Quote:
Originally Posted by Skippy
The first Benz I drove was a beat up W124 in 2002. It didn't impress. Aside from pulling things into and out of shops, I didn't drive another until the '83 300D that I still own.
I'd like to take a few hot laps in the W03.
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Sometime around 1970 at the latest the build quality started to deteriorate in my opinion. Maybe earlier. Time and labour costs had changed.
The valving problem was notorious if you did not pay attention to the adjustment frequency. They by 1970 had stiffened up the interference fitting of the lash adjusters and that helped. Most mercedes shops could easily deal with the two zenith carb setup as well. Much harder today with those old buggies.
Most places that serviced them were not insanely expensive compared to dealers today even in corrected dollars. The five speed on the tree. Four gears forward and one reverse was nicely engineered overall. The 240ds setup on their manual transmission feels crude in comparison to what I remember. Also the vertical barber pole speedometer and gauge layout was very well though out in my opinion. Especially compared to what came later. Rust then as now at least in the north was the downside with their particular type of factory undercoating.