Lots of work on a 240D

[w123fanman]

We did lots of work on a 240D. I mean lots. It took us 2 months.

What have we done? Well it all started when my dad's 77 240D parts car (which he was driving regularly) started having more and more issues with the fuel filters clogging from a rusty tank.



The car had been in a rear end collision and we had originally planned to take the engine from it and put it in his 83 which had the engine overheat and die. We decided now was the time to do that. We thought it would be an easy swap but it wasn't.

Now his 83 is in rather poor shape cosmetically but he just likes driving it, doesn't particularly care about looks. It has the 4 speed manual versus the automatic in the 77. He loved driving the 77 everywhere but he especially loved driving his old 240D with the manual.

All this work has been done at my dad's new office which is basically a construction project that will probably not be finished until I have graduated from Tech. Excuse the mess.

The first thing we did was decide we wanted to put in a bigger radiator. I had a 300SD radiator sitting around that was in great shape so we decided to use that. I wanted to reinforce the plastic necks of the radiator as one of them was damaged but couldn't find correct size copper pipe so I bought a sheet of aluminum at Ace and cut pieces and painstakingly rounded them to fit then epoxied them in place.



Once they had set, I took AC condenser cleaner and cleaned the fins on the radiator.



After that, we took the fog lights out of the headlights and added a pair of sealed beams for dual low and dual high beams. We also doubled up the brake lights and added a 3rd brake light (cops will try to ticket you here for not having one even if it wasn't originally equipped).





The next step was to fix the seats from the 83. The 77's seats had bad horsehair and we wanted to keep them in good shape for a better condition W123 so we decided using the original seats from the 83 would be the best option. On the driver's seat, the seat backrest frame was broken and the seat bottom had one broken spring (surprising after 330,000 miles that it was only one break). In both seats, I put the front spring supports from a W126 which are made out of a high density foam. I then on the driver's seat added a second set of the coil springs in the open slot on the seat bottom and fixed the broken spring with a 1/8th inch compression fitting elbow and JB Weld (learned that idea on this forum). Unfortunately I have no pictures of all of that work. Next I cut up a license plate and riveted it to the seat back frame to repair it.



One thing I did while the engine was out of the 240D was change the steering stabilizer. It is actually much more difficult to change it from above so I suggest only doing it from below.



I also changed the engine mounts and the slave cylinder while the engine was out but that was much later.


The first really hard part was pulling the engine. We started the job on a dry day and those have been pretty rare in Georgia this year so we were delayed getting it out for a couple of weeks. The hardest part was undoing the transmission bell housing bolts. Other highlights were dealing with the York compressor bracket (which we have left off for the time being) and that we could not remove the oil cooler from the radiator and we did not want to remove it from the lines (afraid for the fittings stripping). The old design for mounting the oil cooler is insane, we had to drill it out after the engine was out.





The radiator was somewhat of a sacrifice taking the engine out but was already in rather poor shape and was not going to be used anyway.



Finally out!



It was at this point we got side tracked. My mom's Grand Marquis had the heater core go out. Again. Second time in 6 months. The Ford Motorcraft heater core was a piece of junk. No evidence of electrolysis, it just failed. We decided to try our luck with a Murray heater core from O'Reillys that was $30 vs $90 for the Motorcraft. The quality was far superior. We installed that and a new radiator plus a manual heater valve from a Honda to limit flow into the heater core. We also renewed the transmission cooler lines, bypassed the in radiator transmission cooler (Murray radiator wasn't quite as good quality as the heater core, transmission cooler fitting leaked terribly), and replaced the power steering hoses and added a power steering cooler.

We also got a dog. His name is Steve.



We then came upon the biggest PITA known to man. Hex bolts under gobs of torque. The early automatics used hex bolts for the flywheels versus 12 points. If you have to deal with them, know they will only strip.



I used high quality sockets and they still just stripped. It was a joyous experience. This setback took 2 weeks to remedy. First we tried drilling. Nope. Next we tried welding nuts onto the heads of the bolts. Sorta worked on a few but we could only find zinc plated nuts so the welds often didn't hold. Our last attempt was to use an air grinder with a 3 inch metal cutoff blade attachment. Worked beautifully but still took quite a bit of time.







Finally got the new clutch on. This took some more work with a dremel because the tool included in the kit to align the clutch was slightly too bit. cutting it down was a dremel worked wonders.





Getting the engine in and bolted in place wasn't too difficult. An expansion take from a W201 was added to work with the 300SD radiator. I can also say that the star of this project by far was Kroil, saved us a lot of pain.



We got everything installed for the most part but before that we did a valve adjustment. I'm not sure with engine had ever had an adjustment, or if it did, it was probably was last done before I was born. The old valve cover gasket was OEM but was so old that it was cracking and dry rotting.



For some reason while mounting the expansion tank, we forgot to consider the air filter housing. Simple fix, we simply rotated it a bit and drilled new holes for the mounts to go through.



Diesel purge! Old filter was nasty.



Replacement glass for the broken triangle piece from a hail storm 3 years ago.



We also replaced the clutch master cylinder and bled the system and the brakes. Was much easier than I expected after the horror stories some people have given.

Took the old rims and tires from my brother's 300SD to put on here, not correct size but close and not amazing tires but better than what it had. Also the silver Honda (Isuzu) in the back was a Christmas gift to one of my dad's employees who we have been providing housing for the past 10 years or so (lived in a van before).



We upgraded the cooling system even more with an electric fan from a Volvo. It fits extremely well. We had it running though the original Volvo relay and that is ran through a Toyota fuse block we have added as an upgrade so we can also run the headlights on relays. The alternator was replaced with an alternator from a 190E 2.6 which is 80 amps versus the original 55 amps.



I also had to change the brake booster as the original did not hold vacuum.

Last thing we did was change the coolant which we just used regular green coolant for now. We are going to put in G-05 when we replace the rest of the heater hoses and add the AC sometime in April or May.

The Volvo fan upgrade works extremely well. With our 75 degree weather and the fan on low speed, the thermostat never opened while it was idling to bleed the system. The heater works great.


The next steps are to get it registered (which is happening today) and finish the wiring for the headlights and radio. It will also have a temp switch put in for the fan so it doesn't kick on until the engine has warmed up. Later one AC and cruise control will be added.


I am also currently working on replacing the suspension in my 190E Sportline, probably will have a write up on that once it is done.

One more picture of Steve: