MBDiesel.net - An Owner's Journey

Tomorrow I'll be attempting to bring home a 1972 220. I'm the 3rd owner. The 2nd owner purchased the car used in 1973 from a woman in Atlanta. I will hopefully bring it back home, 33 years later.

At the rate I'm acquiring gas cars, I'm going to have to change my domain name!

Today was an interesting day. The wagon hit 180,000 miles, received new glowplugs, and I got a shower courtesy of Mother Nature.

You can go here for more.

Recent car points of interest:

• Had to R&R the alternator in the 300TD. I neglected to install the proper sized shim when I swapped in the custom alternator a few weeks ago, and the pulley was freewheeling under the belt. Made an interesting noise as it loosened up. Installed shim, reassembled and reinstalled, and everything is perfect again.
• The 240D received a quick bath yesterday and a fresh waxing. Looks a lot nicer now! We'll be taking the 240D on a road trip to North Alabama this weekend - trying to rack up the miles to get the break-in period over!
• Mulling over the idea of rebuilding the front end on the 300SD, and also mulling over restoring A/C to it and the 280S. We'll see how that goes later on.

That's all for now!

After a quick trip to the junkyard today, the wagon has power steering again. I really need to clean the engine bay, it's pretty filthy in there from when the old pump let loose.

The pump I got in the yard came from an '84 Euro 300D. MB Tex seats, fabric inlays on the door panels, and aftermarket power windows in all 4 doors. Interesting car.

We got home and popped the hood, and then removed the old pump. That's when we found that the plastic tension adjuster was broken, and the bolt was missing. Great - I love repairs like this.

We put the replacement pump into place, and I immediately noticed that we had a problem - the pulleys are different. If I had air tools, this would not be a problem - but I don't, so it is.

Carefully using a 10" pair of slip-joint pliers and my long handled 1/2" wratchet, and a lot of feet applying load here and there, we were able to swap out the pulley, and then install the new pump. To get a decent amount of tension on the belt (I strongly hesitate to say that it's good, because it isn't - but it's enough), I used very careful placement of a scissor jack underneath the pump. This was not a shining moment in my DIY car repair career, and I wouldn't even claim that there was any genius to it, either. But, it worked.

After tightening down the three bolts that hold the pump, I swapped out the power steering filter (the one in my old pump had maybe 12k on it, with nearly 4k of that with no fluid circulating in the pump) and topped up the reservoir. I had Donna hop in the driver's seat and turn the wheel back and forth a few times so we could bleed out the air before starting the car. A quick road test yields no fluid leakage - another successful fix!

Now we just have to take a filing cabinet back to Office Depot...

Mat twisted my arm to go to The Mitty vintage races at Road Atlanta this weekend, and Donna certainly didn't help by encouraging me to go, either.

In retrospect, I'm glad I went, because I wouldn't have missed this for the world:

That's Mat - with me as passenger - running the first of two laps around the Road Atlanta circuit. That in and of itself was cool, and wonderful experience. What made it better is that Mat's 2.3-16v is running a stainless steel straight pipe. At the time of the laps, there were numerous cars out on the road - Maserati, Ferrari, you name it. But none of them had that kind of sound, that raw commanding presence. As we whizzed around the course, people who were walking away from the track after the previous professional race heard the car, turned their heads, and rushed back to the fences to see what was making that beautiful sound. On the second lap, they were still there to cheer us on and to beg Mat to give them more.

To top it all off, our friend Thomas ran his 240D during the parade laps on Sunday - he just might be the first person to run a lap at Road Atlanta running a car fueled by waste vegetable oil. The smell of race gas in the air around the track was briefly replaced by an odor vaguely resembling french fries and Chinese food.

What a fantastic weekend. If you'd like to see more of the 190E 2.3-16v, head on over to Old World Auto for more. As for me, I'll post more pictures of the race within the next few days.

Last night, we installed new alternators in the 240D and 300TD. Old World Auto uses a local shop for obtaining rebuilt starters and alternators - and I can't blame him, because some of the Bosch-in-a-box rebuilds can be a little sketchy.

When I initially purchased the Euro lights for the w123s, I toyed with the idea of running relays and overwattage bulbs. Well, the non-turbo cars have only a 55 amp alternator, while the turbos got the 65. It's an easy upgrade path, if that's the way you want to go.

However, I'm a bit crazy. I wanted a little bit more. I figured that the highest possible load I'd have between the two cars would be the wagon. Worst-case scenario, I'd have lows, fogs, running lights, radio, defrost mode (A/C compressor engaged, blower motor at highest settings, aux water pump engaged), windshield wipers on both ends of the car - it's a far from complete list, but you can already see that there's a lot of stuff going on there, and some of it drawing a lot of juice.

Now, let's just assume for a moment that I really step off the deep end and go for some 100w Narva fogs, and some 130/100w Narva high/lows. With lows and fogs on, that's 400w of light, powered by a 12v system for a whopping 33 and change amp draw - before powering anything else in the car! I wanted a little more room for error than the stock 55 amp alternator.

After contacting his rebuilder, Mat was able to procure 2 custom-wound alternators capable of handling a 70 amp load. The rebuilder could go as high as 95 amps (maybe higher? I can't recall, the conversation was a few weeks ago), but the cost/benefit ratio didn't fit my criteria. The 70 amp alternators are comparable in price to the 65 amp standard alternators that you can get from many of the online resellers. Best of all, I can get away with using the stock wiring from the alternator to the battery and starter.

I have to say, I was impressed with the quality of the two alternators - if at the very least from the outside looking in. The fit and finish was better than a Bosch 55 amp unit I purchased a few years ago. If you have need for a custom unit, or a competitive price on a stock rebuilt alternator, I suggest giving Mathieu Cama a call. He can also get the heavy duty Iskra starters for those tired diesels out there that hate cold winter starting.

Fortunately for us, the 240D won't be needing one of those for a very, very long time.

The 240D is back home again, and that's a great thing. The engine replacement was a tremendous success, and the pictures tell a great story.

But I couldn't have done it myself. No way, no how. If I had tried, I doubt this project would have reached the same conclusion as it has today.

I owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to Mathieu Cama of Old World Automotive. For 3 long months, our 240D took up space in his shop's parking lot. On his recommendation, we sent our injection pump and injectors to his specialist - and we received a heavily customized final product. I picked his brain on every subtle nuance from theory to practical application of every nut, bolt, bracket, and gasket during the months leading up to the start of this project, and then continued to pester him during it as well. I kept him at his shop way later than I bet he would have liked on too many occasions.

When the decision was made on which way to take the project, it was Mat who inspired me not to just do it - but to do it right. I wanted to emulate the quality and caliber of work he is known for. From him, I learned about the little things that separate ordinary car repair from what some would argue could only be called a form of art. He offered his shop, his supplies, his tools, his knowledge, his guidance, and his time all throughout this project.

But most of all, he offered his friendship. And Donna and I appreciate that the most.

...but the end results can be worth it. Update 2 of 2 today features us taking a panel on the ratty-looking 300SD - namely, the trunk - and applying a little elbow grease to try and bring back a shine to the heavily oxidized paint.

You can see how it went here.

Took some pictures this evening of the Euro headlamps installed on the 300TD and the 240D. We have 1 set each of the square lights and the slightly less common round lights. The round set looks very much like the US style headlamps, but has halogen bulbs and a considerably better beam pattern.

I personally refuse to drive a w123 with US headlamps unless I'm using low beams and fogs full time - it's just not enough light. With the Euro lamps, having the fogs and lows on at the same time is too much light to be polite to your fellow motorists. It's nice to be able to see!

Anyhow, update 1 of 2 tonight features a couple photos of the wagon and the 240D and their new lamps.

The 240D came home Saturday as part of Donna's surprise birthday party. Donna never saw it coming, and is ecstatic about getting her Bridgette back. She drove it to work this morning, after several days of talks about engine break-in procedure. Friday, the car goes to Gran Turismo East for an alignment, and now it's on to cleaning up Greta, panel by panel.