Cannons CLS320 CDI W219 project - make it low

[Cannnon]

Hi all,

So I was told to start up a project thread by a few members as they have seen my previous projects and cars that I have "played" with,

to give you guys an idea of my work:

Before:

After:

And:

Before:

After:

and finally:

to this:

to this:

Anyway I have some plans for the CLS, which follow my normal trait or Wider... Lower... Faster... Cleaner..

So thought a project thread would be suited for this one,


So Easter Sunday I picked up a 2008 Mercedes CLS 320CDI W219, car was very clean, no dents, no scuffs, no marks, facelift model and MBSH,
and the price was very very good. Colour was a bit of an odd one in a metallic burgandy red (not sure of factory name), Cream/beige leathers and matt wood trim, 7 speed gearbox and not a single mark on the interior.

Got the car back an immediately set to work polishing up the exhausts and tracking down the 2014 Maps for the Command NTS2.5 (Mainly as it panicked when I was going through the Hindhead tunnell and thought it was on a collision course in a field)

For Sale Pics:

Before and after image of the zausts,

Got the car booked in with a friend at Clarity Automotive for a stage 2 paint correction and clean inside and out (and yes some stripey work on the interior carpets) and then got my personal plates on the car.

Obligatory Beading shot

Set about tidying up the car generally and cleaning it up, so got the old library card and wd40 outand set about removing the rear badges to clean up the boot,

And then set about the rest of the car tweaking, first things first, after a bit of a big hit with a pothole I needed to replace my thrust arm bushes, so ended up with a new set of arms as well, and some rear lower bushes whilst there:

Old Vs New

More to come in the next post

comments welcome

 

[Cannnon]

SO carrying on,

after whipping the rear badges off noted that the plastic chip guards on the side of the car were quite grey, so bit of polish on them and a quick touch up did the job (yes it would have been easier to buy new plastic chip guards but I didnt think of that at the time)

popped up to see the lovely chaps at Prestige, car came away with a few more horsies and torque, also grabbed 10 litres of mercedes oil and an oil filter, and a turbo oil seal for the front of the turbo as mine was getting a bit loose,

Also noted that it sounded a bit blocked up, so popped down to eurocarparts and grabbed myself a set of air filters, (unfortunately the chaps didnt have any)

note to everyone... check your air filters... I pulled out a few cigarettes, moths and general rubbish from both of mine,

Car had a proper service with filters, oil, general checkover, MOT etc, the only thing I need to do is book into see the chaps at Prestige again and get them to do me a Gearbox oil change, as these are a nightmare without the proper kit.

Also found myself some inspiration... and a deeper hole in my pocket.. So if anyone wants to give me their AMG front bumper/entire AMG kit then you are welcome too, and a lip/chin spoiler... and your air ride. as I am on springs...

 

[Cannnon]

So Another little update,

Decided on a set of wheels, managed to find some coilovers for the car that weren't a million pounds (couldnt justify £3.5k+ for airride to be installed) and also found myself a nice set of PCD converters so that I could run the wheels I wanted and a bit stronger offsets,

the issue I had was the wheels I wanted are only available in 5x114.3 or 5x120, now as we know Mercs are 5x112 so this was my first issue, run 'wobble' bolts - yes the name is that concerning, or get some PCD adaptors and run those, the safer and more obvious choice, but requiring a bit more investment.

for those of you who dont know what a PCD Converter is.. quite simply, it is a hubcentric spacer, which bolts to your existing hub, and allows you to change your cars PCD from say 5x112 to 5x120, allowing BMW/Land Rover wheels to fit to your car safely, now I have run these before on many of my cars, I ran Land Rover wheels on one of my old saabs and never had an issue ->>

Anyway I managed to find a set of the wheels, brand new from the UK Supplier in the sizes I wanted, well.... the sizes I could afford at this time as there was a 6 month wait for the 20x11j size, so ended up with a set of 18x9j et35 and 18x10.5j et 20, which running a 15mm pcd converter will make them 18x9j et20, and 18x10.5j et5

so a little bit of tyre stretch may be neeed for these to fit on the rear, I generally use www.willtheyfit.com to help me with my calculations and to ensure I havent gone too crazy, the rears sit about 41mm stronger than the stock wheels on the CLS so I am hoping I have enough camber, stretch and flare to allow these to tuck,

Anyway took deliver of them the next day quite happy with the amount of dish on the rears, although would have like to run those on the front and wider on the back

Also took delivery of the coilovers, after many many hours of searching for someone who made them for the CLS other than H&R, these guys came up trumps and have some amazing reviews from other forums on the coilovers and other applications of their suspension,

:bannana:

so watch this space,

 

[clk208]

Happy CLSing, looks like a fun project.

How did you get those carpet stripes?!

 

[herby thr cls]

going to look great, cant wait to see it, keep em coming

 

[BIRMA]

Hi Cannon looking good so far, just remember with Mercs you can go into bad taste 'pimp my ride' if you're not careful.

 

[Cannnon]

Hi Cannon looking good so far, just remember with Mercs you can go into bad taste 'pimp my ride' if you're not careful.

absolutely agree, I am not aiming for this lol:

as I said, I like my cars Low, Wide and with a decent bit of power behind them,

With the car being on 18s instead of the normal 20" wheels that people go for as an upgrade, or the 19" AMG wheels, but with the wheels being a bit wider it means I am going to have to run very low but not get the benefit of additional 1/2 to 1" chassic clerance gained by having larger wheels, which means I am more susceptable to the top of the arm at the front of the suspension that is connected to the upper balljoint hitting the top of the inner arch when hitting bumps, something I have come across before in my other cars that ran dual wishbone setups,

but dont worry, for every problem.... there is a beer and turning the radio up to ignore it... .. ... ... I mean a solution...... haha

 

[Cannnon]

Happy CLSing, looks like a fun project.

How did you get those carpet stripes?!

shampoo the carpets and get them clean, then you vac them in the opposing directions with a smaller vac head,

I do it on my run in my lounge room now too haha

 

[alex89]

Awesome. Seriously like the direction this is going in.

I've borrowed my mates cls55 a few times and am in love with these things. I keep trying to make him lower it but he refuses, although one of the standard airmatic bags is on its way out at the moment so he may well be persuaded by those coilovers. Let us know how they handle?

 

[Cannnon]

Yeah will do. I have been in a few other cars running them and they are comfy and not too hard. But you can adjust them to make them harder and stiffer

 

[MWCLS]

Subscribed, the stone chips guards are only £12 quid a side from MB.

 

[clk208]

Subscribed, the stone chips guards are only £12 quid a side from MB.

They are by all accounts a complete bugger to fit though and best left to the pros apparently. I have one waiting to go on currently when I get chance to take it somewhere.

 

[MWCLS]

They are by all accounts a complete bugger to fit though and best left to the pros apparently. I have one waiting to go on currently when I get chance to take it somewhere.

I heard the same, my car is in the bodyshop at present, they removed the old ones and the paint was as good as new underneath. They've even got a specialist in to fit the new ones.

The bodyshop guys said they are pita hence I assume some sort of vehicle wrapping company applying them.

 

[Cannnon]

I have a vinyl guy he can do it.. he is also my cnc guy

 

[Cannnon]

so had an operation today, and the wife went to work after and left me to recover at home,

asked her if there was anything I could do to help out, she said I could clean some dishes...

So I set to work...


not sure if this is what she meant but I was happy



Rears:

and the fronts

I suppose I should get some rubber on them and get them fitted now...

 

[Abb]

Nice plans for it. Good to see someone stray from the OEM look! Looking foward to the updates!

 

[Cannnon]

so Popped down to the workshop on Saturday and set to work on the car,

Needed some new pads front and rear so thought while the wheels were off maybe its time to fit the new toys, PCD Adaptors, Coils and Wheels,

New Vs Old comparison of Front Shocks

Fitted Shock - Now in traditional style normally I would have just wound these down as far as physically possible and had the car sitting right down on the adjustment, but as this is a daily driven Merc Cls and I have a few rubber speed bumps to crawl over, I thought maybe we would start with a little drop of about 80mm and work from there.

As you can see here, plently of thread left to wind it down for shows, and plenty to raise it up if needs be.

Test fit of front wheels and ride height without tyre, was hoping the front would allow a small amount of camber to tuck the wheel at the top to remove any chance of arch contact,

I was lucky

Tyre on and test fit of suspension when car is not under load - so basically how much I would need to jack it up to take the wheels off in the future... turns out really not very far... haha

So this is prettymuch where we got to while I had battery, then it died..

Ended up with the following fitment from the wheels

18x9j et20 with 225/45/18 stretched on the 9j (not much stretch but was really worried about contact and clearance) I think I could go to a 245/40

Rears: 18x10.5j et5 with a 255/40/18 stretched on, now I didnt realise how happily the rears swallowed the wheels as most of you will be running 10.5/11j rears in an et of 20-30 especially on the american MB forums which I was stalking, so to make sure these would fit I went for the stretched rubber. If I had known I would have stayed with the 275/35/18 I was already running on the rears, but just means I have a bit more clearance for now and a spare set of rubber for the winter.

SO... A FEW DISCLAIMERS:

So the rest of the pics are from the car being completed, but please note
THE RIDE HEIGHT IS NOT SETTLED YET - expect it to drop between 10-20mm once the springs settle, I have also not put the centre caps on the wheels yet, that is happening when I pick the car up tonight and give it a road test and check how it all feels,

I also need to find somewhere with a flat ramp to get the car aligned and the wheels setup properly to remove any unwanted toe and reduce the camber a bit. I also need to clean the car as it is filthy, and need to clean off the sealant from the tyres where they have been fitted to the rims,

but for your viewing pleasure.. some crappy phone pics of a 90% complete car:

feel free to comment,

some better pics later

but overall... a very happy chap

 

[Mike Walker]

As said before I think threads like this are excellent. Keep it going!

 

[Mc1]

Now that looks great but how practical will it be?

 

[7om]

I wasn't sure when you mentioned 18" but that works really well.