I took the trim, the star and the "turbodiesel" and "300TD" badges off of the rear hatch of my 84 300TD wagon do do body work. The star came off by unscrewing a nut, but the others have posts which fit into little plastic grommets which, I believe, are installed with heat applied inside to shrink them to the posts. I took off the badges by melting the grommets from the inside with a soldering iron.

Is anyone familiar with these plastic grommets? can you get them from the dealer?

I am also considering just "debadging" the hatch....I would re-install the center star, but may omit the 300TD and Turbodiesel badges. I would have to whack each hole with a punch to counter-sink them, then fill in.

I need to remove the rear window to repair rust beneath the rubber seal, as well as some surface rust near badges, so I will repaint the whole upper hatch above the horizontal trim (with paint line beneath the trim) before reinstalling the window and such.

What are your thoughts on debadging...cool or sacreligious? And what about those little plastic "melt-grommets".

Regards,

Mark

__________________
1984 300TD Wagon, 407,800 mi (current daily driver)
1985 300DT Sedan, 330,000 mi (gone to that great autobahn in the sky)

I'd leave the debadging for the 560SL's and E55 AMG's.

Ditto's on the debadging. As far as the grommets go,,, I don't know, but 3M 2 face tape does it for me.

__________________
95 SL500 Smoke Silver, Parchment 64K
07 E350 4matic Station Wagon White 34K
02 E320 4Matic Silver/grey 80K
05 F150 Silver 44K

Your probably right...all the chrome on these old cars is part of their charm!

__________________
1984 300TD Wagon, 407,800 mi (current daily driver)
1985 300DT Sedan, 330,000 mi (gone to that great autobahn in the sky)

I have been debadging my cars since the '70s, looks more euro, badges are not always installed in Germany and personally I like the less cluttered look.

That being said, I still have all of the badges on my diesels, am proud to be a dieselhead.

Up to taste.

__________________

Gone to the dark side

- Jeff