Wow , got price shock at what the fix would be on mine, not pleasant when you find out your vehicle needs major suspension surgery when normal shocks are so affordable. I guess thats what really gets at wagon owners like myself, a more reasonably priced alternative is not available.. The majority of people have not gone the route of transplanting a different setup and Im guessing this is why.

The 1979 wagon, which i have ,if im not mistaken , has the same wheelbase as the coupe ,and the sedan. Taking and changing the wheel base for one particular body is expensive in assembly production and if youve every seen pictures of Mercedes assembly ,they flip the bodies around from their tube jacking post points on the body.The suspension , I imagine ,uses this system due to amount of overhang from axle to rear bumper.This problem was probably found out at its road performance testing in intial trials . Combinations of shocks with weight and load test were conducted to find its best middle ground .Since this was going to be a hauler too,great engineering with a lot of extra cost went into making this system an effective performer. Im sure this is why were still looking at a sizable cost for repair of it.