Are upper control arms asymmetrical?
 

I'm replacing the upper control arms on my 1983 300D turbo and the two new ones I have have different width bushings, with the passenger (right) side one about 1/2 inch (~13mm) wider than the other. Is this the way it is supposed to be?

I need to know because the right one won't fit. Either I have the wrong part, or the chassis to my car is nonstandard. Knowing which is the case will make it a lot easier to get the correct part.

thanks.

Uhhh, no. They should be identical with regards to measurements, just mirror images.

One site I looked up, have different part numbers, but I'll agree with MattB, just mirrored.

thanks
 

Thanks, that's what I needed to know.

My parts supplier must have gotten the part mislabeled. That means I'm not going to have to be trying to convince people to send me the right parts for my chassis for the rest of it's life :)

Guess I'm off to the dealer to get the right part today.

BTW, anybody be interested in a w123 UCA R&R DIY? (wow, now that's a lot of TLAs :))

You get a lot of snow in Oregon? Mine has been in the NE all it's life. What a pain in the ass it was to do mine. My problem was the main bolt on the fender. The bolt had siezed onto the metal part inside the bushing. I think one of them took a week of beating to get it out. THAT sucked.:mad:

Replacing the UCA is one of the easiest R&R on the W123. ;)

Heck yeah! that's one of the things on my list to do :)
-nB

I'll bite, what's a UCA?

me and surf n turf just did my UCA's.... when getting the sway bar through and bolting it together with the bushings a floor jack and 2x4 help.. alot.

Upper control Arm. Look in your wheel well. Its bolted to the chasis and the sway bar passes through it and some bushings.

I'm so lucky :) We get a little snow, but not a lot. Unfortunately, we get the frozen rain thing, which glazes the roads with a thin sheet of ice that looks indistinguishable from wet pavement :eek:, which sort of prompted the whole affair. More importantly though, they do the studded tire thing instead of the salt-the-road thing around here -- salt really dissolves cars.

The gear puller made amazingly quick work of the ball joint pin -- put it on and gave the bolt a few rotations and it literally popped right off. Took me a while to realize what had happened because I still hadn't put any force on the wrench -- I thought I was still snugging it up for the real cranking yet to come. Probably all the Kroil I used on the pin and puller threads.

Hardest part so far has been trying to get the incorrect UCA installed. It has a bushing that is 1/2 inch too wide for the pocket in the chassis.. that much was obvious, but it took me all of 10 minutes to figure out it wasn't gonna fit and stop for the night. Good thing too, it allowed me to finally have dinner and think about why it wasn't fitting -- a quick comparison to the old arm convinced me they'd sent me the wrong part or my car had an odd chassis.. hence this thread.

I've been taking pictures as I go. Got the replacement arm from Phil this morning, so hopefully be done tonight (just in time for the freezing temperatures.. and me out under the carport.. at least the mud will be frozen). I think I want to wait till I do drivers side before I post pictures tho -- that way I can make it look like I knew what I was doing :D