Howdy,

I was at the euro car wrecking yard yesterday and thought I'd share some miscellaneous ramblings....

I did find the part I was looking for (the wing nut and bracket that holds the spare tire in place in the trunk) but it was rusty and frozen, so I'll have to try a thread chaser to see if I can clean it up.

They had quite a few 108 and earlier cars in various state of disintegration, but all were sitting on the ground where the metal one would most desire can come in contact with moist earth. The tops, fenders, hoods, and trunk lids were mostly in good shape which is worth something.

They had a complete M100 out of a 6.3 which looked largely unmolested. I pulled the cast alloy oil cap. Quite a bit of water and rust inside. Still looked nice. Man, that's a BIG engine. Even the red oil cap on the injection pump looked fairly fresh.

They had a euro 109 body. Most of the hydropneumatic suspension parts were gone, but the airpump, dryer, and suspension control valve was still there. It has bosch H1/H4 lights. I thought about removing them to see if I couldn't clean them up and use them on my US 108, but the backs were very rusty and probably rusted through. They only had 2 of the 4 that weren't cracked anyway. I might go back and get them anyway. The lenses were in excellent shape, but I still don't know about the reflectors and connectors. (I don't understand why the H1/H4 lights would be left on the car outside to disintegrate. Oh well....)

The inside of the 109 and trim was interesting. It had the wood trim around the winshield. It looked pretty nice in parts, but since the car was open, there was water damage on some of it. The dash wood at the winshield had expanded to about 1 inch thick. Sad...Even original winshield wood surround trim would look pretty nice in my car.

On the outside, the door trim was different than mine. The trim around the door glass was a 1-piece polished stainless instead of the cut to fit aluminum anodized that I have. It looked pretty good (and very shiny), but the car door had been hit so it was bent on the drivers side. I've never seen one with that type of trim. I think stainless is better than alloy since you can buff it to a high luster easily.

They had one V8 car. The D-jetronic module was gone, but some of the sensor connectors were still there. I may go back and grab the harness and connectors. It also had a brand new looking fuel pressure regulator and newish pressure sensor. The guy wanted $5 for each, so I may take them, test them, and keep them in the car for roadside emergencies. Heck, I wonder what he wants for the whole engine, maybe I could make some use of the core.

Oh well.... Pretty sad, really: all those nice looking cars sitting on the ground wasting away....


Sholin

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What else, '73 MB 280 SEL (Lt Blue)
Daily driver: '84 190D 2.2 5 spd.