Lowering links to SL55

Lowering links to SL55

Author
Discussion

Candellara

Original Poster:

1,886 posts

187 months

Tuesday 27th November 2018
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Anyone fitted lowering links to their Mercedes with ABC suspension?

Which are the best to buy and how do you set if you only wish to drop the car by say 1"

Riversides

89 posts

190 months

Wednesday 28th November 2018
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I fitted lowering links on my SL55 a couple of years ago. Think they were from Airmatic Lowering Links. If I recall there are instructions giving a rough indication on where to set the link length in terms of the overall drop. To be honest, its really trial and error to have them exactly the way you want them on your car. Be careful taking the old links off not to break anything. One of mine was stuck and too much force resulted in me breaking the plastic arm on one of the level sensors. I had to make a mini splint and cover it in epoxy to fix it which was a bit of a bodge really!
It looked good, but it certainly firmed up the suspension on the lowest setting - pushing the ABC button to the middle height setting would put the car back to stock height and ride comfort however.

Riversides

89 posts

190 months

Wednesday 28th November 2018
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This is how it looked with BBS LMs after the drop

anonymous-user

59 months

Wednesday 28th November 2018
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Riversides said:


This is how it looked with BBS LMs after the drop
Very nice!

Candellara

Original Poster:

1,886 posts

187 months

Thursday 29th November 2018
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That looks great.

I think i'll do this route as it's simple to return the car to completely standard. I only want to drop it about an inch from the sport setting

How much did you lower by? Love the BBS rims 20"? or 19"

Riversides

89 posts

190 months

Thursday 29th November 2018
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I didn't really measure the drop. It was more of a case of messing around until the wheels filled the arches without rubbing. The BBS alloys were 19 inch - 9.5j front and 11j rear. Bought them 2nd hand - quite a rare wheel to find these days in the correct fitment.

Edited by Riversides on Thursday 29th November 18:03

Candellara

Original Poster:

1,886 posts

187 months

Sunday 9th December 2018
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Well,

Fitted the lowering links - a lot more of a faff than the instructions lead you to believe (especially the rear) as I was particularly careful not to damage the sensor arms.

The instructions recommend an 8mm adjustment on the links (longer at the front and shorter at the rear) but I opted to do just 5mm as this is supposed to represent a 28mm chassis drop

Well, suspension is definitely a lot lower but I made the schoolboy error of not measuring the original ride height - dooh!

Can any 55 owner with standard ride height measure group to wheel arch for me - front & rear. Thanks if anyone can help

EDIT: If anyone can measure - can you do it with ABC in sport mode

My car is now (in sport) Front 655mm from floor to wheel arch and rear is 675mm


Edited by Candellara on Sunday 9th December 14:26

Candellara

Original Poster:

1,886 posts

187 months

Sunday 30th December 2018
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After a bit of tinkering, got the height to exactly where I want it - which is a uniform 1.5" drop

The car looks ten times better IMO and is how it should have left the factory as I always thought the ride height was too high

Looks great now and by only dropping a small amount shouldn't be too bad in terms of inner tyre wear. By running the car with the suspension in position 1, the car runs as standard height