Well, I'll vouch for the disconnecting it first method, I've pulled 2 616's now, first one I did without trans, came out really easily. 2nd I did with trans attached (I saw several posts saying this was easier) and man...what a pita it turned into, took me a few hours extra with a virtually wedge pinned engine and several new scratches in the rust free engine bay of my nice '82...of all the ones to learn that on, why couldn't it have been the rusty '80?...

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Chris
64 190D R.I.P.
80 240D W/617 engine -for sale
82 240D -for sale