w123 heater cores NLA?
 

I recently found a nice dash for my 300td, and I've been thinking of any while-I'm-in-there work I should do. I've had a heater core fail on me once, and it was miserable to clean the mess and do the R&R, so I thought I'd replace the heater core in the 300td before it fails. It has 328k miles on it.

I just looked through a few online vendors and it's apparently NLA. What can be done? I tried searching here but didn't find much. I guess w123 heater cores don't really fail that often? I read a couple times about circulating stop-leak through the core as a quick fix, but I'm more interested in an actual replacement.

I've read that before, but when I was looking for one this year (leak turned out to be in a different place), they were in fact available through some vendors. Dig a bit deeper -- I'm traveling now and can't be arsed to find the vendor that had them :)

I've looked around and couldn't find it. Whenever it's convenient for you, could you look up the vendor you're talking about? Thanks!

Answer
 

heater core
MB# 0028352901
Pelican Parts - Automotive Parts and Accessories - Porsche & BMW

ebay has dozens of used and new/old stock listed.
search: 300d heater core


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I literally bought my car for less than that.

Hey, I'm glad it's available somewhere, and thanks for pointing it out! I really want it, so I'll probably shell out, but I won't like it. :)

Have you read through Dave Morrisons DIY thread on removing the Evaporater? It is a very well laid out how to remove things in both a 300D/TD and 240D. as long as you are going that far into the system, might as well install the system out of a 240D. then it will be simple and manual.
PeachPartsWiki: Replacing the A/C Evaporator

Go to PNP and practice on removing things first, take pictures, label things. then when you do yours it will go quicker and maybe not break something.

Charlie

Yeah, I saw that DIY. It's fantastic.

My heater core is OK right now (thank you God), but I have a manual heater system I've been meaning to put in, and actually the heater core replacement will be a while-I'm-in-there thing. It's such a giant PITA to pull the heater system, I only want to do it once.

Same issue on one of my W123's. Rather than pay >$300 new or $50 used, plus days tearing into the dash, I recirculated hot silicate stop leak, which I think worked. My son drives that car at college and doesn't communicate.

If in your position, I would look into installing a heater core from another car that is cheap and robust, like for a 60's Chevy. Indeed, since so hard digging into the dash, maybe something that would last forever like an after-market tube-fin transmission cooler. I would use all soldered copper tubing. Anyway, what I have pondered. I know W123's have a unique 3-tube Behr heater core as used in Semis, but it can be re-plumbed for 2 tubes. We don't deal with German winters in CA.

Honestly, I just found out that the heater core has 3 tubes a couple of weeks ago. I've had my car for 10 years.

The ACC sucks! SUCKS! There are like 5 buttons, but they all do the same thing. They will blow air out all of the vents, at the same temperature. When I saw how the manual system works, with the ability to set different temperatures for left and right, I thought it was neat but I can live without it.

I'm down to put in a solid metal heater core. I usually try not to reinvent the wheel - there is already a core that fits properly, and $300 isn't the end of the world. However, it is expensive enough to warrant spending a day messing around and seeing if it will be easy to adapt a generic all-metal water-to-air heat exchanger. If/when I get around to it, I'll make a separate thread.