Thread: Judgement day 94 E320 save or use for 87 300D
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Old 06-15-2013, 09:18 PM
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ngarover ngarover is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JimFreeh View Post
Over the last twenty years of w124 ownership, I've bought/scrapped many W124 chassis cars.

With the value of really nice W124 cars hitting a ridiculous low, there is no economic justification to returning this car to the road. Even if you value your time at zero, and the car was free, you're not going to come out ahead.

I've had to make this decision lots of time, and only twice have I repaired the car. Once was a very nice, one owner 300TE with a bad trans ( I had a known good one in another wreck), and nothing significant wrong otherwise.

The other was my current 95 E300, which had full records, had been serviced as required and other than the crunched rear end (I had all the parts from a 94 E320 parts car), was also a very nice car. If I add up the value of the rear clip, exclusive of my time invested, I'm probably close to market value in the car. I chose to fix this car because of it's relative rarity...and because I wanted to drive a diesel again...

In both cases, I only had one main issue to deal with per car, and I had the needed parts for each in hand for no additional cost outlay.

The other no go is the rust. The W124 body is very good at disguising rust. I owned a 400E that had been driven in Pittsburgh. The car had been owned by a bodyshop owner. To walkup to the car and look at the paint and interior, you'd think it was a very clean car.
But.... look underneath, and EVERYTHING that bolted onto the body was rusted. Not just rust, but stuff like the rear subframe mounts rusting off, brake and fuel lines rusting through, calipers frozen, and much, much more. Moreover, just working on the car was a PIA. EVERY bolt was seized, then rounded off no matter how much penetrant you used.

Gack.

Use the parts to upgrade your D. But... be aware that many of the electrical connectors use a different style pin, a change I believe was made in 94. Oh, I bet your headlights are std USA, The '94 front end update uses a euro style USA legal light that perform at near euro levels. No 5w parking light or levelers, otherwise equivalent to euro spec.

Jim
I do see your point. Here's what I 'm going to do, Tomorrow I'm going to drop the transmission and find out exactly what it needs to fix. I've read all the threads on this fix and all seem to be fairly simple. I spend a good part of the summer last year rebuilding transmissions for a local shop, so not that big a deal to me. Either way, I would have to drop the trans anyways so no loss. It will also give me a clear view of everything going on under the car obviously. I may go ahead and pull the body panels and expose the car underneath to get a better look at any rust issues. Again, would have to do it anyways. Same with taking off the wheels etc, if I find the car to be savable I can simply load the rims up and have tires mounted on them, drive the car while I work on the 87 some more and be able to really take my time with it. In the last 8 months, I've put over 10k miles on my 85 300TDT, driving it back and forth for work. It would be nice to give that car a rest also and address a few little things that nag me (like the crappy paint job).
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