El-Swappo

[djugurba]

So, for several years now, I've had my eyes open for w123 300TD turbodiesel wagons (yes I know that's redundant). Tonight, after a bunch of searching/looking/driving/etc, I've finally landed not one, but two.

1985 300TD 345k miles or thereabouts. this is a franken-car, with parts from who knows how many others that have long since been rendered parts cars. However, it is amazingly fast, shifts extra smoothly thanks to wonderful Chris Fett who wouldnt sell it to me with the tiny flaring between 2/3 so he put in a different transmission... Has 3rd seat, all original tools, first aid kit, cross bars on the rack- great rebuilt palamino interior- a/c is cold, and even the clock works. I love the car already, and have put over 500 miles on it since I picked it up on wednesday.

Friday night, during a stroke of genius, I thought to check the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's online classifieds. Even though the Sunday paper comes out on Saturday.... they publish the ads online friday night. There, to my amazement, was an 81 300TD. Usually, ads like this yield the following result: "Hi, yes, I was calling about the mercedes wagon?" "Er, well, actually it's a turbo diesel sedan- four door." "oh. a 300D" "that's right". Not this time... the ad indicated it was indeed a wagon that 'runs good'. Saturday morning I was up at 530am; had to drive an hour away to run a 5k race. (my first! woo hoo! 32.30) As soon as I finished the race, I called about the wagon. We set up a time to meet that night, and I went up to see the car at the scheduled time. What a treat. The car is almost perfect on the outside- paint is original and unmolested; wheels are clean of brake dust. ZERO rust. headlight doors are not cracklin' wow. Inside looks like a dog lived in there- blue tex in good shape, dash has a couple cracks... but that hair will vaccuum out! And, actually, the very nice owner did vaccuum out the dog hair prior to my picking up the car this evening. This car has a vaccuum leak somewhere in a line to the transmission I think, because it doesn't want to find the shift point to final drive. It eventually does; but I'll start tinkering with that tomorrow. Or, I might need a new transmission... who knows? This car, tentatively named 'bluebell' will be the wife's in-town driver, while "SVO Speedwagen" gets the royal treatment full rolling restoration as I drive it. Very exciting! I'll snap a couple pics of each tomorrow.

Sadly, I had to trade the '87 300SDL veggie car in order to facilitate the wagon aquisitions... but I'm very happy with what I've got, and honestly, neither one of these cars gives up much to the SDL on pick-up or comfort... and I really liked the SDL! So, thanks in advance for your assistance with coming issues with these two, and long live the w123!

k