New Project...JDM AMG CE! - Page 2 - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

Roncallo · #1 05-24-2024, 07:09 AM

Nice to see a new project starting. I never realized MB was still using cable drive speedometers into the 90's. Good luck with this.

duxthe1 · #2 05-28-2024, 09:00 PM

An 88 CE turned up in a local u-pull yard.

Nothing coupe specific was useful on it but I did grab a few generic 124 bits off of it.

Today I spent my lunch hour pouring through the EPC to figure out how to get a 4 bolt AC compressor with a speed sensor mounted to this engine while keeping hte automatic belt tensioner. What I have determined is that the compressor mounting bracket for the C-class cars is different from the E-class and the SL so I'm going to source the correct bracket from EBAY as there are no 104 cars in the local yards now.

duxthe1 · #3 05-30-2024, 09:28 PM

Small bit of progress today. I got the throttle actuator harness patched in. I unhooked the actuator on the donor and followed the harness into the fusebox where it merges with another much larger harness. Opening up my fusebox exposed the chopped harness so I decided to patch it there instead of chasing it down the rabbit hole. The colors match in both, so 11 soldered and shrink wrapped wires later and the throttle actuator is wired up.

duxthe1 · #4 06-02-2024, 08:23 PM

Spent a full day Saturday working on the coupe. I was able to make a starter harness and a transmission harness. I also got the wiring at the front of the engine generally sorted. With this done I was able to put a battery in it and crank the engine over.

I was also able to pull the complete ABS harness from the donor 124. Its a real PITA to pull that harness but I figured it was worth the work to not have it patched. I dread getting that back into the coupe.

I still have to get the engine module harnesses sorted before I can hope to hear it run. The engine side of the harness is too short and with have to be extended. I believe the donor 124 had a replacement harness because I haven't seen any wiring deterioration in it so I have no reservations using it to extend the C36 harness. The body side of the engine module harness was chopped so it will have to get grafted out of the donor as well.

I think about another full day of working on the wiring will have a runner assuming this statement doesn't jinx it

duxthe1 · #5 06-14-2024, 07:58 PM

Today was a big day for me. Maybe not so much in the grand scheme of things, but I got the belt drive assembled. The reason its a big deal to me, is that I have the correct 4 bolt, 3 wire compressor mounted with the automatic belt tensioner! While technically this is not period correct, it is done with all MB parts, and is a significant upgrade to the crappy manually adjustable belt tensioner. Along with a new AC compressor, there is a new water pump, alternator, and fan bearing bracket installed. The other deviations from a stock appearing, period correct setup is that I'm going with the later electric air pump, and the later power steering pump, both of which in my opinion are better than the earlier parts. With the belt drive tackled, I can move on to getting a cooling stack in place. A new radiator and condensor are waiting to go in along with a pair of low mile used fans.

duxthe1 · #6 06-19-2024, 11:55 PM

Lots of progress! I got the engine module completely wired in. Additionally, I have the ABS harness routed. With a battery sat in it, I was disappointed that the fuel pumps did not kick on with a key cycle. Further investigation revealed that the overload relay was not powering on. I beat my head against the diagrams for a couple hours trying to figure out how circuit 15U gets to the relay. Under about 8 inches of tape and another 5 inches of sleeve I found the wire cut and left hidden. Once repaired I have an HFM coming online and switching on the fuel pumps.

At this point I believe that the engine is electrically ready to run.

I'm ready to get a cooling stack installed but there's a hiccup. When the turbo motor was hacked in, the radiator supports were cut to clear an intercooler. With no way to mount a condensor, this was gonna have to be rectified. Today I cut the supports out of my donor car. This is not a fun job. With the spot welds cleaned up I moved on to cutting the remnants of the mounts out of the coupe. Also not a fun job. Eventually I was ready to weld the mounts into the coupe. Using an old radiator and my new condensor I made sure to line up everything as best possible. Turned out pretty good.

duxthe1 · #7 06-24-2024, 10:43 PM

Its been another busy week. Radiator, fans, and condenser are in and the cooling system is buttoned up and full of coolant. Also front and rear driveshafts are in along with a new center support. The fuel pumps ran but didn't pump fuel so today new fuel pumps were installed along with a filter, tank strainer, and new feed line going forward. With all that sorted, 5 gal of fresh gas in the tank, its time to turn the key. IT FIRES RIGHT UP! It sounds pretty nasty with no pipes at all, just manifolds at this point.

Ran it long enough to set the transmission fluid level and determine that there is no throttle control. Hopefully that is something simple. I'll get a diagnostic done next chance I get to spends some time on it.

duxthe1 · #8 06-26-2024, 11:06 PM

Dug into the lack of throttle control. It was throwing a "CTP switch fault" The idle tracking switch was switching so I studied the star finder diagrams and determined that the problem is the throttle actuator. They were changed in 96. It was fairly east to spot that the idle and WOT contacts are swapped but the more challenging find is that the throttle position potentiometers track opposite one another in pre-96 actuators and they track in tandem on the 96. Before I try to source a correct actuator I'm going to open up the actuator and see if I can rewire it to the early specifications.

duxthe1 · #9 06-28-2024, 10:37 PM

I ended up pulling the actuator off my donor 124. Its a high mile car, but the actuator works and the engine revs eagerly. With the throttle sorted I moved on to wiring up the electric air pump and getting a connector soldered onto the purge valve wiring. That pretty much wraps up the engine wiring. I moved on to getting the AC lines routed with basically all parts pulled from the donor excepting the expansion valve and receiver drier. I ran into a bit of a snag here as the drier interferes with putting the headlight back in. If anybody has euro lights in their 124 I'd really appreciate a picture of the area behind the left headlight. I still have a bit of work to do on the AC wiring harness. I grafted the donor car harness into the coupe but there was a bit of a wiring mismatch so I need to figure out what a few of the wires are. I'm not familiar with the Non-US dual zone climate control. If anybody has diagrams for that system, help a brother out.

duxthe1 · #10 07-20-2024, 02:56 PM

Spent some time today working on the climate control. Got the wiring mostly sorted, and charged the system with R134A. After double checking a few things and still not having compressor control I pulled the climate panel out and apart. Two of the larger transistors on the board look pretty cooked. I'm gonna try to repair it before shelling out the cash for a replacement, however if anybody has a 124 830 38 85 lying around, give me a shout.

My next big project is getting an exhaust on it. I only have the down pipes from the C36 since tweakers stole the catalysts off of it while it sat. I'm leaning towards magnaflow universal cats with the C36 resonator. No idea what to do for a rear muffler. The C36 part doesn't come close to fitting but I would like to have the dual AMG tips on whatever I end up going with.

duxthe1 · #11 07-28-2024, 06:49 AM

Another 1993 124 chassis car turned up at the local u-pull yard so I went Saturday morning to see what all I could grab. It was smashed bad in the rear so the engine bay was in great shape. First off, I still needed an airbox, grabbed it. There is also a housing that the right headlight sits in that ducts air to the airbox. Unsure if it fits the Euro stye headlights, I grabbed it anyway. Spoiler: it does fit! I needed the blower cowling and this one was in good shape. I also was able to score the washer nozzles along with the thermostat and hoses in the hood.

Back at the shop I pulled the right headlight and installed the air duct housing. Since the left headlight didnt clear the receiver drier I was worried about the right side not fitting in this housing. Turned out to not be an issue. With this ducting installed I sat the airbox in and found the issue. The crossover pipe that connects the air mass to the throttle body doesn't really fit in a 124 setup. You can smush it together but you can see in the pic that the little section of accordion hose is fully compressed. Since the big fat "3.6" crossover pipe is iconic and the only indication that its an AMG motor beside the badge, that will have to do.

Speaking of headlights, I set about getting the left side to fit back in. There is a small bit of room to push the receiver drier backward before it is wedged solid into the "V" space it sits in. Drilled a new hole and mounted it there. Another hole nearby since the ballast resistor now wont fit under the ABS pump and the drier doesn't move enough to use the original hole.

With the blower cowling installed the engine bay is now complete... almost. There is still one piece of trim at the rear of the engine compartment that is missing. This was broken on the junkyard car so I'm still looking.

turbobenz · #12 08-21-2024, 10:53 PM

Those rear wire covers on the firewall are shot on my car as well. I have one I found at junkyard that's intact but Im just keeping it off the car.

I found a 124 830 33 85 push button klima unit in my crap, not sure if it's a second or first gen.

Good to see that the hurdle of DAS ECU swaps being documented, not many people try.

duxthe1 · #13 08-24-2024, 03:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by turbobenz

Those rear wire covers on the firewall are shot on my car as well. I have one I found at junkyard that's intact but Im just keeping it off the car.

I found a 124 830 33 85 push button klima unit in my crap, not sure if it's a second or first gen.

Good to see that the hurdle of DAS ECU swaps being documented, not many people try.

The 3385 kilma is a US style and I need a Euro style, but thanks for thinking about me.

I'm jumping head first into the HFM-DAS problem, check out the new thread "Chipping and HFM ECU"

duxthe1 · #14 11-13-2024, 09:59 PM

In the midst of other projects I managed to make more progress on the CE. I got the super stiff springs out of the suspension. I put 500SL (129ch) front springs in with one full coil cut off of them. With the 2 dimple spring pads, they put the fender about 1" above the front tires. In the rear I put the stock 300E 2.8 springs in with 1/4 coil cut. This brought the back down significantly but it still needs about an inch to 1/4 coil cut off the springs to get the stance right. It still currently has the 19" wheels that came with it, that do not really fit the car. I'm on the search for a set of wheels that will fit the look of the car as well as the space available in the fenders.

I also pulled the exhaust off of the donor 124 car. It had a catalyst welded in but once it was out, I could see that it was a decent stock type replacement, which is about as good as I could hope for. I fit it under the CE and then welded the C36 resonator behind it. Needing a muffler and having the C36 part that had no hope of fitting, I set to cutting it to bits. It is a double pass design, which I cut the entire first section out. I then welded it back together as a straight through design. The twin tips run as two pipes into the front section. About 8 inches of those twin pipes is perforated with steel wool and then fiberglass packing around them. With just the resonator, it was a bit boomy but had a nice sharp rasp when revved aggressively. The muffler quieted down the boominess, but did leave most of the rasp.

duxthe1 · #15 11-20-2024, 10:43 PM

I bought a set of wheels for the coupe. A Brabus style knockoff, similar to the 19"s currently on the car but without any dish or polished lip. While not my first choice, they should fit great at 17x7.5 with an ET38. I plan on wrapping them with 225/45 tires in the next couple of days. That is the last piece before the thing becomes a driver. The rubber currently on the 19"s is barely acceptable for parking lot speeds, and I literally haven't driven it much over 5 mph.

Another recent development, I pulled the emmulator from the 1990 and installed it into my early HFM. Loaded the bin file and it didn't even try to fire at all. As a test, I reinstalled its actual chip, and confirmed it would run. So, its not a hardware issue with the module. I haven't given up on the emmulator but now have the hurdle of getting it working in the HFM module. Hopefully it is something stupid.

Despite the emmulator not working yet, I still had a nice win this week. I scored the HFM from a 1995 SL 320. I read it's bin and then programmed a chip with it's file modified with the 3.6 mapping. That module fired up and ran great! The SL has a drop in module box so the form factor isnt 100% compatible with the 124's harness but you can plug it in without latching the connectors. The best part was that the modified bin doesn't have the checksum corrected, I think at least. My eprom burning utility shows a checksum value but when searching the file as written, I can't find any data to match it so I dont think its actually recognizing and correcting the checksum. I need to actually get the car fully running and driving to ensure there isn't some other artifact of an incorrect checksum that pops up down the line, but for now at least I'm very hopeful it isn't an issue (It hasn't been on my modded CIS ECU, which admittedly is a generation older)