Originally Posted by
onehundred80
Thanks for your response, as you can see my main point is the initial deformation of the springs. I realize the problems of making springs that are required to meet certain elastic and tension specifications but it can be done. Using such a spring and reverse engineering the pulley to keep the rear clutch plate face to the rear bearing face the same the OEM shim would be the correct size. There would be no run in period and all would be rosy.
The rivet orientation should be like the OEM ones, rivet head against the spring.
Actually Mercedes specifies a break-in period for the OEM pulley when it's replaced. The metallurgic composition of all the components and especially the temper properties of the dog bones on this pulley are closer to OEM than that of any other manufacturer and that isn't by chance. That being said, I've got a bag of them to compare against if you'd like to dismantle your own pulley for further testing.