C63 PPP - KW V3 Coilovers

[Palmball]

Cheers Jack..informative as always.

I'm going to concentrate on getting what I've got working as best it can for now and then I think it'll be sufficient for me. Indeed, just driving it now is a relevation and it's not even finished properly!

 

[NISFAN]

^^^ Interesting view. Many would suggest ARB's first, especially on a road car that has restricted geo set up options.

I don't really know much about ARB's - the benefits aren't hard to work out but what are the downsides or compromises?

Stiffer ARB's will give you a flatter cornering stance, without the need to go 'stiff' on the dampers. All good. Negatives will mean there is less comunication at the point of limit. The car will go into a slide more violently than on softer ARB settings. So cornering speeds will be higher, but with less feel of impending slide.

 

[Jack Wood]

^^^ Interesting view. Many would suggest ARB's first, especially on a road car that has restricted geo set up options.




Stiffer ARB's will give you a flatter cornering stance, without the need to go 'stiff' on the dampers. All good. Negatives will mean there is less comunication at the point of limit. The car will go into a slide more violently than on softer ARB settings. So cornering speeds will be higher, but with less feel of impending slide.

Well you can't fix body roll with geo, but you can with dampers.

ARBs are a cheap and quick way to reduce roll, if that is all you are interested in. Most people would assume that having a flatter stance equates to better handling, and if they are happy with having that, then that is great. But they can also have detrimental effect on ride and handling. It depends what you want "your" handling to feel like. Basically, all the components of geo, damping and ARB all work together as a package, and it's rare to be able to change one aspect without effecting one of the others. Or rather needing to change one of the others.

 

[petermansell]

I'm no expert. The reason I suggested adjusting the ARBs was because I really liked my CLK55 (209) save for its understeer and fitting adjustable H&R ARBs did the job. Now the car doesn't understeer anywhere near so much.

 

[NISFAN]

I'm no expert. The reason I suggested adjusting the ARBs was because I really liked my CLK55 (209) save for its understeer and fitting adjustable H&R ARBs did the job. Now the car doesn't understeer anywhere near so much.

Yes it is quite common for manufacturers to set the car up with understeer, as it is the safe option. Stiffer rear ARB sorts that out most of the time.

 

[NISFAN]

Well you can't fix body roll with geo, but you can with dampers.

ARBs are a cheap and quick way to reduce roll, if that is all you are interested in. Most people would assume that having a flatter stance equates to better handling, and if they are happy with having that, then that is great. But they can also have detrimental effect on ride and handling. It depends what you want "your" handling to feel like. Basically, all the components of geo, damping and ARB all work together as a package, and it's rare to be able to change one aspect without effecting one of the others. Or rather needing to change one of the others.

Sure stiffening dampers has an effect on body roll, but dampers are not primarily used to reduce body roll, that is the job of the ARB.

 

[whitenemesis]

Yes it is quite common for manufacturers to set the car up with understeer, as it is the safe option. Stiffer rear ARB sorts that out most of the time.

Stiffer? Wouldn't you go softer to allow a little rear end roll to induce oversteer?

 

[NISFAN]

No, for complicated reasons, normally with ARB's what you do to the front effects the rear, and vice versa. A stiffer rear bar will make the front follow steering input more closely, hence less understeer.

 

[Palmball]

Well, I am definitely no expert (hence I use others knowledge all the time!) but what I can say is that just changing the springs and dampers alone have almost killed the body roll.

Yes, it is stiffer but even with the damping rate turned down a bit (as it is now on the front) there is still very little roll...much less than say my 2009 Performance Pack C63 which had very stiff stock suspension.

 

[whitenemesis]

No, for complicated reasons, normally with ARB's what you do to the front effects the rear, and vice versa. A stiffer rear bar will make the front follow steering input more closely, hence less understeer.

Well, yes, it's relative to the other end..

 

[The _Don]

Lovely car with some excellent upgrades!

 

[Palmball]

Not happy

I went back to CPR today and spent the day there 'refining' my suspension further to try some different settings. Firstly, another shout out for these guys...I was there from 10am until 6pm today and they worked on my car solidly helping me try different settings, drilling holes (see below!) and also taking my brakes apart to deglaze them after my Nurburgring trip last week. And Max charged me just 2 hours labour at £65 an hour! Bargain.

My first observation is how good Uli got the front suspension set up in Germany as this hasn't really needed changing. However, Uli couldn't do the rear suspension in the time he had as the whole damper needed to come off....the top of it is sealed by a covering plate on the cars' bodywork.

NOT ANYMORE!

The guys at CPW spend a long time (hours!) removing the rear damper so I could have a play about with the settings. To make matters easier in future, I asked if they would make a small hole in the metal plate covering the top of the rear damper so I could adjust it without needing to take it off the car. They weren't exactly overjoyed at the prospect of drilling my new car but I eventually convinced them and they did a great job - a nice neat (and very small) hole which is covered with a removable grommet and thus allowing me to make adjustments at my leisure. The hole has been done so well it actually looks like a factory finish!

Anyway, this finally allowed me to dial in a lot more compliance into the rear end and I seriously think I'm almost there - the compromise between ride stiffness and handling is now very good and I can confidently say it has a more comfortable ride than my previous PP C63 whilst maintaining the wonderfully flat cornering!

So, what am I NOT happy about??

Remember that (very expensive) Brabus tune?

Well, the car went on the dyno again today and with virtually identical conditions and on the same dyno, it barely made anymore power than standard

Of course, it's not just as simple as that, so let me explain....

The Brabus kit claims to put out 520PS...that's 513bhp in our money. On the rolling road today, my car with Brabus put out 511.9 bhp which was almost bang on their claim.

But of course my particular car (and probably most Performance Pack Plus equipped C63's) put out 506.9bhp in standard tune when I had it dyno'd last week. So whilst the Brabus kit seems to deliver what Brabus claim, my issue is that the it just doesn't give any real improvement to a car fitted with Performance Pack Plus.

So, is that Brabus's problem that my car was so strong in the first place?

I'm not sure...but I did make it very clear that I did have a PPP C63 and although they said I should still see improvement, to end up with nothing at all for my considerable spend (4bhp at this level is nothing!) isn't really acceptable and IMO they shouldn't be selling this kit to customers with a PPP equipped C63.

To be fair to them, they probably wouldn't have known this as I'm probably the first person to get a B63 kit for a PPP C63, however any tuning company I've come across in the past will always offer to refund and take the tune off the car if you're not happy. In this case, I'm not happy so it'll be interesting to see how Brabus respond to my request for a refund on Monday!

Heres a few photo's from today....

On the dyno

What it looked like for most of the day...

Andy, their technician drilling the required holes !

The drill coming through the bodywork

The final finished result of the drilling with a nice neat perfectly placed grommet!

My cracked brake pads (I was told off for not bedding them in properly when i got the car )...

And finally for a giggle...below is an exhaust that they took off another car. The exhaust is custom made by Hayward & Scott and just look at the hideous quality of this fabrication....


Check out the dents in the headers where they've had to improvise to get them to fit round the steering column (rather than design it properly in the first place)

And look at this wonderfully symmetrical centre section with some particularly sharp angles to (NOT!) help the exhaust flow

And the car this came off was none other than an E63 AMG which was having some quality Kleeman kit fitted to replace that lot!

 

[BenzedUP]

WOW, you modified the car so nicely man, well done, nice beast you have, i'm sure this will see off more or less any car on the road.

that brabus kit didnt really do much, you would have been better off with an ECU remap, it will deffo give you more than 5 or 6bhp you gained from brabus.

I reckon it would have taken it to 525+bhp Nice car though has to be the best C63 out there unless some crazy guy has added a supercharger somewhere, lol.

 

[Simon_M]

Bummer about the Brabus, but do they claim the kit gets a standard C63 @ 451bhp up to 513bhp?

 

[NISFAN]

Just make sure the the drill hole was painted before fitting the grommet. That area will get wet and exposed to road salt, so will corrode really quick.

Regarding the pad cracks, I wonder what material MB use for the C63? If you will be regularly doing track days, hard driving, I would go for some better high temperature pads, like EBC Red stuff, or yellow stuff, Mintex 1144, etc.

The Brabus engine tune is a essentially a re-map, probably done via a tuning box. If your car already has a more progressive map (don't know anything about the PPP set-up, but perhaps already has a revised map???), then the Brabus kit, or any re-mapping for that matter, has less opportunity to improve the power.

I don't think the dealer would expect the average C63 owner to actually dyno test before and after

Never underestimate the plecebo effect

Thanks for sharing all this info, it is good to read about modifications to an already capable car

 

[Palmball]

Thanks for the feedback guys!

Firstly with regards to the Brabus map, it does actually 'feel' perceptibly faster but Max told me this is likely due to a different throttle map giving me more power for less throttle travel - regardless of how it feels, there isn't actually anymore grunt available.

TBH I'm very frustrated with myself as I came soooo close to getting the Kleeman kit for less money which would have given me a nice 540bhp and saved me a few quid. The reason? It has hardware changes, in particular headers and less restrictive cat's

I bottled it and got the Brabus kit as I thought it was the ultimate brand in Mercedes tuning and being supplied by MB, would not risk any warranty on the car! Oh well, you live and learn but I'm still going to attempt to get my money back!

NISFAN - you're right, MB are going to be a bit shocked when I present them with the facts as I'm sure most people wouldn't have bothered with a before and after comparison! Also, the area where the hole was drilled is actually sealed (by the damper) but yes, I will be covering it with paint today just to make sure


Simon - yes exactly...if you have a non Plus C63 then I guess the gains are well worth it! They just shouldn't have sold it to me knowing I had a PPP but then I don't think they'll have come across this situation yet!

 

[mercboiuk]

Another excellent additional write-up, Palmball. Thanks

I'm sorry to hear your Brabus upgrade hasn't gone to plan.
Assuming to do get your money back, will you then do for the Kleemann option, or just leave the engine alone?

Darren

 

[Maff]

Hi Palmball,

Good news on the suspension work, I would love to have a ride in your car if we ever make it to a GTG, to feel how a C63 should ride!

Bad news on the Brabus upgrade though. I must admit when I drove the DR520 car at Goodwood I could not feel it being any faster than a C63 PPP, but could tell the difference was noticeable between the PPP and non PPP cars.

The trouble is at ~500bhp you are going to need a 20 to 30bhp increase before you can even feel the difference, and I think with the stronger PPP engines you will be hard pushed to release that kind of power from a PPP engine without other mods (such as air intake, headers and/or exhaust work)

Fingers crossed you can get the money back from Brabus though.

Matt.

 

[Palmball]

Another excellent additional write-up, Palmball. Thanks

I'm sorry to hear your Brabus upgrade hasn't gone to plan.
Assuming to do get your money back, will you then do for the Kleemann option, or just leave the engine alone?

Darren

Thanks Darren.

I haven't decided yet what I'll do if I get a refund but it is likely I will probably go for a Kleeman K2 or K3 tune which are proven to give a reliable 540-550bhp due to the minor hardware changes that it gives.

It's what I should have done in the first place.

Hi Palmball,

Good news on the suspension work, I would love to have a ride in your car if we ever make it to a GTG, to feel how a C63 should ride!

Bad news on the Brabus upgrade though. I must admit when I drove the DR520 car at Goodwood I could not feel it being any faster than a C63 PPP, but could tell the difference was noticeable between the PPP and non PPP cars.

The trouble is at ~500bhp you are going to need a 20 to 30bhp increase before you can even feel the difference, and I think with the stronger PPP engines you will be hard pushed to release that kind of power from a PPP engine without other mods (such as air intake, headers and/or exhaust work)

Fingers crossed you can get the money back from Brabus though.

Matt.

Thanks Matt!! I've spent yet more hours today refining my set up and I'm now extremely happy with how it drives. The thing is, it now seems normal and I've already forgotten how it drove before!

I don't understand why MB have used the Brabus kit on a PPP C63 to make the DR520 as it seriously makes no more power! What they haven't taken into account is that the PPP C63 seems to make more power than AMG quote...what's the bet that MB UK didn't even dyno a C63 PPP before considering the DR520??

CPR are emailing my all the dyno graphs tomorrow - I'll put them up on here and you'll be able to see that at certain parts of the rev range, the Brabus tune is performing worse than the standard car! Of course, theres also parts where it does better but on the whole the difference either way is so minor.

Totally agree about the hardware changes needed - I just wish I had the balls to do that in the first place!

 

[NISFAN]

I wonder whether Brabus did the mapping on a standard exhaust system, or with the Brabus sport cats fitted, when they set them up? There are two kits for the C63, one has another 10bhp but needs the cats replacing. Sounds like the Kleeman offers alot more in any case, does the kleeman kit use uprated camshafts?

What fuel do you use?