Tump43: have you dyno'd you car?

[C280Sportster]

I would go ahead and Dyno it or are you waiting till after the UD pulleys are on?

I'm curios as to what a C43 car do, and you have done a lot to yours.

There is a 1999 C43 at my local dealer for $25000...I might go take a look..

[Tump43]

I haven't dyno'd the car yet. I will probably do so after the udp set is installed, the air box modified and the the control arm bushings replaced with the 190E 16 valve Sportline solid bushings.

I am also somewhat interested in the Powerchip Gold93. I may get that later -- or I may get a supercharger. A number of members at amg-owners-club.org do not recomend supercharging the C43 and they claim that the smaller M113 is not built to handle it. They claim a 55 M113 would be fine. I think the 55 and 43 internals are the same except for bore and stroke. However, a couple of members here have supercharged a CLK430, an E420 and a C43. I do not know if they have experienced any problems or not. Do you know?

Do you have any good info on supercharging? I do know that if you do the chip and pulleys you will have to remove those mods before supercharging.

Thanks

[Tump43]

Oh yea!

Go check out the C43, you will like it a lot better than the C280 if you are interested in performance. $25K is not a bad price if the car is in good shape and under 80K miles. Buy the extended Starmark if you can, it's well worth it.

[Rocket]

I paid $9900 for a 1995 C36 with 80K... It was a great deal for an amazing car! :) My point is look at the C36 as well.


Originally posted by Tump43
Oh yea!

Go check out the C43, you will like it a lot better than the C280 if you are interested in performance. $25K is not a bad price if the car is in good shape and under 80K miles. Buy the extended Starmark if you can, it's well worth it.

[C280Sportster]

Originally posted by Rocket
I paid $9900 for a 1995 C36 with 80K... It was a great deal for an amazing car! :) My point is look at the C36 as well.

If I can find one for that price I'd jump on it!

[speedybenz]

Marc,

Fill us in on the solid front bushings. Are they a direct fit?

C280Sportster, If you have a V6 engine I would consider keeping your car. While the C43 is quite a bit faster in a straight line the C280 out handles the C43 without as much work needed to dail it in.

But my C43 does run 0-60 times in about 5.5 secs without a supercharger. Removing all the weight you can will make a big difference. If you don't have very light wheels get some. Maybe even some 16"x8" whels and run 245/45/16 all around.

My car has a dual 2.5" exhaust, Magnecor wires and Denso Irdium plugs, highly moded airbox, a complete and sealed ram air system, ported and modified the intake runner lengths of the intake manifold, phenolic spacers, ford truck PVC valves attached to all the crankcase vents(it allows a slight vacuum in the cases), Evosport UD pulleys, removed the clutch fan, Mobil ATF, Redline lightweight shockproof gear oil in the diff., MAS bored out from 72mm to 80mm.

Jeff

[C280Sportster]

Originally posted by speedybenz
Marc,

Fill us in on the solid front bushings. Are they a direct fit?

C280Sportster, If you have a V6 engine I would consider keeping your car. While the C43 is quite a bit faster in a straight line the C280 out handles the C43 without as much work needed to dail it in.

But my C43 does run 0-60 times in about 5.5 secs without a supercharger. Removing all the weight you can will make a big difference. If you don't have very light wheels get some. Maybe even some 16"x8" whels and run 245/45/16 all around.

My car has a dual 2.5" exhaust, Magnecor wires and Denso Irdium plugs, highly moded airbox, a complete and sealed ram air system, ported and modified the intake runner lengths of the intake manifold, phenolic spacers, ford truck PVC valves attached to all the crankcase vents(it allows a slight vacuum in the cases), Evosport UD pulleys, removed the clutch fan, Mobil ATF, Redline lightweight shockproof gear oil in the diff., MAS bored out from 72mm to 80mm.

Jeff

Hey, I have to say thank you for pimping my C280. I was taking some turns (the wide, sweeping, and forgiving type) and my friend in a Jetta was following me, or trying to follow me. When we parked he said "you car can totally out handle mine, I couldn't keep up". I was shocked, it must be the sport suspension (AMG parts).

Did you see the link I posted about the C43 beating a C32 around a track in Germany! Go W202!

[Tump43]

Jeff --

I haven't done the lower control arm bushings yet but when I do I'll post immediately. Looks like a couple more weeks.

I started modding my air box ( I dremeled out the cross bars on the top of the box, pulled out the screen where the box fits over the air intake, removed the screen just on top of the MAS, retained the plastic insert with square hole and dremeled out the covers on the grill in front of the air hoses leading into the air box). I will soon place heat insulation on the bottom of the air box and around the intake hoses leading from the grill to the airbox.

Please post a little more detail on what you did to your air box so that I can copy your modifications. Also, where did you purchase that cool hexagone hole insert that replaced the plastic insert (I guess these are air straighteners)? And how do I accomplish the PVC modification?

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

[knemeth]

Marc,

I was just looking at the mods you have made to your car and noticed that you have the AMG drilled rotors. I have a 1999 C43 and have been looking for drilled rotors ever since I bought my new wheels. Since I don't want to buy a big brake kit for $$$ I am just looking for the rotors. I can't find any for the C43 though. Where did you get yours, are they off of another MB or did you get them made? Any help would be appreciated.

[Tump43]

knemeth --

I went through a local tuner "Lorenzo Cutsom Cars" in Westchester, New York (914) 447-1623 (apparently they are very well know and written up in enthusiast magazines), ask for JD and tell him that Marc w/ the black C43 sent you. He got a set of drilled C43 AMG rotors for me. I believe that these rotors came from KVR in Ontario, Canada. At least the rotors I got were definately the OE AMG rotors for our cars with an agreesive hole pattern, and they came in a box from KVR. His price was $1,300.00 for the front and back rotors. It may be less expensive to contact KVR themselves (by phone) and try to order the Rotors through them. KVR Performance is on the Web but they don't advertise C43 Brakes and they don't seem to answer email questions.

In the long run it would probably be cheaper to get the Brakeman, Brembo or C32 AMG caliper and rotor set for your C43. All of these options have been discussed on this site and range in price from $700 plus custom work to $3,330. The best thing to do from a performance stand point, according to our resident performance expert, SpeedyBenz, is to get the lightest rotors and calipers possible that will work as well as stock or better. Keeping unsprung weight to a minimum gives the maximum performance advantage.

I now want lighter wheels ( the HRE 540 series in 17") (18 lbs each!) (anybody have a set they want to sell?) and probably the Brakeman kit when I think I can convince my wife that this is a "necessary" expense, or if she goes on vacation with out me (not likely).

Good Luck!

[speedybenz]

Marc,

The MAS was bored out from about 76mm to 82mm. I did this on my lathe. The hexogon thingy was bought from Ground Control Suspension and had to be machined to fit right. It is for a BMW.

Does anyone know if the CLK 55, E55 airbox is bigger.

[Tump43]

Jeff --

I heard or read somewhere that the normally aspirated 55 and 43 air boxes are identical.