12 hours and 350 miles later we are the proud owners of a hood, passenger fender and a somewhat rusty core support. Despite being a theater kid, Alex rarely speaks to us so we listened to Stuff You Should Know podcasts while I drove there and back. It all fit very nicely in the back of a Uhaul van.

He did enjoy the process of removing the parts and isn’t concerned that the clear coat is peeling and the hood is a bit scratched up. I cut the drivers side of the core support at the point where it joins the fender, on the passenger side, I cut up to the area under the coolant surge tank. There is rust in the lower outer corner so I may end up using it as a template for straightening the existing corner and just use the center portion as a replacement for the bent one. I also spent some quality time getting the fan shroud out from between the fan and radiator. As far as I can tell, it’s laying on the ground under the car still. Sigh. We did grab the bumper, it was easier than pulling all the trim off.

Michael

Bravo ;

You did well .

I hope your son remembers this trip fondly .

My son still talks about the road trips we did 35 years ago....

__________________
-Nate
1982 240D 408,XXX miles
Ignorance is the mother of suspicion and fear is the father

I did then what I knew how to do ~ now that I know better I do better

Yeah, I still talk to my dad about the wild goose chases we went on to find a car or motorcycle part forty years ago. We went to a lot of JYs and met the colorful people who ran them. Priceless.

__________________
79 300TD “Old Smokey” AKA “The Mistake” (SOLD)
82 240D stick shift 335k miles (SOLD)
82 300SD 300k miles
85 300D Turbodiesel 170k miles

Children are the future, many do not grasp this simple concept .

I began taking my son along with me when he was 6 years old, he learned life lessons he still uses to day in his 40s .

__________________
-Nate
1982 240D 408,XXX miles
Ignorance is the mother of suspicion and fear is the father

I did then what I knew how to do ~ now that I know better I do better

Had some time to tinker today, did have to wake Alex up at the crack of noon but then, he is 16.

We spent most of our time in the inner fender area, it was pushed back and down. We have most of the damage from about 4" behind the headlight frame to the shock tower straightened out. The front end of the inner fender is still about 1" to the rear, part of that is that it's torn away from the frame rail and part is due to a deep bend that's being held in place by the radiator core support which is heavily tweaked.

We won't use much of the support we picked up in Oregon, it's pretty rusty. We had drilled out most of the spot welds to remove the upper part of the headlight bucket, including the hood latch and the strut that runs down at the left side of the radiator.

The truck has a cracked engine block so is not driveable but we pressed into service as a movable tree to pull against.

On an odd note, who would drill into the inner fender in search of the vacuum storage tank twice, eventually punching a hole in the tank? I assume this is the storage for the HVAC system, could explain why it's a little iffy at times.

Michael

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__________________
Usta haves '69 250/8, '76 280C, 1971 250C 114.023, 1976 450SEL 116.033
Current have, 1983 300SD 126.120

I wonder how many of those I have in my shop? I know I pulled a lot from the three pick and pull donations…

On the hood, you did get one from a DIESEL 126 right? Big difference in weight… steel vs, aluminum.

__________________
John HAUL AWAY, OR CRUSHED CARS!!! HELP ME keep the cars out of the crusher! A/C Thread
"as I ride with my a/c on... I have fond memories of sweaty oily saturdays and spewing R12 into the air. THANKS for all you do!

My drivers:
1987 190D 2.5Turbo
1987 190D 2.5Turbo
1987 190D 2.5-5SPEED!!!

1987 300TD
1987 300TD
1994GMC 2500 6.5Turbo truck... I had to put the ladder somewhere!

We did grab it from a diesel, didn't know the hoods were different but come to think of it, it wasn't as heavy as I expected. I figure we can fix the vacuum tank with a bit of fiberglass and epoxy, it's a pretty clean hole.

Michael

__________________
Usta haves '69 250/8, '76 280C, 1971 250C 114.023, 1976 450SEL 116.033
Current have, 1983 300SD 126.120

So the hood did turn out to be steel, it's almost too heavy for the hinges, even with the springs in the inner holes. We are keeping it for now as it's the right color. There is an aluminum one an hour north of us but it's the wrong color and I'd have to rent a truck again. The hood can wait for now.

We did hit the yard up north today to get a fan shroud and whatever we could grab and ended up with all the wood trim except the drivers door and shifter bezel. Cost us $6.40 for all. Is that a good price? I had Alex pull everything off the dash himself after pointing out how to locate the plastic nuts on the backside of the dash. He did a great job and seemed to enjoy the task so a massive win for the day.

Michael

__________________
Usta haves '69 250/8, '76 280C, 1971 250C 114.023, 1976 450SEL 116.033
Current have, 1983 300SD 126.120

The hood weight isn't that big of a deal....my dad's 300SD had a steel replacement hood.

Those 40lbs aren't going to have much impact on the 0-60 times.

Good progress on getting it all fixed up!

__________________
-diesel is not just a fuel, its a way of life-
'15 GLK250 Bluetec 118k - mine - (OC-123,800)
'17 Metris(VITO!) - 37k - wifes (OC-41k)
'09 Sprinter 3500 Winnebago View - 62k (OC - 67k)
'13 ML350 Bluetec - 95k - dad's (OC-98k)
'01 SL500 - 103k(km) - dad's (OC-110,000km)
'16 E400 4matic Sedan - 148k - Brothers (OC-155k)

The car has enough torque to deal with the steel hood but the poor springs are a different matter. It barely stays up. I'm keeping an eye out for a correct color aluminum hood.

T'was a good weekend for body work. Finally got the inner fender pulled out enough to get the fender to fit without twisting. I ended up removing the upper core support that runs atop the headlight and down along the radiator. That let me get the inner fender straight and at the right height. A large cold chisel and a BFH got the seam along the frame rail closed back up and the tear at the front edge closed up in the process. I then busted out the new Harbor Freight Mig 170, powered it with an under sized extension cord and welded the tear closed. And then found my big extension cord for next time. Also used epoxy and fiber glass to patch the hole in the vacuum reservoir that someone drilled. Why they would drill through the inner fender liner into the reservoir I don't know.

Next is getting the core support straightened out and welding in the replacement bits.

And the seller on eBay that I bought the Depo lights from is checking his inventory for just a passenger side set.

Michael

__________________
Usta haves '69 250/8, '76 280C, 1971 250C 114.023, 1976 450SEL 116.033
Current have, 1983 300SD 126.120

It's alive!

Is it perfect? No.
Does it work and is Alex happy? Yes.

That's what's important. At least for now. I told him no more crashing, as I don't have it in me to do this again. Not quite true, I live to fix things but this was a bit of a pain. Still need to put on all the trim and replace the passenger turn signal socket, that's a GM unit gaffer taped into the housing and it's a piece of Chinese junk. Also need to sort out the AC. I'm considering the Klima parallel flow condenser and assume it needs a compressor and the usual bits and obs.

We will keep our row52 search open, hoping for a cleaner fender and hood. At under $70 each, if we find a better set, we can swap these out.

Parts list:
Fender
Hood
Bumper
core support
Coolant surge tank
Radiator and hoses
Upper and lower radiator mounts
Fan
Fan clutch
Fan shroud
Water pump
Passenger headlight and turn signal

Cost was about $1000 for parts and van rental.

Michael

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__________________
Usta haves '69 250/8, '76 280C, 1971 250C 114.023, 1976 450SEL 116.033
Current have, 1983 300SD 126.120

Congrats. Looks good. Glad you saved it.

Good job. It looks good enough for a teen. So many lessons in this for a young guy.

My teen son is starting to drive my 300D. After following this I’m asking myself if it’s a great idea to let him drive it. While I’m glad it’s a safe car I’m worried we will be doing some body work and JY hunting in the near future. Hunting NLA parts.

I’m sure fixing the car strengthened your bond. I really respect the way you handled this. He’s a better man for it.

My older brother did the same thing to my family’s Volvo 144 back in the 70s. Me and my dad spent a couple of months pulling the front end out and banging on the fenders with hammers. We were too poor to get replacements. It was ghetto body work with lots of primer. My brother came home from college and threw a tantrum over how we should sell it because he felt so ashamed every time he was forced to see it. He said he couldn’t stand to look at it so “mommy and daddy get it out of my sight!” He almost was crying wahhh wahhh make it go away. So my dad sold it. Big brother never lifted a wrench and ran off to Caltech again…of course with another one of our cars. In retrospect letting him do this made him the man he is today. My dad handled it wrong.

You’re a great dad Michael.

__________________
79 300TD “Old Smokey” AKA “The Mistake” (SOLD)
82 240D stick shift 335k miles (SOLD)
82 300SD 300k miles
85 300D Turbodiesel 170k miles

Sigh…

Anybody have a spare passenger side DEPO headlight and turn signal? Someone pulled a U-turn in front of the boy Sunday morning. I should be able to hammer out the dent in the fender and uncurl the corner of the hood but the headlights appear to be unavailable right now.

Michael

__________________
Usta haves '69 250/8, '76 280C, 1971 250C 114.023, 1976 450SEL 116.033
Current have, 1983 300SD 126.120

We just tried to get an estimate to fix this. Estimates are booked out all the way to July 18th. Not repairs, estimates. In the meantime, I've put a Bosch headlight in and reinstalled the original bumper. I can't fix it this time, the front end is tweaked hard enough that the drivers door no longer closes first try.

Michael

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__________________
Usta haves '69 250/8, '76 280C, 1971 250C 114.023, 1976 450SEL 116.033
Current have, 1983 300SD 126.120