My SEC project-in-progress - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

Johnhef · #1 02-03-2008, 01:02 AM

The story:

I first came to know this car in the summer of 2002 when I first started working for MB. The first time I went to get a car off the roof of the parking garage at Euro Motorcars in Bethesda, I noticed this SEC, mostly because it was backed in the spot and the obnoxiously loud gold plated grille. I inquired about it some time after with it's service writer and he said it belonged to a customer who had approved a lot of work but then couldn't pay the bill. This was about a year before I started working there, it had been sitting in that spot ever since, baking every day in the sun.

I found out who had worked on it and asked him about it. He remembered the "eyesore" quite well. He had done a valve job, put in a new transmission, resealed the diff, put on new belts and a new battery. All this to the tune of just under $9,500 ...on a beat 1983 380SEC. I got the key and went to check it out, battery was completly dead, and wouldn't hold a charge, interior was baked and split everywhere, the windshield was split right across the middle, purple tint that had been half scraped off, the rest was peeling, headliner half fallen down and two of the tires were flat. Not to mention all the hideous gold plated items on the car, chrome 16" ///AMG wheels with the large gold star coving the center and the lug holes, the grille, hood emblem, washer nozzles and rear trunk lid emblems.

Some more time went by, the car would always catch my eye everytime I got a car off the roof of the garage. A total of two years had passed now since the car had been sitting there and the service manager came to me since he knew I had asked about it and said they had got the title from the DMV and were going to sell the car off to cover some of the bill. The price? half of the total bill. came out to about $4700. This of course was way too much for me at the time after only working for MB for a year, but a friend of mine (the drummer in a band I played with) always liked my car and was interested in it. He came out, drove it, liked it and bought it shortly thereafter.

My friend loved the car, he fixed a few things with it- the broken windshield, some suspension parts and while trying to get it to pass Virginia emissions, did a fuel filter, spark plugs, wires, cap and rotor, catalytic converter and finally charcoal canister (the actual cause of it failing). After three years his wife finally "convinced" him he had to get rid of it, so after some haggling, I bought it.

In 2004, when my friend still owned it, after a fresh detail:

The car in November 2006, new temporary set of wheels, the old ones had too much chrome for me, traded them to another member for the 500SEC wreck.

From the GTG here, November 2007, only known pic with the black 15" AMG Penta's on it, front end lowered now and all the gold de-blinged thanks to the 500:

More recently now, with a new set of 17" Lorinser D93's on it and after swapping over to the 1986+ Headlights, headlight wipers and trim and solid lower body panels. Also put in smoked taillights around this same time.