I’d learned, maybe from GRM, to catalog EVERY nut, bolt, washer, or piece of plastic in little ziplock bags, labeled by subcomponent. Complicated subcomponents (like an entire bumper) would have a piece of paper in the bag, with a diagram, so I’d remember how to put everything together when the car came back. “4 10mm bolts, two per side, near fender.” Stuff like that.
One of the other things I did when putting Mabel back together was install a set of KONI sports. MB nerds tend to gravitate towards Bilstein HDs or Sports. That’s fine and everything, I just don’t happen to care for them. In the MBs I’ve ridden in with Bilsteins, they’ve all felt like they had way too much compression damping.
I’ve had KONIs on a lot of my cars over the years. I say it every time I put a set on a car - I’ll get a set of these again for my next car. The difference they made in Mabel’s ride and handling can’t be overstated. Gone is the wallowing, the dive under braking, and the floatiness. It corners much more crisply, and it doesn’t go up on plane like a boat under acceleration anymore. But it still rides like a Mercedes should. Adjusting them makes a very real, very noticeable difference.
