Very area dependent, I'm thinking. I've never seen a 617 in a junk yard. Ever.

Here in the PNW, diesel MBZ's are vintage, very trendy with the hippy granola sandal biodiesel craft beer crowd. Mention "biodiesel" in a car ad and you can easily have a car that you east coast guys would deride as a $500 junker going for $2k. We don't salt the roads here, which I think helps tremendously. If there was an era where they were common in junk yards, I missed it. Any that are still on the road now are relatively well cared for.

There are two right now in the So. Portland PNP, fresh within the last two weeks. A few years ago one might have had five or six to pick from in the Metro area, but availability is definitely dwindling, as is the overall census. There have been a few short periods in the last year or two when no W123 was available in the yards, but there's usually one or two to be found. They are likely to become more scarce as the newest of the W123's ages past 35 years. It's still a lot easier to find parts for my W123's than it is to find anything for my 43 year old W114. Another factor is the independent entrepreneurs who are paying better than scrap prices, which are currently very low, and parting these cars out.

I really think that the biodiesel/wvo fad in the PNW has passed along with the ready availability of decent W123's that could be economically driven into the ground over a year or two of ownership. I agree that most of the ones that remain are being relatively well cared for, and that too is putting more pressure on the used parts markets.

I see a few on the road in Columbus. Kind of weird, there are a hand full of Jeep Comanches running around. They are usually rare to see on the road. I haven't frequented the Pnp's of late. I never saw many there at either in Indy.
Tom

Being a college town there has always been old Mercedes running around here in Lafayette.

Hello folks. This one was near me, so I went out this evening and had a look: It's on a large farm between Yoder and Canby, about 10 mi. North of Silverton.

Seller is a BMW guy who works at a shop in Portland. Has some classic BMW's in barns & garages on the property. He also has several motorcycles but just the 1 Mercedes.

Said he's not familiar with diesels at all, got this one cheap and family drove it for a while, but it was hard to start in Winter, had blow by and never did have any power(240D Auto!), so concluded it needed a re-build & parked it in a barn 2 years ago.

It has good paint & a truly rust free body, interior was fair, save for typical drivers seat split. Needs a good clean-up. Passenger side CV axle boot is torn and radiator is rusty. Good tires. I gave him $350 for it. When I get it home, I should be able to get it running and go from there.
Don

W123 and 126 diesels and gassers still show up at Pick-n-Pull here in Norcal but fewer of them and more of the 124 gassers (rarely a 1987 300D Turbo). W210s are now appearing occasionally, never yet a diesel and almost immediately stripped.

The 123/126 cars look to have been sitting in the weeds for a long time while the 124s have been wrecked just enough to not be worth repairing.

Jeremy

::
Don great that you got it, let us know how it turns out.
Hard to start could just be Glow Plugs, valve Adj., Filters or low compression.

Might be a Diamond in the rough.


Charlie

Thanks, that's what I thought too. Seller said he hadn't adjusted the valves or done anything else but drive it some. Paperwork shows 240K on it 4 years ago, now @244K miles and sat in barn for couple years. Probably not a diamond but could be a jewel when cleaned, get a battery and hopefully up and running. Don

So is now a bad time to get one?
 

I wanted to get a W123 with an OM616 as a daily driver as my first MB. Is it too late for that now?

Not necessarily. They're out there, and reasonably easy to find, especially if you're willing to travel a bit for a nice one. I see a few pop up on Craigslist every month here in Massachusetts.

Finding one that's not a complete rustbucket is the challenge. Personally, I bought a rustbucket that I'm fixing up.

No, not at all. There are still quite a few available and often at a pretty decent price. Most of the maintenance parts are pretty available as well.

What this thread has shown is that using junk yards as a readily available "parts store" for cheap used parts is either over or getting over depending on your location.

The only thing I would caution in using a W123 as a daily driver is to have a backup means of transportation for those times when something breaks and it takes awhile to fix. My other caution is that if you're not a DIY kind of person, you need to be independently wealthy to handle the shop costs of keeping it on the road.

What do you think a reasonable price is for one that at least drives reliably? I have another reliable car that I can use when I need. From the ones available near me if they drive they are asking around $3k. If they drive and look nice more like $6k. I was thinking about getting something that at least drives and then slowly work on it myself. Hoping to budget $100-$200/mo for parts/tools to get it at least sorted mechanically. Is that reasonable?

Where are you located? Pricing differs in different areas.

Trout, where are you located? That can matter greatly in terms of answering your question.

I'll throw out some hard-won wisdom (I'm 68 and have messed with cars for well over 55 years) - go South and get a rust-free body to start with. If you have to pay a friend to haul it back on his car trailer - still WAY worth it.

Even rust belt cars that seem OK may have significant rust in the structural members (rear jack pockets are a good place to check) and that stuff is always hard to fix. You may have a hard time hiring someone to fix that stuff as, if they're in business, there are liability issues that they simply don't want to get into. I've welded up WAY MORE than my share of rusty hulks (I lived in Michigan for most of my life) and I can assure you that unless you do a full frame-off resto (actually, that's a rotissiary resto on these) they don't stay fixed. So start with a decent body - and shiny paint is NOT an indication of "solid". You have to climb under there and REALLY look and poke. MAACO can make ANYTHING look decent!

The mechanical bits are all fixable though Mercedes can be more challenging than most. I'd start with a late (say, '82/83) 240D with a manual trans. Expect the clutch slave to be bad but these are pretty basic cars and pretty easy to understand. Pelican Parts has provided lots of good stuff for my OM617 (the engine in a 300SD and what I have in my race truck) for reasonable prices (no, I DON'T work for them!).

Have fun!

Dan

Dan,

Thanks for the advice. I live in Florida so I can't go much further South. Around here when buying used we try to stay away from the beach. Beach cars are pretty easy to spot though with lots of body rust where the water collects.

I was looking at 82/83 240D's. But I can't find any manuals. All autos. I'm fine with the performance as long as they work.