The sunroof on my 87 300E has been broken for a while now and its time to fork up the money and fix it. the only problem i see with it is the two rails that slide back and forth are cracked in half. can anyone give me an idea how much its going to cost to repair this properly? also, how many hours dose a job like this take? Your responce would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks,
Adam

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Current Stable:
01 ML55 AMG
92 500E (a few mods)
87 300E (lots of mods)
00 Chevy 3500HD Diesel Box Truck
68 18' Donzi Marine
06 GT i-Drive7 1.0 Mountain Bike (with GPS!)

PREVIOUSLY OWNED:83 300SD, 87 420SEL, 88 420SEL, 90 420SEL, 86 560SEL, 86 190E 2.3-16V AMG, 94 E320

$850 is the average repair for the broken angles. The angles and cable and usually the cable tube have to be replaced.

Is there any thing I can do to prevent damage/prolong life of the sunroof?

You can grease the sunroof rails!

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2006 E350 w/ 155k miles (Daily Driver)

Previous:
1993 300E 3.2L Sedan w/ close to about 300k miles
2003 E500 Brilliant Silver (Had 217k miles when totalled!)
1989 300E with 289,000 miles (had for <1 yr while in HI)
03 CLK 500 cabrio (Mom's)
2006 C230k (Dad's)
1999 S420 (Mom's/Dad's)
2000 C230k Sport sedans
2001 CLK320 Cabrio (Mom's)
1995 C280 My First Mercedes-Benz... (155k miles. EXCEPTIONAL AUTOMOBILE. Was Very hard to let go of!)

would it be cost effective to just weld it shut! im not kidding, its not worth $900 to me.

hey adam

if you have not fixed your sunroof, you should do it yourself if you are somewhat mechanically inclined. it's pretty easy to work on the 300e sunroof.

just get a hold of a 300e service chassis manual and do it yourself. i fixed mine and it works great.

later,
andy

I agree, been there done that. Easy as pie. You will get greasy however.

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I got too many cars!! Insurance eats me alive. Dave

78 Corvette Stingray - 3k
82 242 Turbo Volvo - Manual - 270k
86 300e 5 speed manual - 210k
87 420sel - 240k
89 560sl - 78k
91 420sel - 205k
91 560sel - 85k
94 GMC Suburban - 90k
97 Harley Davidson Heritage Softail - 25k
00 GMC Silverado 1 ton 30k

ADAM BOURASSA,

I second the opinion you should fix it yourself. I have a 190E that has a simpler set up (no tilt feature) but failed and began to show signs of electrical gremlins. Once I got the interior roof panel off, and with some help from a number of regulars on this forum, I got to work. In the end, it cost me $0.37 for a new metal clip that connects the cable to the sunroof. The electrical issues were very unusual, the switch only worked in the direction of closing the roof, and only when you pushed the switch to open the roof. Once I wound the cable back in by hand, the thing started working in both directions again, and it now opens when I push the button to open it, and closes when I push the button to close it. I think is has a limit switch that needs to be reset once the cable comes out of the drive nut on the motor. Anyway, I highly recommend you get into it as it proved relatively simple and saved me a lot of money. Jim

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Own:
1986 Euro 190E 2.3-16 (291,000 miles),
1998 E300D TurboDiesel, 231,000 miles -purchased with 45,000,
1988 300E 5-speed 252,000 miles,
1983 240D 4-speed, purchased w/136,000, now with 222,000 miles.
2009 ML320CDI Bluetec, 89,000 miles

Owned:
1971 220D (250,000 miles plus, sold to father-in-law),
1975 240D (245,000 miles - died of body rot),
1991 350SD (176,560 miles, weakest Benz I have owned),
1999 C230 Sport (45,400 miles),
1982 240D (321,000 miles, put to sleep)