Mercedes-Benz W124


W124 is the Mercedes-Benz internal chassis-designation for the 1985 to 1995/96 version of the Mercedes-Benz E-Class, as well as the first generation to be officially referred to as E-Class. The W124 models replaced the W123 models after 1985 and were succeeded by the W210 E-Class after 1995.
In North America, the W124 was launched in early November 1985 as a 1986 model and sold through the 1995 model year, through 7 November 1995.
Series production began at the beginning of November 1984, with press reveal taking place on Monday, 26 November 1984 in Seville, Spain, with customer deliveries and European market launch starting in January 1985.

History

The W124 was a mid-sized vehicle platform, which entered planning in the autumn of 1976 under development Hans Scherenberg. In July 1977, the W124 program officially began, with R&D commencing work under newly appointed Werner Breitschwerdt. In April 1978, decisions were made to base it on the Mercedes-Benz W201 model program. By April 1979, a package plan was completed for the program, laying out the guidelines of the project. During the winter of 1980–1981, the final exterior for the W124 program was completed, chosen as the leading proposal by design director Bruno Sacco, and approved by the board of management in early 1981. By mid-1982, the first prototypes reflective of the production design, were assembled and sent to testing. In March 1984, pilot production commenced and development of the sedan concluded with engineering sign-off.
Front suspension used a separate spring and damper with a rubber top mount. The rear suspension of the W124 featured the Mercedes multi-link axle introduced in 1982 with the Mercedes W201 and which is now standard on many modern cars. Estate cars had Citroen-like rear self-leveling suspension with suspension struts rather than shock absorbers, gas-filled suspension spheres to provide damping and an under bonnet pressurizing pump. Unlike the traditional Citroën application Mercedes opted for a fixed ride height and employed rear coil springs to maintain the static ride height when parked.
The R129 SL roadster was based on the W124 platform, W124 was later equipped with two of the roadster's engines 3.2 24V straight-six and 5.0 V8.
Much of the 124's engineering and many of its features were advanced automotive technology at its introduction, incorporating innovations that have been adopted throughout the industry. It had one of the lowest coefficient of drag of any vehicle of the time due to its aerodynamic body, that included plastic molding for the undercarriage to streamline airflow beneath the car, reducing fuel consumption and wind noise. It had a single windscreen wiper that had an eccentric mechanism at its base that extended the wiper's reach to the top corners of the windscreen. The saloon/sedan, coupés and convertibles had optional rear headrests that would fold down remotely to improve rearward visibility when required. This feature was not available for the T-model because of its specific layout, but the estate serially came with a "neighbour-friendly" rear door that was pulled in the shut-position silently and automatically by a sensor-controlled servomotor. This allowed the use of a tighter fitting rear gate, minimizing the cabin noise in the T-model - sometimes an area of concern for station wagons.
With the exception of the 200, which was equipped with a Stromberg or Pierburg carburetor but was not available to the United States, fuel injection was standard, and the engines incorporated features that maximized performance. The most notable such feature was the addition of an oxygen sensor in the exhaust system which, in conjunction with a semi-electronic fuel injection system, could make the engine run more efficiently. This improved fuel consumption while simultaneously meeting stricter emission regulations. Mercedes-Benz's four-wheel drive system, the 4Matic was first introduced on the W124 in 1987.
The estate cars came in 5 or 7-seat models, the 7-seater having a rear-facing bench seat that folded flush luggage compartment cover and an optional retractable cargo net. To provide a flat loading floor with the seat folded down, the T-model's rear seat squab was mounted about higher than in saloons, robbing rear seat passengers of some head room. The S124 estate continued in production alongside the new W210 until the S210 estate launched more than a year later. A two-door coupé version was also built, with the chassis designation C124.
Mercedes launched a cabriolet version in Europe in 1991, the 300CE-24 cabriolet, and in the UK and Japan. The 320CE, and North America, the 300CE, in 1992. These versions were redesignated as the E 320 in 1993, complemented by the less powerful, but less expensive E 220 in 1993, and the mainland-Europe-only E 200 in 1994. Mercedes brought the E 320 cabriolet to the USA and Japan from 1993 to 1995. There were 68 E 36 AMG cabriolets built from 1993 until 1996 to complement the also rare E 36 AMG coupé, saloon, and estate. Approximately 171 estate cars were produced for the Japanese market. The pre-merger AMG coupés are based on the 124 series 2 update. The AMG 3.4 CE were all LHD, 25 were produced from 1988 until 1993. There were also 7 cabriolets built, and eleven saloons. AMG Japan also carried out such conversions locally.
The E 320, E 220, and E 200 cabriolets ceased production in 1997. Indian assembly began in March 1995. Offered with five-cylinder diesel engines built by Mercedes' Indian partner Bajaj Tempo, the W124 was replaced there in December 1997.
A local manufacturer in Indonesia are known to continue production of the W124 until 2000 despite the W210 was already introduced in late 1996, making it the last country to locally produce the car since its worldwide discontinuation in 1995. At this time, only two variants were offered; the E 220 and E 320.
SsangYong Motor Company of Korea licensed the W124 design and continues to produce a stretched and rebodied version of the W124 as the Chairman, with a Ssangyong badge. It has a wheelbase measuring and a 3.2 L Mercedes inline-six M104 engine. The latest versions of the Chairman were equipped with 2.3 L, 2.8 L, and 3.2 L engines in its product line-ups. The car had a modified 3.6 L version of M104 engine recently for the high-end models. The engine has a designation of XGi360.

Models

The pre-facelift models from 1985 to 1993 used the model designations: 200/200 T, 200 E/200 TE, 200 CE, 230 E/230 TE, 230 CE, 260 E, 300 E/TE, 300 CE, 300 E-24/300 CE-24/300 TE-24 valve, 400 E, & 500 E. Diesel models consisted of the following designations; the 200 D/200 TD, 250 D/250 TD and the 300 D/300 TD. Facelift models produced from 1993 to 1996 used the following model designations: E 200, E 220, E 280, E 320, E 420 & E 500. Both saloon and estate versions of the facelifted model carried the same model designation on their boot lid, i.e. the T was no longer used for estate versions. In the UK post-facelift diesels were E 250 Diesel and E 300 Diesel models. The W124 was also offered as a long wheelbase saloon targeted for taxi companies, but the more luxury equipped version was also used as a limousine.
The pre-facelift four-cylinder models came standard with a four-speed manual transmission, but could be ordered with the five-speed manual or four-speed automatic. In Finland, the four-speed manual was available with a column shifter only as a special-order taxi model. After the facelift, the four-speed manual was dropped and five-speed manual became standard.
Five and six-cylinder engines had five-speed manual as standard, and optional four-speed automatic.
Cars with V8 engines, 3.0-litre turbocharged diesel engines, all-wheel drive and AMG models were available only with the four-speed automatic.
24-valve petrol engines could also be ordered with 722.5 five-speed automatic.
The four-wheel drive system was available from 1987 with 2.6 and 3.0-litre petrol and 3.0-litre diesel engines with 12 valves. It was not available for coupés and convertibles. From 1987 to 1989, the four-wheel drive cars had five-speed manual transmission as standard, with optional four-speed automatic.
The table gives preproduction to end of production as per Daimler. Daimler lists November 1984 as the start of production for the series but also lists 1985 as part of preproduction for any specific early model. No regular deliveries occurred in 1984.

Dimensions and weight

Gallery (Pre-facelift)

Gallery (Post-facelift)

Sportline option

Mercedes-Benz offered an option called "Sportline" for the W124 and W201 chassis cars. This option was available in the North American market for the 1992–93 model year 190 E 2.6, 1992–93 300 E/300 CE and 1993–95 E 320/E 320 Coupé. In the European market, however, the "Sportline" option was available for all body styles except the E 500/500 E, all of which came standard with the Sportline package and every option. The package included sport seating, wider wheels with wider profile tyres, quick ratio steering and a smaller diameter steering wheel, "Sportline" badges on the front wing moldings and gear knob, slightly lowered ride height and a specially tuned suspension including shorter, stiffer springs, struts, anti-roll bars, and bushings.
The suspension components of the Sportline package were available as an option on all cars, including estates, as option 650—sports chassis with 15-hole alloy wheels and option 653—sports chassis with eight-hole light alloy rims.

500 E

Mercedes-Benz sold a high performance version of the W124, the 500 E, created in close cooperation with and assembled by Porsche. It used the 5.0 L 32-valve V8 M119 Engine based on the engine from the 500 SL roadster. Porsche engineered the suspension and chassis design with a performance bias. Mercedes entered an agreement with Porsche to assemble the vehicles at their plant in Zuffenhausen, as the automaker was in crisis, and its factory capacitiy was underutilized.
Porsche also constructed the chassis for the 400 E, which was in essence identical to the 500 E's chassis.

Masterpiece

In some countries, the final batch of W124 was sold as the limited edition Masterpiece in 1995. Following the impending release of its successor, the Mercedes-Benz W210, the remaining units of W124 were fitted with additional accessories found in stock models such as walnut wood steering wheel, airbag for front passenger, walnut center console glove box, electric rear blind and rear seat side window sunshade. There were also 4 unique pieces of accessories fitted to Masterpieces which were not available to any other W124 around the world – gear knob engraved with the word Masterpiece, stainless door sills engraved with Mercedes Benz, Masterpiece label on the right side of the boot and the brand new 6-hole light alloy wheels.

Engines

Safety

Some main innovations of the W124 series were related to occupant safety. Derived from the Mercedes W201, with which the W124 shares the basic layout, its similarly angular body was designed to withstand an offset-crash in a concrete barrier at some 35 mph without serious harm to the occupants and a largely undamaged passenger cabin, a windshield that stays in place and doors easily opened without special recovery tools. This crash-test configuration became the base for the Euro-NCAP procedure currently being the standard crash-test configuration in the EU. Unlike Euro-NCAP, Mercedes required the body of the W124 to withstand an offset impact from the front and from the rear.
The W124 also featured a driver's side airbag, height-adjustable seat belts with electronic-mechanical pre-tensioners for both front passengers, rear seat belts which automatically adapted to the size of the passengers, pedals that were moved inversely in a frontal impact and door arm rests with deformable elements designed to reduce abdominal injury risk resulting from a side impact.
The dashboard made of impact-absorbing, artificial foam was reinforced with a thin aluminium layer which effectively prevented hoses, valves, housings and other components from heating and engine from penetrating through the dashboard inside the passenger cabin in a severe impact. The passenger glove box also featured a defined point of rupture, which considerably reduced the probability of front passenger injuries.
Following the Mercedes W201, the W124 was the second serially manufactured car in history to see widespread use of light-weight high-strength steels, which today are a standard in car design.
From late 1988 on, the W124 was one of the first cars available with a front passenger's SRS airbag as an option for the 1989 model year.

Build quality

The W124 gained a good reputation for reliability. In 1995 the diesel engined version topped the "upper middle class" category in a reliability survey of 4–6-year-old cars undertaken by the German Automobile Association, with 11.8 recorded breakdowns per 1,000 vehicles for four-year-old cars and 21.6 for six-year-old ones: this compared with 14.6 breakdowns per 1,000 cars for four-year-old Audi 100s and 27.3 for six-year-old big Audis.

General

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