Turning stupid into fun - W123 300D

[ferrijessica]

love the w123s! definitely following this! keep it up!

[3EyedGoat]

That interior is in awesome shape! Looks like a fun project. Love me some old mercs.

[Rocambolesque]

I can't wait to see this at Julep next season!

[superturbodiesel.com]

Dat car! They have fucking much potensial! I've had many w123, and it is so charming! Lovely interior and the best engine every made, great ride!

you have to create a profile on:

https://www.superturbodiesel.com

[j.kam]

...
For parts, mercedessource.com is good and have great tutorial video for our chassis! You can also look at autopartsway.ca, good price and shipping.

Yeah, I will vouch for autopartsway.ca. They're in Canada so no worries about getting hit at the border and the stuff I have bought there has been delivered within a week. I have an 87 golf and they have everything I have needed so far.
And free shipping for any order over $75

There is a w123 by my house and I REALLY want to pick it up

good luck

[M.Sam]

Hey! Glad to see an other w123 from Montreal! I planned to bag mine cause there is nothing available for a true coilover setup... There is some lowering spring available but nothing that will bring her low enough !! I would want to cut some coil while I wait for the bags, but I need to find the proper tool to compress the coil (Klaun type) since a normal tool is not strong enough for W123 coils!!

For parts, mercedessource.com is good and have great tutorial video for our chassis! You can also look at autopartsway.ca, good price and shipping.

[A2J7C]

I wish i had that car
My grandpa wants to sell it's old W123 but i don't dare doing a 1600km trip to get the car... :/
One thing: I don't like your headlights. I prefer the clear ones. And if youre going to give a clean look to the car i would rather change them

[Raarasutra]

Will switch hosts when I get home after work, although I have to make a pit stop at a hydraulic shop for some braided brake lines and fittings.. I might also stop being lazy and snap a few pics with the DSLR, cause who likes crappy phone pics anyway, right?

will also be ordering my rotors and pads tonight. Anybody have a better source than Pelican Parts? They have pretty much everything I need and the price seems reasonable...



Happy monday! It froze here this morning :'(

[A4crn]

Subbed....there's something appealing about an original car that's been abandoned

[datsaab]

love the w123s! definitely following this! keep it up!

[AMGwheelwhore]

Pics are down... Always wanted one of these... Do it justice!

[milano_red]

That's a pretty clean start man! Good luck on the build!

[Raarasutra]

Hello S|W! I'll start by saying that I have little history with anything related to cars apart from the fact that I've always loved and been fascinated by them. I make my living as a cabinetmaker, so getting my hands dirty is the only real link between my work and my passion. Everything I do is a huge learning curve and is pretty much figured out on the fly. Thank f**k for the internet



Anyway, I'll cut the personal introduction short and skip right to the good shit.



Just 2 weeks ago one of my friends told me about a W123 just sitting in a driveway, waiting to end its life as a rotting carcass... So we went knocking and talked to the guy. Fantasy quickly became reality as I sold my one and only car, an '02 Jetta TDI to get the funds needed to buy the W123 and get it road worthy again.

Here is what I drove up until a few days ago :









The Jetta started it's life with me as a poorly maintained bone-stock boring daily driver. So I did a couple things to it, including Koni coilovers and some cheap wheels, the rest of the mods pretty much pointless to mention here



I was at the point where I was pretty happy with what I'd done to it and I felt I needed something a little more special, a new challenge, something that connected to me more than the Jetta did. And as my dad had always had Mercedes' when I was a kid, I just needed that W123.



This is how it was sitting in the guys's driveway :













The interior is pretty mint, the exterior needs some work (2 fenders, a door, and a respray when I can muster up the cash) but it hadn't even started in 6 years. So my buddy and I went over, swapped the battery from the TDI to see if it would start. Surprise! It didn't even hesitate, fired right up on all 5 with 6 year-old diesel in the tank and jelly for oil! I even have the guy's full service record, which is pretty immaculate, 4 keys plus a vallet, all the original paperwork that came with the car, all the manuals and shit.








...So I traded paper for money and had it towed to my place on friday after having sold the Jetta on thursday night. I then went to the dealer to get some parts.







It needed a brake line for the front passenger side, so I got that sorted today, also put in a brand new OEM battery, new oil filter and oil, fuses, got a head gasket and air filter and took out the front calipers to have them rebuilt some time this week. Will also be ordering some rotors and pads to replace the pretty rotten ones (even though they were probably never even broken in).


As for the lows, I plan to cut a couple of coils off of the stock springs before the winter hits, and probably a few more when spring comes back around As of yet, I have no intention of getting it bagged, but that might change some day with the never ending quest to go lower

I've been searching for wheels for a couple of days but nothing of interest came up, so I'll have to keep an eye on the classifieds for a while. I saw a couple sets of Aeros for sale, but way out of my price range. I'm going to keep my focus on maintenance and getting my plates before winter hits, as this thing is going to be my daily


Now this thread also serves as a logbook of sorts and a source of motivation and feedback/ideas. Any and all advice or pointers will be appreciated, I've only worked on VWs before.


Oh, and a quick question to any W123 owners on here, how wide of a wheel can I fit under those huge arches?