Here's my prize winner and HUGE money saver.
My heater fan went on my SD a few years ago, and of course it was the coldest part of winter, and I NEEDED to get this fixed. the nearest replacement had to come from the states and was going to cost me ALOT, I think around $400. NO GO. so I took a heater motor from a 1990 Nissan 240SX, and trimmed the flange and cut the mercedes motor from it's flange and welded it up and did some swappage with fan cages from several I had lying around.

I think I was almost at one point, ready to install a modified fan from a 1955 Ford

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RIP: 80 300SD
RIP: 79 450SEL
2002 E430 4matic (212,000km)
2002 ML500 'sport'

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FACEBOOK: PANZER450

i like the ingenuity with the fan.

I have another one sort-of...

I was working on my dad's one 300SD (the work car) trying to diagnose a charging system issue (theres a thread in the diesel discussion forum) and I was going out to check some voltages and get something to do drink. I walked out of my house into the garage, checked the voltage grabbed my beverage and then found out that the door had locked.

I had no keys, no phone or anything else to get back in...my parents's bedroom is right above the garage and I usually get yelled at pretty good for making noise in the garage at night..so I figure some horn action from the van would wake them up and let me in.. that didn't work.

Next I found some oranges/grapefruit. I figured the classic "throw stuff at the window" trick would work. I re-examined this and decided I would aim for the siding rather than the glass. I don't want to break the glass. That failed and as an added bonus there is now around a pound of fruit on the roof.

My next plan was ingenious, but flawed. I knew I could startup the SD and potentially drive it to my grandma's house (she sleeps at odd hours and would be awake) and then phone home to get the door open. I got the engine running and was all set...however I couldn't bypass the steering lockout and driving in a straight line was not going to work.

Finally I was able to use a combination of long horn honking and beating the ceiling with a 4' lead pipe (which consequently cut the garage door wires--which I had to fix) that finally woke someone upstairs.

30 minutes later...

That really doesn't qualify as jerry-rigged but it was interesting and worth sharing lol

Hopefully some on gets a laugh out of it.

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Cruise Control not working? Send me PM or email (jamesdean59@gmail.com). I might be able to help out.
Check here for compatibility, diagnostics, and availability!

(4/11/2020: Hi Everyone! I am still taking orders and replying to emails/PMs/etc, I appreciate your patience in these crazy times. Stay safe and healthy!)


82 300SD 145k
89 420SEL 210k
89 560SEL 118k
90 300SE 262k RIP 5/25/2010
90 560SEL 154k
91 300D 2.5 Turbo. 241k
93 190E 3.0 235k
93 300E 195k

Right on, good thread. I once saw a guy use a car battery to weld an alternator bracket that had broken off the lug where it mounted to the engine block. This was in a jeep and we were off-roading umpteen miles out in the middle of BFE in the Calif desert. The bracket had broken and the weight of the alt was causing it to hang just enough sideways to cause it to get into the fan. He used jumper cables as the welding leads and some baling wire as the electrode and kind of looked away as he struck the arc. Obviously this was in an old jeep that did not have a PCM or anything electronic. When you're off-road and stuff breaks, you get pretty creative... It wasn't pretty but it dang sure worked. I had always heard that you could use a battery to weld with but had never actually seen it done.

http://www.4x4wire.com/isuzu/minutemods/welder/

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1998 C230 330,000 miles (currently dead of second failed EIS, yours will fail too, turning you into the dealer's personal human cash machine)
1988 F150 144,000 miles (leaks all the colors of the rainbow)
Previous stars: 1981 Brava 210,000 miles, 1978 128 150,000 miles, 1977 B200 Van 175,000 miles, 1972 Vega (great, if rusty, car), 1972 Celica, 1986.5 Supra

Hello ! Regarding post #23, wherein it was said "...rubber in the throttle linkages on a 617 diesel", I have a '84 300D (Turbo)(bought in '95, and a '73 220D before that), and although I know about the 20 or so ball-n-socket rods, where are the rubber pieces ?

Dave H.

East German Commies had once handcuffed me with McGuyver to a nuclear reactor that had been set to leak, thereby bursting, after which twenty tons of concrete would come down on us to reduce the radioactivity.

Mac Guyver found that one of the guys had left a piece of wire on the table. After straining I got the wire, the end of which Mac Guyver used to open the handcuffs. Mac Guyver then stuck the wire in my mouth and used two of my teeth as a wire stripper to get several fine filaments. He broke off the edge of a plastic spoon he found to open the main panel and jury rigged things so that the reservoir below would flood the coolant chamber. At the same time, we emptied a 55 gallon drum, and Mac Guyver then jury-rigged the circuitry to send the concrete crashing down. We stood up in the drum, which acted as a boat as the concrete slowly floated us to higher ground and an access vent, whereby we made our escape.

We then made our way out of the country but that's another story....

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Strelnik
Invest in America: Buy a Congressman!

1950 170SD
1951 Citroen 11BN
1953 Citroen 11BNF limo
1953 220a project
1959 180D
1960 190D
1960 Borgward Isabella TS 2dr
1983 240D daily driver
1983 380SL
1990 350SDL daily driver alt
3 x Citroen DS21M, down from 5
3 x Citroen 2CV, down from 6

Long ago,overheated in the El Paso sun off road.We had beer my 2 friends and a girl helped fill the radiator with pee.

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1999 w140, quit voting to old, and to old to fight, a god damned veteran, deutschland deutschland uber alles uber alles in der welt

Not too impressive, but this may save some of you money. My 95 e320 wagon has not had heat in the front for your feet for years. I go fed up and pryed open the vent and shoved a AA battery in between the fins, (it was the only thing that fit that was handy). Just enough heat now for a cold winter in New Hampshire.

Try this one.

On my 74 W114 coupe the hardened plastic ball socket on the firewall end of the accelerator linkage went to pieces from age. This allowed the linkage to just flop around in the mounting hole. It caused some pretty strange behavior when you pressed on the pedal and also didn't want to go back to idle.

Couldn't find anything in my collection of oddball spare parts but I did manage to find an old shock absorber bushing. One of the ones from the top part of the shock. A little carving to fit it into the hole, a $0.45 plastic bushing from the hardware store and it's back in business.

Now I need to look up the part number and order one from the dealer.

definitely tying a broker lower-bumper to the upper part with a 12" tie wrap

Red bumper, big white tie wrap. Still looked misaligned, lol

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former: 83 300D, 97 C230, 93 400E

current: 08 C300 Luxury , 92 500SL