I've just spent a week of our Christmas holidays in the Lake District (a very hilly part of the UK with some great roads), but the pleasure of driving on such great roads was let down badly by the Crossfires terrible handling.

My previous car was a Lotus Elise so I guess it's a little unfair to compare one with another, but I must get something done with the suspension, the car just rocks around like a boat.

I've looked at some upgrade kits which come with lowering springs and upgraded shocks. The concern I have is that because the set up is VERY bad to start with, would an upgrade kit only get it to bad .

If the crossfire is based on the SLK platform (R170 chassis) could I fit Merc upgraded springs and shocks to the crossfire??

So I guess two questions:
1) Has anybody upgraded their suspension with one of the aftermarket kits such as Bilstein or Koni, and if so what kit and what sort of improvement did you get??
2) Are the SLK suspension components a direct fit on to the crossfire, I know in therory they should be, but has anybody done this and can confirm they are identical.

Thanks,

Mike

 

Out of curiosity, what do you mean by "terrible handling"? Oversteer? Understeer? Body Lean?

With respect, the Crossfire's suspension was regarded by many auto journalists as being extraordinary out of the box in slalom and braking.

In any case, a couple of users on here have installed Konis on their Crossfires and done well in competition. Koni makes Crossfire specific shocks.

 

When I say "terrible handling" what I mean is "body roll". The cars set up is very soft and bounces around to much for me. It provides little feedback through the steering and as such does not make for an enjoyable roadster driving experience, espacially in the Lake District where the roads are just over 6ft wide and dry stone walls on both sides, or worse, a dry stone wall on one side and just a massive drop on the other.

Other people may think different about the handling but I guess it depends on the bench mark to which you are comparing it. It is well known that US spec cars typically have a softer set up than european cars, and compared to other roadsters I have owned in the past the crossfire has "terrible handling", my opinion! Other than that, for the price, the car has a good spec, and based on Mercedes engineering, is a good car. Just need to sort out the suspension.

Cheers,

Mike

 

There's actually a lot of options for our suspension since this is really a R170 chassis.

Fully Adjustable Coilover Kits:
Ksport Coilover
KW Coilover

Matching Spring/Shock/Struts:
ST Suspension
H&R Suspension

Then of course you have shocks by, Koni, AGX and a lot of others (easy stuff to find). LOTS of spring choices (H&R, Eibach, etc etc). And H&R makes upgraded sway bars for our car. Then you can go to energy suspension for our suspension bushings, they have a kit for the R170 chassis that will work on our cars.

Then if you wanted to get really crazy and do tubular A-Arms and suspension pieces with HEIM links and get rid of the bushings all together (if you came from an Elise you shouldn't mind the squeeks, groans and rattles that these things would bring). Custom race shops can do this for you for a nominal fee (several thousand ).

The basics are already there for our car because it's based on the R170 underpinnings, but anything is possible with enough money.

 

Swaybars are the quick, cheap, easy way to help a little with body roll...the front will help a bit with the steering too. Unfortunately, the steering is the worst part of the car...the overboosted recirculating ball isn't ever going to be great, regardless of what you do suspension wise.
Shorter stiffer springs with matched dampers would be the next step...doing shocks alone isn't really going to change things that much in the body roll dept.

 

Mike, unfortunately, if you want feedback through the steering you're not going to get much if any. The Crossfire uses a recirculating ball steering system which is Mercede's old school design at work (this type of steering used to be considered luxurious). The steering rack uses a worm gear instead of a straight gear, which prevents wheel movement from turning the steering wheel.

Short of swapping the steering rack for a rack and pinion aftermarket or mercedes unit, you're not going to be able to change your steering feel.

Good luck with the car! It's a good one.