As I mentioned in a previous post I am painting the 'ol 300TDT wagon and would like your all's opinion on something. I have purchased the body "cladding" from another e class car and I am going to install on my wagon. It is the gray color that seems to be on most so should I leave it the original gray or paint it the same color as the car which will be silver? Of course the bumpers will also have to be painted so would it look strange to have silver bumpers with gray door lowers? Or should it all be silver? I am changing from blue to silver by the way.

You can never go wrong with the original color. Or, you could try another shade of blue to emulate what was done on later W124s.

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'81 MB 300SD, '82 MB 300D Turbo (sold/RIP), '04 Lincoln Town Car Ultimate

Sooner or later every car falls apart, ours does it later!
-German Narrator in a MB Promotion Film about the then brand new W123.

You mean paint the panels the same as the body? The car will now be silver instead of blue.

this is how my car is painted. it is a respray but i believe the main colour of the car is the original colour. i am assuming from your post that you are dealing with a 124 wagon since you mention the cladding. my car is an '87 that looks like a later car because of the cladding. everything below the lower skirt line including the bumpers is a darker grey silver. i am sure someone here will recognize the color scheme since i believe this was a factory scheme.

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punkinfair

I changed my dull grey bumpers,an clading to flat black with 4 coats clear.Black hides road tar.

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1999 w140, quit voting to old, and to old to fight, a god damned veteran, deutschland deutschland uber alles uber alles in der welt

Actually I am adding the cladding to my 87 to update the look. I got the cladding from a newer e class car. The clad is gray and the car will be silver.

I mean another shade of silver or gray.

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'81 MB 300SD, '82 MB 300D Turbo (sold/RIP), '04 Lincoln Town Car Ultimate

Sooner or later every car falls apart, ours does it later!
-German Narrator in a MB Promotion Film about the then brand new W123.

1. All cars look better without body cladding. I say again: all cars look better without body cladding. Cladding is almost as much of an automotive atrocity as a fake convertible top.

2. Original color is almost always best. Color changes are difficult and expensive to do right, and done wrong it just looks tacky.

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Whoever said there's nothing more expensive than a cheap Mercedes never had a cheap Jaguar.

83 300D Turbo with manual conversion, early W126 vented front rotors and H4 headlights 401,xxx miles
08 Suzuki GSX-R600 M4 Slip-on 26,xxx miles
88 Jaguar XJS V12 94,xxx miles. Work in progress.
99 Mazda Miata 183,xxx miles.

Oh, yes that would look good I think. Do you know if the chrome trim comes off the bumpbers of the newer E's and is able to be added to the older ones? The strip along the top I am referring to.

Go body color.

On my black '94 I like the dark gray metallic lower panels, kind of a tuxedo look, on all other 124s I've had I felt that the contrasting color lower panels cheapened the car's look. My black-sapphire '95 Special Edition has body-color bumpers, impact strips, and cladding, and I think that it looks the newest and least cluttered of all of my 124s. The bumper impact-strips MUST match the bumpers IMO, makes a huge difference and looks less '74 rubber-bumper-strip like, was standard '94/'95. Much more modern look.

The chrome boomerangs on the front bumper are easy to swap, clips under the bumper skin need to be removed, and you will have to drill holes in your bumper for the pins to drop in. I'm not sure you can do it with the bumper on the car, you might need to spend the 10minutes it takes to drop the front bumper (unless a diesel, then you need to remove the inner-fender lower piece on the left side to get to the left bolts, ... add 10minutes).

Rear bumper is pretty much the same, 10minutes to drop the bumper, mark and drill holes, clip them in. On the '87 you will not have the matching strip on the hatch-lift piece, and the later lift piece is not interchangeable between the '80s and the '90s hatches, ... you might have to fake that one with some epoxy.

No question it updates it, as do the '94/'95 headlamps & hood or at least Euros, clear corners or '94/'95 bi-color as in the above photo help, and updated wheels.

I love spending other people's money.

Also on my last '87 I went with the later door panels which have zebrano wood on them and leather panels, plus leather seatbacks with the leather pouch instead of the net that drops things and sags, leather steering wheel from a later car, and either a leather knob from a later car or a zebrano-wood one.

Have fun, it never ends.

Do you want me to check on a shipping price for my spare late-model dash (with the zebrano-strip across it)? ROFL!

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Gone to the dark side

- Jeff

ya, easy to spend. I would like to find door panels with the wood but my interior is the hideous blue to match the hideous blue exterior. Hence the color change. I love the car but have always despised the color. I figure silver with blue interior will look OK. Also can the wood be added to the older panels or is it molded to fit them.

That's your opinion and in most cases I would agree with you, but I would much rather have a genII W126 or W124 because I think it looks better. US W126s especially.

I agree with keeping it the original color!

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1985 500SL Euro w/ AMG bits 130k
1984 300SD Turbodiesel 192k
1980 240D Stick China 188k
2001 CLK55 AMG 101k
2007 S600 Biturbo 149k Overheated Project, IT'S ALIVE!!!

It is molded to fit them.

Blue TE interiors aren't hard to find, every dealer had one for a service vehicle in the early '90s.

The hard part is finding one in leather, that is scrapped with a good interior. I found one, used the door panels and other goodies, but sold the perfect blue dash, ... DOH! Then I bought a perfect car with a cracked blue dash. Figures.

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Gone to the dark side

- Jeff

OK one more question, anyone have the part numbers for the correct clips to attach the cladding to the TD? I mostly need the ones for the bottom of the door and the two rear quarter panel pieces. There seems to be 1000 different clips and I just want to be sure to order the right ones. I assume they will be from 1990 up? That is the first year for the cladding or was it 89?

'90 was the first year for the sedan and wagon, I believe that the coupe got it in '89.

I don't know the part numbers, sorry.

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Gone to the dark side

- Jeff