Can anyone here recommend a source for rear self-levelling shock absorbers for a W140?
Want new, but don't mind after-market if they are decent alternatives.
I am in UK, but don't mind where they come from and am not in any rush, so I can wait for them to be shipped.
I am not proposing to replace these myself, but my regular mechanic (too darn' regular) may not have done this before, so any tips/methodology on replacement?

Regards

 

I have not seen aftermarket struts, but I am onlu speaking for the US, The struts are pretty bulletproof, my service advisor at MB "if they dont leak they are still probably good" the accumulators usually go around a 100K miles.

 

Tks for reply, Peter.
My "e-mail notification of a reply" feature does not seem to be working. I'll look into that later.
I don't know about leaking, and I don't know the difference between a strut and an accumulator in this context, but this shock absorber system has done nearly 200,000 miles and the ride is definitely uneven, left to right.


Symptoms include creaking and groaning from the rear, when going over any unevenness in the road.
Add passengers in the back and luggage and it gets so bad, pedestrians start to look round as I pass - I mean that's why I drive an S600, right? Just not quite in that way .

My mechanic recently replaced some arms in the rear suspension - these had a kind of ball joint with a rubber bush and an eccentric mounting for adjustment - he said they needed replacing anyway (he would say that, wouldn't he?), but this did nothing to solve the problem.

Well, if there are no aftermarket alternatives (are you fairly sure of that?), do you have any links to an official MB source over there? The prices here are way beyond reasonable, even if I am only getting $1.75 to the £1 these days and probably have to pay import duty.

Regards

 

Further to previous post:
My mechanic tells me that the creaking and groaning noises are coming from the struts, so that is why he thinks the struts may need replacing. If it was the case that the struts were fine and the accumulators needed replacing, would we still observe the same symptoms of creaking from the struts?

One of the Sponsors of this site offers Sachs struts for the S600, so that appears to be possible.
Two questions:
There are two strut versions both apparently for S600s - one with ADS and one without ADS.
How do I tell if the ones that I need are with ADS or without? Mine is a January 1996 model, if that helps.

Secondly, the sponsor's website mentions three parts which may be relevant to repairing my problem, the strut, the accumulator and an accumulator valve. The valves seem to be sold as singles, whereas the default for both struts and accumulators is pairs. I am guessing this means that there is only one valve per car but two struts and two accumulators. Does anything I have described suggest I need to order an accumulator valve as well as the accumulators?

Regards

 

e mail philipsee1@yahoo.com if still interested and can providw you with diagrams taken from WIS ASRA (official mercedes benz work shop instruction) we have complete sets of rear suspension parts for yor S600 and I have some one who frequently travel to london. There are good aftermarket brand for your hydraulic rear suspension. we can do an elimination trouble shooting first before you decide to change any part, this is one way to really find out which part needs to be change and which part are still ok .

 

This sounds like what I need, cool.
FWIW, I have now confirmed there is ADS on the car, so the struts that incorporate this would be what I needed, if I needed new struts. I would of course prefer just toreplace the accumulators if that is all that is needed as they are a lot cheaper thanstruts.

Regards