a source for good aftermarket lights? I'm too old for tricking out cars. I just want to see where I'm going. Also anyone try installing lights from newer 124 into older? There is a lot of styling change. It might not work.

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Auto Zentral Ltd.

You're piling on now,,,,

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95 SL500 Smoke Silver, Parchment 64K
07 E350 4matic Station Wagon White 34K
02 E320 4Matic Silver/grey 80K
05 F150 Silver 44K

Informing ...
...........for those who jump answer a post without reading them.

I agree that the early w124 DOT lights are crap. In any situation where there a bit of ambient light such as street lights, or any glare from rain or even on-coming cars, you can't even tell if the lights are on except on reflective highway signs. Mine were properly aimed.

I just upgraded to Euro's last month, using 55/60w H4 bulbs, and wow, there is a huge difference. I cheaped out and used a set of reproduction units that you can find on ebay, vs the hellas/bosch and I was satisfied by the fit and the performance.

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1970 280SE Cab
1983 300D Euro 4-speed
past MB's:
1971 280SE 3.5 s/r
1981 300D
1985 300TD
1987 300TD

There is a great difference in the quality of bulbs. Even though they are 60W some produce a lot more light than others.