Jade's weight loss begins

This morning in response to a parts request, I went out to check a few of Jade's interior parts which I had been storing safely in the boot as I have nowhere else to keep them.  You can imagine my annoyance when I was unable to unlock the boot!

After 5 minutes of fiddling with the lock and key my patience was wearing thin so I decided the best thing to do was walk away and come back to it later.

Later in the afternoon with a clearer head I went back to have another go, a further 20 minutes of fiddling n' twiddling with the key and a few swear words the key finally turned in the lock and I was able to open the boot; hurray! I was very relieved as there is no other way into the boot in these cars.

With the boot opened and an rare hour to spare, I decided to have a go at removing the back bumper which has been requested by a fellow MBCCWA member.

After a quick examination I located the four bolts that hold the bumper in place, two on the back and one on either side.  It is worth me mentioning that this is the long sided bumper which I understand was only fitted to W114's, that is 250 and 280 variants.  The smaller engined W115's had shorter / no side returns, and I would hazard a guess that they only have two bolts holding their bumpers on.

Note the length of the bumper returns on UGU....

.... compared to these shorter bumpers on this 220 (W115)

With the fixings location I sprayed them with a heavy dose of penetrating oil and set to work.  It is not possible to get a socket onto any of the fixings so a ring spanner was my weapon of choice, and a successful one at that.  The back fixings have a threaded bolt that is fixed to the car so it is just a nut that needs to be undone, on the sides it is the opposite, a bolt goes through the quarter panel into a nut that is an integral part of the side bracket.

Looking up at the bumper, back bracket of which there are two.  

The nut is what needs to be undone

Passenger side bumper fixing is located inside the boot once the boot side trim is removed.  I found the bolt to be too close to the bracket to use a socket and ratchet, so again a ring spanner was the best option

The drivers side was a little harder to spot initially as it is tucked in behind the jack cradle, petrol tank vent filter and on this car, behind the electric ariel  

I have to admit I was also a little distracted by Jade's internal water feature!  This channel was full of water, and of course rust!!

With the bolts undone, the bumper can be slipped off, however if you are dong this on a car that you are precious about, I would call a friend as it could be very easy to scratch the paintwork.

Once the fixings are all undo, it's time to phone a friend

This is what the back fixing point looks like

Job done.  Just needs a polish and then it's off to a new home

And just to confirm to myself that I am doing the right thing dismantling Jade, some more rust!

Memories

Sitting at work today, an email from my best mate popped up entitled "memories".  The email was full of pictures of "The German Lady" who, for those of you who have not read my previous blog post, was my first Benz and is responsible for my love of classic Mercedes-Benzes.  She was a 1976 W116 280SE

Read more about my first benz "The German Lady"

The photographs were taken back in 2009 and my mate found them on what he thought was a black CD in his office.

It is great to have some pictures of the old girl :)

 This photo makes me smile.  Look at the length of the car!!

 Classic RAC sticker and A-pillar detailing which prevents water runoff from the windscreen going onto the side windows

 Double chrome bumpers were such a great feature of the W116

These sheepskin seat covers had protected the original fabric seats 

Blue interior.  Like the seat covers the dashboard carpet was installed when the car was new, the dashboard below was perfect

Disassembly begins

With the decision made to sacrifice Jade to the benefit of others, I set to work removing the interior of the car which despite being filthy wasn't in bad shape.

First I removed the front seats, a simple job of removing four bolts per seat that I had done on UGU many times before.  I then moved onto the back seat, door cards and rear panel cards; again all things I was familiar with from working on UGU.

Drivers seat was the first thing to be removed

 Unfortunately the drivers seat shows wear to the door side, but generally the seats are in usable condition. Note seats are in reverse order in picture

The back seat was/is actually in great condition once the dirt was removed

Back seat with ghostly seat belt pattern

After a wash down, the rear seat is in near perfect condition

With the seats out there was now a lot more room to work in the car.  I turned my attention to cleaning it out.  As with many cars you always find rubbish under the seats that you would rather not have to touch.  Hair brushes, half eaten sweets, bottles of juice, as well as parking tickets and general accumulation of 40 plus years of gunk. On the flip side, I found $1.45 in change and in a rare instance, found the missing accelerator pedal under the passenger seat!

Centre console in excellent condition

As I started to remove the interior trim I was reminded of the excellent build quality of these cars.  Not a single thing broke or snapped as I undid the screws and bolts.  Only one screw in the rear had rusted do the point that I needed to drill it out.

With that said, I have become sceptical as to whether this car has actually been stored inside as I was told by the previous owner.  It may have done; time can also be a destructive source, but the dash pad, rear view mirror and seat belts were so brittle that it seems to me that they have been sitting in strong day light.

Seat belt spaghetti

I removed the centre console which again was pretty easy despite my concerns about it otherwise.  The hardest thing to remove was non Mercedes-Benz stereo which, without the key to remove it from it's cradle could only be removed with the console out.

Aftermarket stereo and a very damaged gear knob

I removed the speaker cables running to the back of the car and all the old mouldy carpet, things were looking better, well cleaner anyway: the level of rust was not looking healthy at all.

The cleanest this interior has been in many years

As you would have seen in my previous post, this car has had a dreadful repair done to the drivers footwell which has allowed water to get into the car and has run back as far as the front seats, but interestingly it looks like this car has also had issues with rust along the length of the passenger side sill that has been painted over perhaps in a bid to stop it.

I cannot for one minute believe this messy black paint work is standard issue Mercedes-Benz which makes me think this is someones attempt at rust prevention

I make reference to this car being "beyond repair".  To clarify, no car is beyond repair if you are willing to pour the money into it. So what I mean is this car is beyond economical repair.  It would cost several times the cars value to repair it, so until my lottery numbers come in, I am not in a position to salvage this car and so, by dismantling it I am hoping to help other owners and enthusiasts, recoup my initial investment in both the car and tools, and expand my knowledge of these amazing cars so that one day I can perhaps bring one back from the brink.  Everything I learn I will share with you via my Tyrobenz blog.

Check out my first Tyrobenz video to find see more about the disassembly process:

The diagnosis is not good

After giving Jade a good wash I turned my attention to looking for rust.

I already knew the boot floor was very rusty as the accident damage to the rear end meant that the boot lid was no longer able to close correctly, allowing water to leak in.

Accident damage allows water into boot and the boot floor begins to rust

I next lifted out the interior carpets. The floors in the back were solid and in good condition put as I started to look towards the front things took a nasty turn.  In the passenger floor there was a large hole and as I pulled back the frayed carpet on the sill more daylight could be seen.  I had a look under the car and saw huge patches of rust spreading towards the rear.

Rear driver-side floor section is solid and rust free, but does have cobwebs

 Passenger floor and footwell is full of rust allowing daylight to be seen

As I moved to the drivers side the story got a whole lot worse.  I find it amusing that I was able to get into the car and drive it and not notice that there was no accelerator pedal!  The lack of pedal is an excellent clue to the dreadful repair that had been done previously to the drivers footwell.  The repair is crude to say the least, and the fact they did nothing to address the rust issues as that repair was being executed, just made things worse.

Special edition light weight accelerator!  You can see the floor is wet following me washing the car, so water must be leaking through the firewall somewhere. Not good.

Drivers side floor.  I don't know if you could call this is repair, but what ever you call it, it is a disaster!!

It is enough to make you sick!

At this stage things are looking very bleak, but I had to keep looking.  The harder I looked the worse things got.  

These next photos are not for the weak hearted, and will potentially upset fellow lovers of not only the stroke 8, but all classic cars out there.

The boot is very rusty and is thinner than paper at the back edge and around the fuel filler

Holes through the body work where the boot closes

Rust bubbles around back window

More bubbles starting to come through in the rear quarter panel, a common stroke 8 rust spot

Rear wheelarch, passenger side.... 

which after a bit of poking with my finger became this, then....

THIS!!!!!  I stopped at this point.

Driver side footwell.  Again I am not sure why water would be seeping in here, but it cannot be a good thing.

Game over!

No doubt by this time, like me you will all be feeling sick to the stomach.  The rust is horrendous, and I sure, like an iceberg, there is a lot more that I cannot see at this stage.

It breaks my heart to do it, but I have decided that there is no hope for Jade.  There is no way I could commit to the investment it would take to fix her.  It would take a full bare metal restoration to cut out all this rust. I hope to salvage as many parts as I can to help save some other series 1 C114's; UGU included, before sending Jade for a permanent vacation. 

A busy weekend in photos

UGU and I had a very busy weekend together and we managed to take some interesting photos we thought we would share.

Saturday night sunset, following collection of my in-laws from the airport, and also the night before meeting Jade,

Sunday morning, the meeting...

Sunday afternoon, on our way home from an MBCCWA event we spotted this very sorry looking W111 sitting by the side of the road looking more than a little unloved!

Sunday afternoon, photo shoot with friends at Parliament House for the upcoming MBCCWA club calendar

Sway bar linkage replacement

With the excitement of picking up Jade last week I had totally forgot that UGU also needed some of my attention; very much a case of out of sight, out of mind.

A few weeks ago I attended the start of Perth's German Car Day which, despite the horrendous weather, had a great turn out of 90 cars from Perth's German car clubs.  I was unfortunately unable to take part in the event, which perhaps upset UGU and who could blame her having seen some of the fantastic cars on show.

MBCCWA President Paul Blank addresses the attendees

W113 Pagoda SL. What makes this particular car special to me is the fact that it is a daily driver for the MBCCWA Event's Coordinator. And she loves it, understandably

A pair of Porsches, followed by........

..... a trio of Porsches, outdone by.........

..... a trio of W116's! (My opinion only of course)

Yes please!  Audi Quatto Sport S1

SL's, Wagons, Coupes, they were all there

Beemer boys

Brand spanking new G55

Off they go

Ford Focus XR5's were assembled in German so happily welcome at G.C.D

Anyone for Golf?  Love these Mk1's

After I watched the convoy leave, we packed up and made our way home.  Half way home we turned a corner an almighty bang came from the back of the car.  My heart skipped a beat as I quickly pulled over and got out expecting to see something major had broken, but instead I couldn't see anything unusual.  I opened the boot to see if perhaps something in there had become dislodged, but again I couldn't see anything.

A little baffled we set off again with no noise or anything unusual, that was until we turned another corner, BANG!

Again I pulled over and got under the car to have a better look but still couldn't see anything wrong.

The next day I took UGU to see a fellow MBCCWA member who had a look for me.  Being more mechanically minded than me (which isn't hard), he quickly found the problem. The drivers side rear sway bar linkage had snapped meaning that each time we turned a corner the broken linkage would fall over hitting the inside of the wheel causing the awful noise.

Broken rear sway bar linkage.  Hard to see unless you know where to look

With the problem found I spoke to my friends on W(A)114/115 to see if anyone could help me with a part number so I could order a new part;  better than that, one of the members had a spare and brand new set which I happily bought from him.

New linkages, one for each side

Located on the other side of the country it will take a few days for the parts to get to me, and as I want to use UGU this weekend I decided to pay Jade a visit to borrow one from her. Sorry Jade but your big sister comes first :(

Armed with my new socket set, which was a bargain in it's own right.  A gumtree purchase of a preowned, but never used, 166 piece Kinchrome socket and spanner set which I bought  for close to half the price of a new set.

New socket set, and the first I have owned.  Excited!!!

I finished work early and headed out to the back garden.  I jacked up Jade, removed the wheel and using a 17mm open ended spanner and equal sized socket I unbolted the linkage.

Jade, minus one sway bar linkage, for the time being

Removed and ready to be fitted to UGU to get her through until the new parts arrive

This couldn't have been easier, but for me it was hugely rewarding; a quick and easy task to add to my knowledge bank.