The Country Club: 1960 Mercedes 220sb fin tail.

[RENAUD]

great work!

[Zic]

Looks great!

[foxtrot wagon]

Last night we got the clutch master cylinder, slave, and the mounting bracket on the firewall that both the clutch and brake masters bolt to.

Luckily, the rods were individual from the cylinders and the pedal cluster, so they came right out.





Then came the pedal cluster.




We thought we could pull just the clutch pedal assembly along with the spring and bracket, and there was only one reason we couldnt do that...

This one little bracket shown here that hold the assemblies together.
Otherwise the brake pedal assembly could have accepted the bolt at the pivot point also shown here, and bolted on. Thus, an entire pedal cluster swap.





Next up was tackling the dash, since the white tail has a much better dash than the brown tail.
For the record, pulling this was the very last thing I ever wanted to do on planet earth, but since we have teh steering column out, there was no better time to tackle it.

For anyone who has ever or will ever try to pull a w111 cluster, THIS IS HOW THEY COME APART.
The face gets unbolted from underneath the dash, THEN, the top piece.
It is held in with springs and gizmos. Why? I don't know. But that's how it is.






Then, by the grace of God, our dreams came true.
I was hoping the top dash cover was an individual piece, and the entire 53 year old wood dash would not have to be pulled.
Found the secretly hidden screws and out she came.

Compared to the dash cover in the brown tail, this has been the most exciting swap for me, I won't have to look at that awful dash.

[foxtrot wagon]

TREEE FIDDYYYY. I got one of those to run the other day with Brennan. We kinda just wiggled the throttle and distributor till it fired. Then we all took a bath in the community basin and put a dip in while playing the fiddle.

I knew it.

[C-Hutch]

Thanks man!



My face couldn't handle your rebel weather with a beard.

And I appreciate it man!
The Jaguar is pretty fun to drive. It's got your favorite motor in the world under the hood

TREEE FIDDYYYY. I got one of those to run the other day with Brennan. We kinda just wiggled the throttle and distributor till it fired. Then we all took a bath in the community basin and put a dip in while playing the fiddle.

[foxtrot wagon]

Good stuff John, hope all is well up north! Great work and killer documentation.

Thanks man!
Things are well up here, you know, in Yankee country.
It may be home, but there aren't any Toots up here, so we both see at least one problem with that.

[foxtrot wagon]

Looks great John, Can't wait to see it dumped.

Thanks man!

So you move back to yankeeland and THEN grow a beard. I see. I see.

Cars look great by the way. That jag is badass.

My face couldn't handle your rebel weather with a beard.

And I appreciate it man!
The Jaguar is pretty fun to drive. It's got your favorite motor in the world under the hood

[M.Burroughs]

Good stuff John, hope all is well up north! Great work and killer documentation.

[C-Hutch]

So you move back to yankeeland and THEN grow a beard. I see. I see.

Cars look great by the way. That jag is badass.

[tomshouse516]

Looks great John, Can't wait to see it dumped.

[foxtrot wagon]

Aside from the swap, Im also using the passenger rear tail light, which has better chrome than the Brown tail.

[foxtrot wagon]

Then it was onto pulling the actual brain and lifeline of the Hydrak setup in the Brown tail.

I'll post a shot of one of the diagrams of this complex shifting system.
If you're just tuning in, this is an electric to vacuum operated column shift 4spd automatic/standard with no foot clutch.

The shifter in the column makes an electric connection which sends the signal to a control module, where servos operate a vacuum diaphragm that actuates the auto clutch and gear shifting.

Im sure by this point you can tell why these systems had so many problems.

Here is a shot of the overall workings of it.





Now that you've had a few moments to let that all sink in, here is the electric control module mounted in the car, vacuum lines and all.




And here is the diaphragm actuator.




After pulling everything in the engine bay, here is another look at the control module outside of the car.




And the diaphragm





Here is the entire setup of what makes up the brain and lifeline of the Hydrak transmission, from the column to the actual transmission...





Well that's all for now. I promise all this boring swap business will be done soon, I hope.

And then it's onto the fun stuff... bags.


This thing will be getting low soon so don't fall asleep on me yet!

[foxtrot wagon]

Today, the agenda was attempting to pull the pilot bearing on the crank of the White tail that we are using the standard transmission out of.
This would be the only part I would have to order if we couldnt pull it, rendering the swap unfinished until I got it.

With that being said, my father, who is a true master of his trade, did not have the proper outer space Mercedes pilot bearing puller. So he put together a slide hammer puller with parts from all sorts of different tools... and out she came, in perfect condition and rolls smoothly.







While my father was being a magician underneath the White tail, I was up top starting to pull the linkage and steering column (since the Hydrak 4spd column is different than the standard 4spd column).

I color coordinated the linkage arms to make my life 100% easier when it came time to put it all back together.
I disconnected the linkage, and separated the coupler on the steering column shown here.




After some real stubborn, hard to get to bolts finally surrendered, and some motivational twist and turning, the column was free. What a pain.




Since Im also using the steering wheel out of the white tail, I pulled everything as one unit.

[foxtrot wagon]

I didn't get to posting everything we ended up getting done last night.

So at this point I had the standard 4spd transmission, clutch & flywheel and driveshaft out of the white fin tail.

Then it was time to start pulling the Hydrak transmission out of the Brown tail.




We worked around the exhaust on Brown, and got the drive shaft and transmission out...




The actual transmissions are both the same, just the bell housings are different between the two.

Here is a shot of the "automatic flywheel" in the coupler on the Hydrak.




So now that we have everything out from underneath both cars, we realize that the Hydrak has a bigger bell housing, meaning it has a shorter drive shaft than the Standard.

This is yet another reason why having a complete car to pull a swap out of can be key... because I'd now be on the hunt for a drive shaft if I had only bought a transmission haha.

So here you can see the difference between not only the drive shaft lengths, but the sizes in bell housings as well.

[foxtrot wagon]

You are making it so right!!!!!! greaty classy cars, slammed.... You are my hero!

haha thanks man!

awesome

i love those fintails

das mercedes swag.

Wow,
Never seen a fin-tail Merc.

You collection continues to amaze me,

Kudos.

I appreciate it man!

good god, this is too much car porn for one thread.

what are the plans for the jag?

haha thanks man!

and I wanted to bag that as well, but Im not getting ahead of myself. One project at a time haha.
my father & I rebuilt the carburetor on her and she rips now. Sounds good with that v8 under the hood.

they came with a straight 6 and a v12, so the v8 fits right in no problem.
It's a pretty common swap for the series I and II XJ's

awesome cars man.

my uncle has a super mint white fin tail and thats a very fun machine to drive with the column tranny lol. The speedo is the coolest thing on the car.

in for updates

Yea man they're awesome!