Long time (21 years) customer calls.." Heard a loud THUNK yesterday...car seems to wander now...can I bring it in?"

Me "You checked under the car H***** ?"

Him "No...but I did check the oil." Me " Okay H***** drop it off and I'll run you home."

I got a call-out 5 minutes later for a no a/c in a Mack truck next door. So when H***** came by I was gone. My buddy Ron, who owns 3 123's and a 201 was there to greet him and looked at it for me. He called to say the steering box is not attached to the chassis rail !

Eh ???. I got it on the lift later and sure enough the three bolts has sheared at the box.
On closer inspection, the pitman arm, where it connects to the centre link, was covered in concrete dust. The outer tie rod joint was loose in it's tapered housing arm and other joints showed signs of stress.

That's not all.......the muffler pipe was cratered at the under drive shaft bend, and we found half a curtain ( drape.) with it's store tag of $10.99 still attached, wrapped around the rear flex coupling and it had burnt out the pinion oil seal.

I'd seen the picture of the bed spring mattress wrapped around the Jeep(?) drive shaft but this was unique to me.

Seems H***** has succeeded in scoring a direct hit on a cinder block and window drape...not at the same time maybe...but close.

So I have ordered all joints and a pinion seal.

BTW...H***** is my only customer who has successfully driven 16 miles to my shop with a 3 inch hole in the upper oil pan in his 240D an not suffered engine damage. Charmed life !

ask him for lottery numbers

Post pictures if you can?

__________________
hum.....
1987 300TD 311,000M Stolen. Presumed destroyed

I would,but can't seem to ever get them to load into mercedesshop forum posts.



.

Put them on a site like Photobucket and them use where you replace the stuff between the img tag. easy way to do it

__________________
hum.....
1987 300TD 311,000M Stolen. Presumed destroyed

I'll see if it is still worth taking pic's, as Ron started to remove all the steering joints this afternoon.

Now I have to watch Star Trek on 43.1..

That is a great customer. You know he will be back.

__________________
'85 300SD (formerly california emissions)
'08 Chevy Tahoe
'93 Ducati 900 SS
'79 Kawasaki KZ 650
'86 Kawasaki KX 250
'88 Kawasaki KDX200
'71 Hodaka Ace 100
'72 Triumph T100R

You HAVE to teach him to steer AROUND things on the highway....its not a video game where you score points by running things over.

Have HIM buy your lottery ticket for you. Before whatever luck he has runs out.

__________________
Proud owner of ....
1971 280SE W108
1979 300SD W116
1983 300D W123
1975 Ironhead Sportster chopper
1987 GMC 3/4 ton 4X4 Diesel
1989 Honda Civic (Heavily modified)
---------------------
Section 609 MVAC Certified
---------------------
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche

__________________

1980 300TD-China Blue/Blue MBTex-2nd Owner, 107K (Alt Blau) OBK #15
'06 Chevy Tahoe Z71 (for the wife & 4 kids, current mule) '03 Honda Odyssey (son #1's ride, reluctantly) '99 GMC Suburban (255K+ miles, semi-retired mule) 21' SeaRay Seville (summer escape pod)

I think he needs to stop letting his teenager drive his car!

__________________
81 300CD (sold) 1972 280 SEL 4.5 (sold) 1966 250 S 4 spd (sold) 1974 450 SL (sold) 86 BMW 325ES (sold), 1973 280C (sold) 1988 300 SE.

Never lets anyone but me drive this 123.

Drive it all you can. It's apparently indestructible....

Maybe we should extract some numbers from the VIN and play lotteries with them.

__________________


Mac
2002 e320 4matic estate│1985 300d│1980 300td
Previous: 1979 & 1982 & 1983 300sd │ 1982 240d

“Let's take a drive into the middle of nowhere with a packet of Marlboro lights and talk about our lives.” ― Joseph Heller, Catch-22