Car appreciation... the aesthetics, the engineering, etc

Do any of you use autodoc to buy parts from. Or any other of those parts places.

I do, but haven’t recently. But may well end up buying my DMF from them.

Delivery has been slow, but they have their euro import paperwork sorted so there isn’t any duty to pay (so far in my experience at least).

Yes, as @Nef says, slow delivery but reasonable costs and no problems so far over last three years I have used them.

I realise it's a completely different beast but I have just purchased a NOS set of Peugeot French made dampers for my old 306. Found at a parts supplier locally of all places. The original shocks in the car have done 275,000 kilometres and are still in perfect condition but figure a fresh set wouldn't hurt to have considering they were $180! Proves that they did make them better back then. Properly made, correctly tuned and valved and perfectly matched without any need for electricals etc.

For the Merc, do any aftermarket dampers maintain the adjustability and work with the factory setup?

@Nef @Fixedwheelnut Were autodoc slow pre brexit? Am in France so getting a suspension bush seems to be difficult, but no customs issues.

Were autodoc slow pre brexit?

Yes, as far as I can remember.

@lynx yes before was about 1-2 weeks, now 2-4 weeks so don't bother if you need it urgently :)

I’m changing the webasto sunroof cover on my car. I’ve had to pull out the whole unit out of the fibreglass roof. When doing this I’ve finally found the cars original colour - Brun Scarabee.
The cables in the sunroof were snapped and rusted .
It’s taking me hours! But very satisfying 😌

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But at least webasto still have all the parts available....from asking a decade ago on a car of a similar age.

They don’t I’m afraid, very little left for these 90s powered units . The cover was NOS from eBay and the cables and springs from a guy in Belgium.

GLA is quite funny- I'm assuming that the throttle map is rather different from it's E63 sibling as a similar throttle request sees it scoot off very smartly, then the turbo fully spools and you're hanging onto the wheel somewhat, then it's all over and it's changing gear.

By comparison the E63 moves off in a much more controlled manner, and would require a much larger throttle opening to start to scoot in the manner of the GLA - but equally would be just starting to really get going by the time the GLA is changing gear.

Fun for a running around town, and the GLA doesn't notice road imperfections that send a jolt through the E63.

Coz diesel..

Oh, that has changed, unfortunately. Thinking about it, how many people even fit webasto roofs to cars anymore.

Looking back it is closer to 15 years ago that I worked on that Fulvia. The roof was manually operated. I feel old.

Shocks (or, maybe, shock - currently unclear) fitted to the E63. Asked "is the expected lifespan of these fifty thousand miles?" and got "I can't answer that".

Has anyone mentioned Hilary Stones BX van?

In 24,000 miles my Aston went through two sets of front shocks. Depends on who abused it before you.

Is it possible to have them rebuilt rather than replaced? Bilstein will recon theirs for a very reasonable price.

thrytwo

Mis-read as 'thirty two'.

Stupid iPhone keyboard

MB Guildford have replaced (I'm assuming) the fully blown shock, leaving the heavily corroded one in place (again - assumption, but that's the one on back-order from Germany), and the car is ready to collect.

However, and it's only just struck me as odd - they never gave me a quote for the work, just mentioned that it was around £650 per damper unit.

Might mean nothing, but I genuinely don't know what I owe them, currently.

Chap on MB Club website had both of his dampers replaced at 3 years and 18,500 miles - MB offered a 50% discount unprompted on the work.

So! With my 5 miles/52k miles I don't know what their thought process is, but I'm not hugely hopeful.

50k seems like a lot of mileage for a performance shock. I know it's not the same but you wouldn't expect to run the Ohlins on the Porsche for that long without a rebuild, right?

Does suck a bit if they can't be serviced. That's a rip off.

Apropos of not much, I took the nipper to the local drag strip for a test and tune evening yesterday - bloody hell some of the cars are violently fast. I think the quickest was 4.80 odd and nearly 140mph. There was one turbo mustang that got hugely sideways towards the end of the track and let out an enormous bang before coasting through the lights and that still went 5.1. It's fun to watch.

On my DB9 the whole upright assembly needed to be replaced just for a weeping shock. A right piss take. A few months after mine was made Aston sacked off Multimatic for Bilstein, better handling, and that cheap rebuild option.

50k seems like a lot of mileage for a performance shock. I know it's not the same but you wouldn't expect to run the Ohlins on the Porsche for that long without a rebuild, right?

No, the Ohlins need to be rebuilt at pretty short intervals - I'm due now. But they're very high performance shock/damper units.

The stock Bilsteins on the 996 platform are generally good for 100,000k or so.

The adaptive damper units on my E63 are not that special - and the (non-adaptive) dampers on the C55 were going strong at 100,000 miles.

If I'd swapped to track-spec coil-overs then I'd agree, but I think it's poor for the stock units that (I suspect) are common to the more heavily optioned E-Class estates.

Been quoted £710 all in for the DMF on the e46. Seems about right. Probably daft to be committing to chucking cash at the car, but I really like it and I 100% CBA looking for something else/am thoroughly depressed by any of the reasonable alternatives.

Will get diff and gearbox oil done at the same time. Doing an oil and filter change tomorrow myself, and ordering air and cabin filters.
Also asked the guy to have a bit of an inspection to see if there’s anything needing doing. Mate reckons rear control arm bushes is the cause of the minor knocking coming from the rear suspension, so hoping it’s not too spendy to fix. Changing rear shocks and springs wouldn’t be the end of the world.

I’m asking for a raise on Monday, hopefully that’ll help me convince myself that keeping it going isn’t a stupid idea.

Why is it daft? You like the car and getting another that you like will not be straight forward.

Are you sure it has failed. I know that Mondeo dual mass rattle loudly even though, especially after round town driving and if started with out the clutch depressed.

Oils are service even with a sealed for life claim for boxes and diffs.