So I bit the bullet and bought the Die Antwort. No I am not swapping in an LSX. I have a spare, good diesel engine/transmission that, aside from engine maintenance, is ready to go in. The engine that's in my car is ready to come out per the PO, verified by my eyes. I will be purchasing a service manual, but of course I wanted to confer with the hive to see if anyone has done this swap before. Is the header panel welded in, or can it be unbolted? It looks like I should be able to get the engine out from the top, but on the wood ramps, I think the angle is too high.
And aside from checking the timing chain, what other things should I look over on the good engine?
And of course, here's some pics of it in its compromising position.
First step would be to wash the car. 
Yeah, it needs a bath badly. I also intend to pull the interior out (aside from the dash) and give it a thorough cleaning. Trunk too.
What about removing the front end? on the BMWs i've done that is the cats pajamas. I would expect BMW and mercedes to have similar engineering philosophy.
In reply to rcutclif:
Well, the PO said that that front clip is welded in.
I've pulled/dropped in whole bolted together motors/trannys from the top out of tighter engine bays. In a garage with an 8 foot ceiling and Harbor Freight's cheapest cherry picker, which no offense looks just like yours with a different paint job.
In reply to Jamey_from_Legal:
That is how to do it. Car on the ground, engine and transmission together, angle up and out. You will want a load leveler for your engine hoist.
In reply to bgkast:
Good to know! The PO was talking about attempting to drop it from below because obviously at the angle it's at now he couldn't get it out. Thankfully he didn't explore his thought.
Also, be prepared to lift the rear if necessary. I've had to do that on a couple cars where the load leveler didn't give me enough angle.
Yeah, he didn't pull the radiator either, which is necessary before a top pull.
If the engine bay is really tight, it's sometimes necessary to remove the trans first. But I don't like doing that job on the floor if I can avoid it.
Another Plan B option if it's too tight, is to cut out the cross-brace over the top of the radiator slot, and then weld it back in later, since the hood will cover the weld lines. But you have to be good enough to weld it back in sufficiently aligned for the hood latch to work.
The bottom drop option works fine too. I think it's kinda like whether you put the TP over the front of the roll or the back of the roll. I really don't like pulling the front subframe crossmember out of my cars just to remove the motor, so I have pulled from the top.
I have never used a load leveler -- they would probably be helpful, but I have thus far not been able to work out the attachment points I would need on the motors I was pulling.
In these cars you can't drop the engine out the bottom if I recall correctly. The sub frame is one with the body.
Oh a 300SD. I had an '80 300SD I sold to my buddy. He ended up pulling the engine, rebuilding it(including resleeving, that was expensive!), and continues to drive it to this day. Hardest this with that rebuild was timing the fuel pump. Holy crap that was interesting. But we figured it out.
Good luck with the build!
