Originally Posted by TylerH860 (Post 1964260)

Holy crap! Break that up into smaller paragraphs. It will make it much easier for us to read.

Originally Posted by Medesouza (Post 1964258)

Hello everyone, this is my very first post as I have just recently joined the forum here. I must say I have already found this website to be an extremely helpful and useful source of information and support and I want to thank everyone on here for your experience and willingness to share it with other owners of these marvelous cars.

I bought my very first diesel Mercedes about 3 months ago with the express purpose of fulfilling a dream for years to get off petro fuel. I absolutely fell in love with this car from the moment I laid eyes on it and took for a spin. Shes a 1982 300D Turbo. Garage kept her whole life with 2 owners. I'm driving her out to Arizona from Connecticut in about a month or so.

Last week while tinkering around I found a spot of rust under the plastic liner on the passenger side of the trunk. I picked at it and soon a big chunk of bondo fell out leaving a nice hole. Several weeks prior I took her through a carwash (which I will never do again by the way) and afterwards saw a bit of the rubber undercoat had opened up on the drivers side.
I put off investigating it till the day I found the spot in the trunk. When I did, I found a pretty nasty spot of rust (see attached photos) though nothing compared to some of the other pics and stories I've seen on here. I immediately set to work and stripped out the entire interior so see how bad it was. The spot was immediately under the rear drivers seat right under the bolt where the seat attaches to the floor. Luckily, it was surrounded by good metal and was very fixable.

I had a welder come over who patched everything up for an excellent price. I am having the rear and front windshield seals replaced this week as the rear was the obvious source of the trunk leak and the front is just as old. It has been a maddening experience tracking down these leaks. I cleaned my hood drains by suggestion from many other posts I read on here. I found the plastic guard on the inside of the front wheel wells has a very ineffective drain which has almost no space for water or debris to pass out of so water just ends up pooling behind it and running down the rocker panel.

I am lucky this car was garaged or it would probably be a horror show. I plan to modify the hood drain by gluing rubber hoses to the bottom of the drain itself and running them down to the bottom of the car. Than putting the plastic wheel well guard back on and cutting the plastic piece on them to let the rubber hose I installed come through.

However I have one nagging question that I can't seem to find the answer to: What the hell is the name of the rubber weatherstripping that runs along the length of each side of the car which the bottom of the doors close on to and where can I get replacements? I have tried finding the name of this weatherstipping everywhere and cannot seem to find it. I really need to replace it because it is shot and I think despite cleaning the hood hinge drains and so on, water will still find its way in there.

Thank you again for all your help and may you win the battle against the rust demons.

Originally Posted by Medesouza (Post 1964258)

. . . . . . However I have one nagging question that I can't seem to find the answer to: What the hell is the name of the rubber weatherstripping that runs along the length of each side of the car which the bottom of the doors close on to and where can I get replacements? I have tried finding the name of this weatherstipping everywhere and cannot seem to find it. . . . . .