Ladies and Gents, I have been a long time lurker around the project car forum. I figured I'd add my little project to the mix. My project has been very slow going these past couple years: I work a lot, have one kid that is just about 2, recently bought a house, and another kid is being born on Monday. My car is a 1972 Mercedes 280SE 4.5.
My plan for the car is a fun autocross/track day car that I take to work once every few weeks and cruise around in on my days off. I have no hopes of running any serious racing as I don't have the time or green to race often. Luckily I like working on the thing, because I think I'll be working on it a long time.
I have had a soft spot for Mercedes cars from a time I spent a couple of years working on Mercedes cars at an independent shop. I immediately fell in love with the W108 (280SE and 280SEL) styling, but wanted one that was a little different. Let me catch you all up to the current status of this project.
I finally got my chance to buy one I was not afraid to modify the crap out of for $1,500 a couple years ago. The car was a little rough, but what do you expect for 1,500. Rough was also what I wanted. I wanted to do a serious-ish build on this car and did not want mess up a nice example.
The car was left in a driveway for a few years with two windows down. Surprisingly the only rust is a really annoying hole in the passenger floorboard, some minor stuff in the engine bay, and the trunk floor. I had been in a minor fender bender at one point, but nothing I can't work around.
The rack on the roof was from the previous owner's husband who helped design the Sidewinder missile. The hour and a half drive back was mostly Kenny Loggins singing Danger Zone in my head. She told me he put models of the missile on the rack, had equipment in the trunk and on the seat next to him, and used the car to gather data of some sort.
The engine ran great for having just around 400,000 miles on it. I took it home, fixed a hole in the fuel tank, and gave it a nice cleaning.
After a short while, the transmission insides went all cannibalistic and ate each other. I happened to have a spare and I ended up changing the transmission in a dirt patch next to a barn.
After that, I was on a cruise, one of the driver's side seat mounts broke off of the floor. I had some seats waiting to be installed anyway, so I put one in with a harness. The seat is an OMP WRC XL. I also installed their 6-point harness and their 2-spoke steering wheel. They were left over from another project that ended up getting crashed during testing.
I figured since I went full retard on the interior, I might as well have some fun with the outside. I put on some driving lights similar to the old school AMG racer. For the sticklers, I know the original car was a 300SEL and had a completely different engine. I like the way the front looked so I copied it. Some of you might recognise the spot this photo was taken. It is used all the time in movies and commercials.
The front main seal went bad, real bad, so I did what anyone of us would do and decided to put a different engine in the car. I took the car for one last run to get some beer for the tear down. The car was leaking two quarts of oil a week.
A LONG time ago I purchased a 1982 euro model 500SEL with registration issues. It was a gray market car that the previous owner let the registration lapse on. The California DMV said, “What car?” and did not let them register the car again. I began to pull the engine out of the 280SE to prep for the new/old one. If I knew what was going to happen, I would have just fixed the issues with the previous engine.
The 500SEL came with a 5.0 liter all aluminum version of the same V8 that was in the 280SE. It just has a wonky Bosh fuel distributor system instead of a “normal” EFI and hydraulic lifters. Life got in the way and all I did was pull the engine out of the 280SE. I now have a logistics problem. The 500SEL and the 280SE are in different places and I don't have a truck that can tow or a trailer. I am sorting out how to get the non-running, not registered car the 30 miles to my house.
If anyone on here is in Ventura County and would be able to help, I can pay, cash or we can work out a deal with parts, I have a Volvo B20 motor, and a manual steering rack that will go into an AE86. I'd rather a fellow car guy got my money than U-Haul or some tow company.
In the mean time, I have been doing interior prep. The damn 40 year old glue is still gooey and sticky. The Germans obviously designed it to be impervious to the goo gone products of our era, just to spite me. So far I have just been removing the paint, luckily the glue comes with it. I started at the back of the interior because up front is where the real work is. This is the rust hole in the passenger front floorboard.
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It ate through a few layers so it is going to be a pain to fix. In the engine bay, there is another small rust issue that is going to require a small amount of welding. The inner fender is also starting to crack. In another location, the inner fender is starting to separate from the front frame rail. I think the separation is part of the collision damage from ages ago. Should be an easy fix as long as keeping it straight is not too complicated.
That is where I am at now. Just moving along inside the car, priming as I go. The plan is to finish off the interior, work on the engine bay, then get the engine in the car with the auto trans so the car is running again. Hopefully they will be in the same general area by the time that comes. I have eventual plants of running MS, though I don't know if I will install the engine stock first or mess with MS right off the bat.
After she is on her own four wheels, I'll work on sorting out the suspension and fitting up a manual trans.
