Hi all. I'm new here, and new to the Mercedes marque in general. Sorry for the super long upcoming post, but I feel an intro is in order.

My background is mostly with BMW's (1996 318ti & 2010 128i) and a few VW's before that (1991 Corrado G60 & 1972 Super Beetle). My DD is still the 128i, mostly built out for autocross (see build thread here) and we also have a 2014 4Runner as a "family" car.

Recently, the circumstances of our lives changed a little. When my wife goes back to work in the fall (she's a teacher), I'm going to start dropping the kids off in the morning, and she'll be picking them up in the afternoon. Packing up the kids each morning in my coupe is less than ideal - frankly, every time I've had to transport both kids in the Bimmer coupe has been sort of frustrating, and the idea of doing it every day on my way to work sort of stresses me out. At the same time my wife, who stands to have a longer commute and will cross a bridge daily, has expressed concern about driving the SUV all the time (she wants better gas mileage and also a vehicle that won't be buffeted by the wind so much). At this stage of my life (approaching 40 with two young children), daily driving a coupe doesn't make too much sense - but I've got too much time and money in the BMW to give it up, plus it's the main "toy" in my life. All of this is a long way of saying that I'm in the ridiculous position of considering a third car.

My first thought was to lease an economy car, a Ford Fiesta or something. But I'm a dyed-in-the-wool car guy, with an affinity for European brands - and I've always wanted something from what I consider the "golden age," the 70's to early 90's. My dream car is a BMW 2002tii, but of course it doesn't make much sense to buy another coupe - we really need a sedan for our purposes. But the excuse to pick up a fun project car, something that wasn’t just an appliance that met our day-to-day needs, was too great to resist. I just needed to find the right car.

The natural choice was another BMW. I've always admired the E28 chassis, but I also felt like I needed something economical to sort of justify the additional expense in the first place. I started searching for a 528e (a detuned economy variant), but they're few and far between, especially since I was in the unenviable position of needing to find a used car within a certain time frame (i.e., before the school year) and relatively close by (too busy to search nationwide). Really, looking for a specific older car should be done patiently without too much regard for time and distance, but it is what it is. I only had a matter of weeks to make it happen.

That said, I had no luck finding an E28 528e. But then one day, I saw a nice W123 300D cruising around locally. I didn't know too much about Mercs, but I knew the design was classy and timeless. This particular example was a beautiful light green - my wife would’ve loved it, and I decided finding a car in a nice green or even blue (her favorite colors) would be ideal. The fuel efficiency of a diesel would just be icing on the cake, and it started to seem like a no-brainer.

The search for a W123 was unsuccessful, but I started to see a few W124's around. The more modern chassis, plus the idea of a driver-side airbag, started to really appeal to me. And I liked that the earlier models had the big-honking classic grill that the W123's had. A little more reading, and I was sold on the W124. Before long, I found one with relatively low miles (~221,000), only two previous owners, and in Seafoam Green Metallic (so many others were in white or black, and I really wanted a "color"). The car I found was a 1992 300D 2.5 in Portland, OR, less than 300 miles away, and was listed for less than $5K. It seemed perfect, so long as it wasn't a lemon.

I emailed the seller, sort of a shady used car lot, and tried to set up a pre-purchase inspection. They were more or less amenable, but it was difficult because I couldn't get down to Portland on a weekday because of work. The dealer was open on the weekends, but no reputable MBZ shops were. In the end, I hired a mobile inspection guy to look at the car. He definitely wasn't a Merc specialist, but he (along with clean CarFax & AutoCheck reports) gave me enough confidence to at least make the 300-mile drive and see the car in person.

It definitely had some issues. It turns out the car was picked up at auction almost a year and a half prior, and it had obviously spent much of the time since just sitting. It ran well enough, but I knew right off the bat it needed to be caught up on maintenance. At times, it idled a little rougher than I would’ve liked, and there were a few cosmetic problems. But it felt super solid, there was no blow by, and the transmission shifted buttery smooth. I took a leap of faith and made an offer - I was able to talk them down a little from their already recently reduced asking price, with the knowledge that I was going to have to put some more money in the car right away.

So suddenly I found myself in the position of owning a 25-year old neglected (but hopefully not abused) Mercedes, and I was 300 miles from home. I was able to contact a local indy (they answered the phone on a Saturday!) and get them to agree to an after-hours drop-off, with instructions to change all fluids and filters, and basically check the car out. I knew I'd be changing glow plugs, maybe injectors, that sort of thing. I hoped it wouldn't be too much worse than that.

That was two weeks ago, and the car is still at Lakeside Mercedes Repair in Portland, OR. So far, there has been nothing catastrophically wrong with the car, just what you'd expect under the circumstances. Still, it's not cheap to rehab an older Mercedes, but at the end of the day, I think we'll end up with an elegant and interesting car for about the same cost (or less) than a lease of a generic econobox would’ve cost us.

Of course, I've got big plans for the W124. Right now the focus is mainly on getting it to be a reliable and safe daily driver, but I'm planning some suspension and cosmetic upgrades as well later down the line. Maybe even some power mods, if the OM602 is amenable to any (I’m getting the car primarily set up for my wife, but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to have fun with it!). I'll keep this thread updated with details as they come.

For now, here are a few pics of the car at baseline, on the dealer's lot. It's far from perfect, but I think it's got potential, and I'm enjoying the build process so far. Stay tuned!

Congrats on the score! That color is VERY rare. Looks like it has Tex and no headlight wipers, so probably no telescopic wheel or memory seats either. Probably no other options like heated seats or ASD. Still, it looks like a great platform to build on!

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Dave
Boise, ID
Check out my website photos, documents, and movies!

The color was a huge plus. My wife likes teal, and turquoise, and stuff like that, and I think the Seafoam Green will be right up her alley. I'm just happy to have something that isn't black or white, and I already have a red car, so this is perfect. It's also has kind of a dated, vintage-y feel that I'm digging.

Yeah, beige MB-Tex inside. (Is "beige" the proper name for the color? I haven't been able to find any period brochures or anything with MBZ's interior color names).

In a perfect world, I would've found a car with ASD and heated seats, but that combo is probably rare as hen's teeth these days. Otherwise, I don't know what was offered as standard and what was optional - the car has a sunroof, if that's an option. Again, it would be nice to find a period brochure or ordering guide or something.

The USA name for that interior color (code xx5) was Cream-Beige, for W124 chassis through 1993. The color changed slightly in 1994 and received a new name, Parchment. (The colors and names also changed for interior code xx4, which is the peanut-buttery color... 86-93 was Palomino, 94-95 was much darker and called Saddle.) Only those two colors changed, btw... the other six colors remained the same through the end of 124 production. A few pics of the color change are here:
http://www.w124performance.com/images/W124_stuff/color_change_94-95/




10 years ago I wanted one with ASD and heated seats. It took me about 18 months of searching nationwide to find one that wasn't in the rust belt (most were), and that didn't have black paint (can't keep a black car clean here in farmland). It was a real fixer-upper, more than I expected, but it ended up being a nice car once I got it sorted out. Unfortunately we found the little 2.5T was too underpowered in summer with AC on, for our taste... living at 2700' elevation didn't help. It was fine in winter, or at sea level. The car now belongs to my sister who is quite happy with it. Pics are at this link.



Your wish is granted! Check out the 1992 directory, at the top of the link below. Enjoy...
http://www.w124performance.com/docs/mb/articles/

As usual, you prove a hugely helpful source of information. Thanks! I don't suppose you have any of those brochures in PDF (other than the Paintwork one, which I already snagged for my collection)? I suppose you probably posted what you had.

So it looks like my car is actually Crystal Green Metallic instead of Seafoam? I couldn't find the color plate when I actually had my hands on the car, but will double check it to verify when I get it back. Is the plate under the hood or in the door jamb? I don't recall seeing it in either place, but I was looking at/for a million different things at once, it seems like.

Nice 2.5D! Hopefully we don't find ours too underpowered. We're more or less at sea level, but I admit there were times on the test drive that the car seemed pretty gutless, mostly right off the line. Like, I would definitely have to give myself plenty of room when merging into traffic. Is there much to be gained from aftermarket injectors or other engine mods?

The original color code for the car will be one of the numbers stamped on the metal plate next to the hood latch. Alternately you can pull the datacard from the EPC with your VIN and see what the color code is. If it hasn't been repainted, yep, Crystal Green was the name for that color (code 256, I believe). Sometimes a different name is used in Europe but I don't think it was different for this color.



Lack of power off the line can be fixed via ALDA adjustment (search the forum, ignore posts that say to remove the ALDA). This is only if the power is below normal. Measure the 0-60 time on a flat road with a stopwatch, make sure you are at WOT and it's upshifting at 4600+ RPM. Normal times are ±13 seconds for a stock 2.5T. If it's slower, you have some work to do, starting with the ALDA tweak. If it's 12-13 seconds, it's making normal power. You can boost the power further (about 15% or so) by maxing out the fuel delivery, this is a somewhat complicated procedure, and ideally should come with either an intercooler or EGT gauge as a safety... but if you don't stay at WOT for more than ~30 seconds it's probably safe with today's lousy, low-BTU fuel we get on most of the western USA. Nothing to be gained with injectors, but with an open checkbook you can get 300-400hp with monster turbos, custom injection pumps, and intercoolers larger than the radiator. Search "super turbos", lots of them in Finland, those guys are nuts. Probably not what you want for a daily driver...

__________________
Dave
Boise, ID
Check out my website photos, documents, and movies!

Cool color! I included your thread here in the W124.128 group.

http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/groups/w124-300d-2-5-turbo.html

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Peach Parts W124.128 User Group.

80 280SL
85 300SD
87 300TD
92 300D 2.5 Turbo
92 300TE 4Matic

Thanks! And thanks for the invite to the group as well.

So, the car is still at the shop in Portland. I just sort of dumped it in their lap with very little notice, and I told them to take their time since I'm not in a huge hurry to get it back, as it won't be pressed into daily driver service for another 4-5 weeks. I don't think it'll take that much longer, as the bulk of work has been done, and I closed out my account with the shop for the month before moving on to the last few things. This is what has been done so far (in no particular order):

- Engine oil & filter changed.
- Engine air filter changed.
- In-line & screw-in fuel filters changed.
- Power steering fluid & filter changed.
- Coolant flushed.
- Brake fluid flushed & rear brake lines replaced.
- Transmission fluid & filter changed & left transmission cooler hose replaced.
- Glow plugs replaced & holes reamed.
- Vacuum box replaced.
- EGR pressure converters replaced (x2).
- Hood pad replaced.
- Belly pan replaced.
- Engine mounts replaced.
- Rear differential mounts replaced.
- Intake servo linkage ("ball cup?") replaced.

I also had a set of wheels and tires shipped from Tire Rack directly to the shop, still waiting to be mounted:

- ASA Type 8 16x7.5" (x4).
- Continental PureContact 205/55R16 (x4).

I wish I could say that was all that needed to be done! But, it is most of it, I think. A few more issues to be addressed in the shop (probably 2 weeks left, at the rate things are going) before I get the car home, and then some simpler DIY work plus paint & body stuff down the line.

I wanted to provide a little background on my rationale for the change in wheels. Obviously, wheels are a pretty easy way to make a reasonably big change in a car's appearance, but it wasn't going to be something I was going to jump into right away, being more concerned with getting the car mechanically sorted first.

I did know that I wasn't a huge fan of the 15-hole wheels the car came with. Don't get me wrong - they're kind of cool, and very 80's, but overall I think the 8-hole wheels offer a similar character and feel in a better look. And I was pretty sure I wanted to do a Sportline chassis retrofit, so the 8-holes made a lot of sense, since they were original equipment for that package and the extra half-inch of width would allow for the use of Sportline-spec 205/60 tires, rather than the stock 195/65.

So, all of this was in my head before I even bought the car, and then I went and looked at the thing: it had Michelin tires, but they were not all the same tire! Nor were they all the same age. Now, I'm a huge tire snob - I've replaced OE tires on all my vehicles (including my trailer) and I even have two sets of wheels for my BMW (one for street and one for autocross) - so I knew this was going to be a problem for me. And it made sense to replace tires while I was having things like fluids and bushings replaced, in preparation for the 300-mile drive home.

Thing is, it really didn't make sense to put new 195/65 tires on when I was planning on replacing the wheels before too long, probably much sooner than the tires would be worn. So I bumped up my wheel-buying timeline, and started looking on eBay - and there was a dearth of decent-quality 8-hole wheels. I figured a could pick up a used set for $200-$300, but I only found one wheel that was acceptable cosmetically (it was in such good shape and there was only one because it was a spare, perhaps never even used).

I briefly flirted with the idea of AMG monoblocks. Gorgeous period wheels, in my opinion, and there were several vendors selling reconditioned sets out of Germany and Russia. But not cheaply! I really didn't want to spend $1800 on a set of used wheels for an old car, and I especially didn't want to send that kind of money to some Russian with pretty pictures, and maybe not much else.

Then I stumbled on the ASA Type 8's, which if you don't know are replicas of the Mercedes-Benz 8-hole wheel, offered in 15" and 16" sizes:


They seemed perfect - reasonably priced, unblemished 8-holes, plus I could get Tire Rack to mount tires on them at no additional cost and have the whole set shipped right to my car. I was originally going to get 15", in the interest of trying to duplicate the Sportline chassis as closely as possible, but it turns out there aren't any tires that interest me in the 205/60 size, and Tire Rack kept trying to sell me 195/65's - the same size that was stock on the slightly narrower 15-holes! So I stepped up to the 16" size for the much wider tire selection. 16" is still a pretty small wheel by today's standards, with plenty of sidewall, so I reckon the ride quality won't be affected too much, if at all (and honestly, I wouldn't mind a slightly sportier set up, I just don't want to totally kill the plush Benz feel).

For tires, I chose Continental PureContacts. German tires for German cars! Not really, as I'm pretty sure the tires aren't manufactured in Deutschland, but I wanted Contis because of my recent good experience with the ExtremeContact DWS 06 as the street tire on my BMW coupe. I was leaning towards buying another set of the DWS's, but stumbled on the PureContact, a grand touring all-season tire geared towards "luxury performance sedans" but also with Continental's EcoPlus tech for improved fuel efficiency - maybe I'm a sucker for copy writing, but it seemed like a perfect fit for my diesel Mercedes sedan.

Two new somewhat worrisome issues:

• The car is apparently starting in 2nd gear, which is contributing (obviously) to the sluggishness off-the-line. My mechanic has done a bunch of diagnostic fiddling, and thinks the issue will end up being a bad spring or brake band in the valve body. Not terrible, if that's what it is - hopefully it's nothing worse.

• The injection pump is apparently leaking oil badly. I'm probably just looking at a reseal, but it might be hard to find someone willing to do this (I suspect a diesel shop will try and upsell me into a rebuild), and I think it might be leaking too badly to make it the 300 miles to my house for me to attempt to DIY the repair - that is, if I even dare do so.

I guess we'll see how it goes - all part of the adventure, right?

If it really is starting in 2nd gear, wow, that would make it very sluggish off the line. It either has the wrong transmission, the wrong valvebody, or something is wrong inside the valvebody (broken spring is not uncommon). First thing would be to check if the tranny is indeed the correct 722.418 for the 124.128 chassis. Next would be to verify the tranny serial number and see if it matches the EPC datacard for your VIN. If the trans has been replaced, there's always a chance the rebuilder goofed. If it's original, it's fairly likely something is broken - or stuck/jammed - inside the valvebody. Mechanics generally won't want to mess with diagnosis and will recommend replacing the entire transmission. If all other shifts are good, I'd want to fiddle with the valvebody and see if you can find what's wrong. No point shelling out $1500-$3000 if you don't have to.



It would have to be an incredibly bad oil leak to not make it 300 miles... like, dripping into a puddle when parked at idle. If it was that bad, I'd suspect the big O-ring between the block and the IP. This is DIY'able if you can get it home, with the IP lock took, and timing basket... although this thread mentions you may not need the basket. (??)

__________________
Dave
Boise, ID
Check out my website photos, documents, and movies!

So it turns out it was a broken spring inside the valve body. Fortunately, I seem to have found a good mechanic who was willing to dig into the tranny a little bit to diagnose and repair. So, shout out to Lakeside Mercedes Repair in Portland, OR (well, technically Tigard, OR, I guess).

If it's funny you should say so - when I asked Mark, the owner at Lakeside, how bad the leak was, he told me "pretty bad," and then proceeded to describe oil pooling underneath the car when parked (not running). I was bracing myself for an IP rebuild, even scouring the internet to see what was out there. But when I talked to Mark on the phone yesterday, he told me that he tore into the IP himself, and found an O-ring that was "hard as a rock," which he replaced. I don't know which O-ring it was, exactly, but it seems reasonable that it was probably the one you describe, between the block and IP.

So that ended up being a pretty big relief - two issues with the potential to be catastrophically expensive ended up costing me almost nothing in parts, and just a few hours of labor. Another shop might have easily sent me off to find a rebuilt IP and valve body (if not transmission!). I could've probably figured out the IP reseal myself at home, maybe even the valve body, but the job ended up being so reasonably priced that I think it's more than worth it in time and frustration saved.

WOW - it sounds like you found an excellent mechanic. That is amazing. With 1st gear restored the car will be much better. Don't forget to clock it 0-60 with a stopwatch as a baseline, when you get it back.

Even better if he was able to stop the main leak on the IP. If it wasn't totally re-sealed, don't be surprised if there are minor leaks from other seals. It's pretty common for the IP to "weep" and get an oily film which attracts dust & dirt, even if there are no oil drips. Only way to fix that is a total re-seal. Worst one is the L7 rack travel electrical connector up top, which cannot have the O-ring replaced without full pump disassembly. You can use a thin bead of sealant under the locknut as a Band-Aid during a re-seal for that one, everything else can be done on the workbench.

So when do you get the car back?