I was in the office when coming across an ad of a car wrecker advertising a Mercedes car exactly the same model year like mine, even in the same color.

http://dallas.craigslist.org/ftw/pts/1084195915.html

I thought I'd hit the mother lode and went instantly to the junk yard.
After 1 and 1/2 hour of labor, ruining my best office attire and my finger nails I pulled out following parts, all in good condition:

instrument cluster, what I just in dire need of
1 head light assembly (right)
2 tail lights
3 electronic modules in the relay box
2 sun visors

and some small parts like car jack, spark plug wires, first-aid kit, connectors, gas cap etc.

The awakening came at the register, they wanted $1415.- altogether. First I thought I was not hearing right then they showed me the monitor screen displaying the prices:

$192.- instrument cluster
$252.- head light assembly
$198.- 2 tail lights
$594.- 3 electronic modules in the relay box
$86.- 2 sun visors

the rest for the small parts.

Of course I went out empty-handed, would not think of paying such high prices from a junk yard, they are even more expensive than on ebay. I did offer $600.- but got no deal.

In the end I have worked almost 2 hours for them, removing the parts
My bad that I did not ask about their prices beforehand. I had thought to get the parts for less than 100 bucks each. I don't think that I would go to junk yards again soon. It's not worth the time and effort.

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1996 E320 since 1/16/08, 171K miles as of Feb 2011

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1989 300CE - R.I.P. Dec 29 2007
Other MBs (sold): 1992 300E-24 - 1979 350SLC - 1984 230E - 1990 300CE