OWNER msq (E60 AMG)

[msq]

MSQ = That's interesting, I have that same set of wheels, excepting the rears in my set are 9". I have run 10" 285/35 in the rear although the wheel was a 2pc. SL wheel. I believe the ET was 28. No issues. Terry and others run this size. I believe the ET on the 8.5 OZ is 34. I can't remember the proper tire size with the best O.D. match for these. I want to say 245/40.

Stephan = I have not gone larger than 245 on the front. Again, I believe others have but I would expect issues/close tolerances.

If either of you are looking for a lengthy read search the many discussions on the subject and the accompanying issues with spacers and proper size and length lug bolts. Nearly all aftermarket wheels require cone seat bolts as opposed to MB spherical seat. Rear bolt length, which could be different for each wheel is critical at the rear of the 036 due to parking brake interference.


drew

Thanks Drew, this is helpful. I do have separate set of cone seat bolts with correct length for the OZ wheels for the E500E. I'll also search this forum as suggested, but are you thinking my front 18 x 8.5 OZ Opera wheels might need spacers?

p.s. the rubber on the front 8.5 is 245/40 18's

 

[sheward]

I think that setup should be fine.

drew

 

[qtstorm]

Jonathan and his team are awesome! I recently took a dedicated trip down to Atlanta to visit several of my cars under stages of restoration/maintenance . He has completed 3 cars for me with several others now underway (and 2 more on way). His patience and meticulous nature are 2nd to none. He is why I have renewed my love for this era of cars. If you own one of our cars, I encourage you to seek him out.

1992 500E pearl black/black 18k *
1993 E60 040/black 90k Gustov *
1994 E320 cab silver/grey 26k *
1994 E320 cab silver/black 68k *
1990 Euro 560sec pearl black/black 22k *
1998 500sl silver/black 9800 miles
2000 G500 cab obsidian/black 65k *
1987 635 csi black/black 90k *
1967 Tbird coup metallic blue/parchment 31k *

All the ones with an * he has or is working on.
On second thought.......forget everthing I have told you...... If you guys listen to me I may have to compete for shop time.....

 

[qtstorm]

Man I love those Oz rims!!!! Did they ever make a 17 inch? where can I get a set of either?

 

[msq]

Man I love those Oz rims!!!! Did they ever make a 17 inch? where can I get a set of either?

I don't know if they made 17" (update below, they obviously made 17" w/ 5x120 pattern). The Oz Opera wheels are hard to find in general as I do not believe they make them any longer. I believe there was a guy in Germany (?) machining/making high quality knock-off AMG rims (without AMG logo so as not to cause problem) and maybe some other kind. I think Jonathan may know him or have bought from him, so you may want to ask him. I don't know if he makes OZ knock-offs.

update:
p.s. just saw these 17" ones, but they don't look like they are staggered and they look like they are 5x120 not 5x112

 

[sheward]

Man I love those Oz rims!!!! Did they ever make a 17 inch? where can I get a set of either?

I have a set for sale, the set mentioned in my previous post. I also have extra 8'' barrels and 120x5 centers, for sale.

drew

 

[ace10]

Great suggestion on the front bumper filler panel, thank you. Do you happen to know the part number. I will definitely order it. In MA they make you have front and rear plate if you have "red & white" plates, but if you have older "green & white" plates you can just use rear plate. I have red ones on this car, but I do have older "green & white" plate that I used to have on my C43. I could put it on the car but it looks a bit beat up/dirty (even though it is clean) and does not look as clean as the new "red & white" plates. I still may swap it as I do not like having front plate. In any case, thanks for suggestion.

Congrats on getting the car home.

Regarding the Green & White plate... you can get it restored. Back to 99+% condition. Use the Googles to find plate restoration services. The good ones will use the proper reflective paint in order to avoid any issues with the RMV or police.

 

[msq]

Congrats on getting the car home.

Regarding the Green & White plate... you can get it restored. Back to 99+% condition. Use the Googles to find plate restoration services. The good ones will use the proper reflective paint in order to avoid any issues with the RMV or police.

Thanks for the idea. I never knew this. Great idea. I am also going to order the piece that @gsxr suggested for cars that do not have to have a front plate. I had already ordered the part/adapter that @jlaa mentioned above that allows for US plate to be mounted on the rear of a Euro car (although I think I may leave plate mounted as is for now since it's nice and flush and didn't require anything to be changed/bolted on the car).
I never knew you could get plates refinished, it's kind of a big deal because here in MA many inspection stations get really aggressive about retiring the single green & white plates and the only reason they can legally use to get you to retire the older single plates is that it is not in great condition. This will allow me to keep it indefinitely.

p.s. just ordered the part @gsxr mention for license plate filler for cars with no front plate .... it was a good suggestion and source as it was very inexpensive (shipping was almost as much as the part).

 

[brownan]

Incredible looking car. Congratulations. I'm down in NYC but take regular sojourns to Western Mass if you're out that direction.

 

[msq]

Incredible looking car. Congratulations. I'm down in NYC but take regular sojourns to Western Mass if you're out that direction.

Thank you. I am in Central MA outside Boston. If you make it out this way, PM me and give me a few days advance notice. I'll take the car out of storage once they sweep the streets here in the spring and we have one good/hard rain after that.

 

[Benz]

Congrats this looks like an epic car !! love the blue interior !!

 

[Jimbo]

I was just up in Boston last weekend....anyway, I'd like to ask you to come down to central CT with your car and we can get pictures with my friend's Limited E500....and maybe my green dust collector can roll out with yous.
PM me if you are interested.

 

[msq]

Finally getting around to updating my owner thread. Not doing this as a “look at me” social-media/web nonsense, but I like to read & see pics of others cars on here, so this post is in that spirit.

For context - . I looked for an E60 for 4 years and passed on things like some low mileage 957/958s and I picked this car – which cost me quite a bit more than the low mileage 957/958’s that I passed on.

I bought the car in summer/fall 2018 and it arrived in US on Nov 2018. I had it shipped directly to Jonathan @jhodg5ck
at Blue Ridge, where it stayed for ~4 mos. Before buying the car I had gone through this forum and tried to find everything that could likely go wrong on these cars or that may need deferred maintenance and @jhodg5ck also came up with his own list – there was a ton of overlap, no surprise. That formed our working list/punch list for the car. I wanted to get it as close to new as possible (yes, I know that sounds a bit crazy), so I knew I would blow through the top end of any estimates of deferred maintenance that are typically quoted.

Keep in mind, before I bought the car I had a Mercedes Dealer in Switzerland (who was not the seller) do a full PPI on the car and here were some of their comments from PPI:

• No trace of development of rust on the car, no signs of accident
• SLS values were bench tested and no imbalance found
• Compression test ticket this one are perfect (this is their translation from Swiss French to English )
• In summary the vehicle is in perfect condition considering its age and has been perfectly preserved
• The engine works perfectly
• etc.

...but I knew to make it as close to what I wanted it to be I would still blow through top end estimates of “deferred maintenance” estimates on these cars.

Here is a subset of what Blue Ridge did (its 4 pages of line items so I will not list everything here):

• Oil & filter w/Brad Penn Racing w/oil cooler
• Transmission filter & flush
• Cooling system flush
• Plugs
• SLS system flush & cleaning of screen before & after flush
• New high pressure feed lines
• Remove & clean sunroof rails & lube
• Remove, replace/repack wheel bearings & seals
• Change out plastic oiler tubes to metal ones
• New engine mounts
• New transmission mounts
• R&R differential & reseal and renew mounts
• Update all 3 wiring harnesses (lower, upper & throttle body)
• etc.

...there were 4 pages of stuff (above is subset), and while I was definitely not looking to burn $$, when the car showed up at my house I wanted to be like I was buying a new E60 in 1994. Like I have said before, when the car showed up I was blown away with how it looked. Jonathan & team did incredible work including wash/wax/PDR/conditioning all rubber trim on the car etc. The car and their work exceeded all my expectations – that never seems to happen with cars that are not brand new – it did here by a lot!

I have enclosed some pictures.

I’ll do another update soon since I just had Fox Y-Pipe, rear muffler and AMG exhaust tips put on – that is a separate fun topic on its own (I have retained the original mid muffler & rear and if I ever sell that car I will likely put it back on). The only changes to this car from factory will be simple bolt-on/bolt-offs that can be easily reversed.

 

[Jlaa]

Damn you @msq! Now with your complete refurbishment list, I get to think about the stuff I DIDN’T do .... like ..... do I need to do these???

• R&R differential & reseal and renew mounts
• Remove & clean sunroof rails & lube
• Remove, replace/replace wheel bearings & seals

 

[msq]

Damn you @msq! Now with your complete refurbishment list, I get to think about the stuff I DIDN’T do .... like ..... do I need to do these???

• R&R differential & reseal and renew mounts
• New high pressure feed lines
• Remove & clean sunroof rails & lube
• Remove, replace/replace wheel bearings & seals

If it helps, part of the inspiration for the thorough list we developed for the car was when I read an old post of yours here where you removed the headlight knob to clean dust from behind it.....I showed that post to my wife and kept of saying "see, this is normal, this is really normal....you just didn't understand this stuff"
Sorry, but I had to make you look a little nuttier than she thought I already was about the cars, since I knew I was going to run up a big bill on my car.
Of course I left out the fact that you were capable of doing a bunch of stuff on your own and due to my lack of garage space and lack of tools and lack of mechanical expertise on these cars, I was near useless.

 

[e500.org]

Epic!

 

[TerryA]

Marc,

Your car looks awesome! Jono came thru with flying colors. You are a the right person to champion the breed.

It’s sad that AMG did not ship these cars to US.

Take Care

 

[msq]

Marc,

Your car looks awesome! Jono came thru with flying colors. You are a the right person to champion the breed.

It’s sad that AMG did not ship these cars to US.

Take Care

Thanks Terry, I appreciate it.
It's a blast to drive. If you are ever in the MA area you are welcome to take it out for a drive.

 

[TimL]

Finally getting around to updating my owner thread. Not doing this as a “look at me” social-media/web nonsense, but I like to read & see pics of others cars on here, so this post is in that spirit.

For context - . I looked for an E60 for 4 years and passed on things like some low mileage 957/958s and I picked this car – which cost me quite a bit more than the low mileage 957/958’s that I passed on.

I bought the car in summer/fall 2018 and it arrived in US on Nov 2018. I had it shipped directly to Jonathan @jhodg5ck
at Blue Ridge, where it stayed for ~4 mos. Before buying the car I had gone through this forum and tried to find everything that could likely go wrong on these cars or that may need deferred maintenance and @jhodg5ck also came up with his own list – there was a ton of overlap, no surprise. That formed our working list/punch list for the car. I wanted to get it as close to new as possible (yes, I know that sounds a bit crazy), so I knew I would blow through the top end of any estimates of deferred maintenance that are typically quoted.

Keep in mind, before I bought the car I had a Mercedes Dealer in Switzerland (who was not the seller) do a full PPI on the car and here were some of their comments from PPI:

• No trace of development of rust on the car, no signs of accident
• SLS values were bench tested and no imbalance found
• Compression test ticket this one are perfect (this is their translation from Swiss French to English )
• In summary the vehicle is in perfect condition considering its age and has been perfectly preserved
• The engine works perfectly
• etc.

...but I knew to make it as close to what I wanted it to be I would still blow through top end estimates of “deferred maintenance” estimates on these cars.

Here is a subset of what Blue Ridge did (its 4 pages of line items so I will not list everything here):

• Oil & filter w/Brad Penn Racing w/oil cooler
• Transmission filter & flush
• Cooling system flush
• Plugs
• SLS system flush & cleaning of screen before & after flush
• New high pressure feed lines
• Remove & clean sunroof rails & lube
• Remove, replace/replace wheel bearings & seals
• Change out plastic oiler tubes to metal ones
• New engine mounts
• New transmission mounts
• R&R differential & reseal and renew mounts
• Update all 3 wiring harnesses (lower, upper & throttle body)
• etc.

...there were 4 pages of stuff (above is subset), and while I was definitely not looking to burn $$, when the car showed up at my house I wanted to be like I was buying a new E60 in 1994. Like I have said before, when the car showed up I was blown away with how it looked. Jonathan & team did incredible work including wash/wax/PDR/conditioning all rubber trim on the car etc. The car and their work exceeded all my expectations – that never seems to happen with cars that are not brand new – it did here by a lot!

I have enclosed some pictures.

I’ll do another update soon since I just had Fox Y-Pipe, rear muffler and AMG exhaust tips put on – that is a separate fun topic on its own (I have retained the original mid muffler & rear and if I ever sell that car I will likely put it back on). The only changes to this car from factory will be simple bolt-on/bolt-offs that can be easily reversed.



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The non-metallic blue is hands down one of the most stunning colors for the 036. Your car looks great!

 

[msq]

The non-metallic blue is hands down one of the most stunning colors for the 036. Your car looks great!

Tim, Thanks, I appreciate it. Here's the crazy thing, when I was looking for an E60 I wanted Mindnight Blue and figured I would find one within a year, it wasn't until I put a deposit on it and found the paint code link on this forum back then, that I realized there were only 42 Midnight Blue E5E's ever made (according to Wiki entry on paint colors here). No wonder it took 4 years!
The math explains why it took me so long:

- only 0.1% of all E5E's were Midnight Blue's

AND then factor in

- the small % of the E5E's became E60's built/converted as new cars (not counting undocumented aftermarket conversions or partial conversions). I had this number somewhere and I am looking for it now and can't find it. (I am not talking about the ~45 957/958 codes, I am talking about total number of factory documented "converted as new" E60's, which is greater than and includes the 45 referenced above).

....anyway, at the time I did not know I was looking for a needle in a haystack, so it was sheer luck that I found the car I wanted.

 

[JAB12]

the small % of the E5E's became E60's built/converted as new cars (not counting undocumented aftermarket conversions or partial conversions). I had this number somewhere and I am looking for it now and can't find it. (I am not talking about the ~45 957/958 codes, I am talking about total number of factory documented "converted as new" E60's, which is greater than and includes the 45 referenced above).

We may be looking at a number between 138 and 148 total examples including the 45 mentioned to be 957/958. I think the fact that a certain number cannot be pinned to this notion is part of the mythical nature of the W124036 E60. Your car is a sight to behold in photos, I can only imagine what it is to have it in the garage. This said, I blame you! @msq for providing the blueprint by which my humble example is being judged in the kingdom of @jhodg5ck and is now serving a longer sentence than the aforementioned 4 months. Patience is a virtue so I will keep exercising it.

END RANT. Back to regularly scheduled programming.....

 

[JAB12]

BTW being next to a confirmed 1 of 45 double codes was underwhelming (I am biased with blues and silvers) so I would place your car next to that one any day of the week and twice on Sundays. Your car could not have fallen in the hands of a better steward. Keep enjoying in good health.

 

[msq]

We may be looking at a number between 138 and 148 total examples including the 45 mentioned to be 957/958. I think the fact that a certain number cannot be pinned to this notion is part of the mythical nature of the W124036 E60. Your car is a sight to behold in photos, I can only imagine what it is to have it in the garage. This said, I blame you! @msq for providing the blueprint by which my humble example is being judged in the kingdom of @jhodg5ck and is now serving a longer sentence than the aforementioned 4 months. Patience is a virtue so I will keep exercising it.

END RANT. Back to regularly scheduled programming.....

@JAB12 Yes, the number I had in my docs that I saved was 148, but now I can't find it so I will dig a bit more.
Also, your car is no humble example - it is a fantastic 957 code E60 with known history here in the U.S. (originally w.MB exec here) and great color etc.