I spent the afternoon going over the 560SEC, making small improvements and evaluating the car. The first order of business was to look at the original factory wheels that came with it. As was the norm back in 1987, there are five factory alloy wheels. They were in a really sorry state when I removed them from the boot of the car. They...
I recently purchased a Mercedes-Benz 560SEC at auction. The auction was in Queensland, so the cheapest way to get the car was to have it shipped to a depot in Bathurst. My brother and I went up to Bathurst to pick up the car in his E63 BMW 650i. The trip presented a great opportunity to drive two v8’s around the Mount Panorama racetrack. This...
In the space of about ten years, the Sydney German Auto-fest has grown from a couple of cars in a small Canada Bay carpark to one of the biggest car shows on the calendar. I attended that first show, unfortunately I did not take any photos. What a contrast to the 2018 show. This was the biggest one yet. The show has now outgrown...
Back in early 2017 I fixed my broken odometer. The 300SE odometer repair was successful, but there were two things I needed to follow up on. The odometer was reading 10% low. I could hear the gears, especially in cold weather. In addition, some time after I repaired the odometer, one of the bulbs that illuminates the instrument cluster at night failed. The fix...
The OzBenz forum is one of the online resources I use to maintain my Mercedes-Benz’s. The forum has evolved over a 15 year period, starting with the Mercedes Veterans mailing list, branching off to the OzVets mailing list. This became the OzVets forum and then later the OzBenz forum. I joined very early on and found this a great set of resources to...
I like to fit a battery disconnect switch to all my cars. It ensures the batteries don’t run down and prevents fires. Fires are a real risk from cars with old wiring. I had put one of those cheap on terminal switches on the 250SE when I got it a few years ago. Of late it had been playing up and was difficult...
I owned a 1982 W123 280CE for just over a year between mid 2013 and mid 2014. I hadn’t planned to purchase this car, but I saw it on ebay with Mercedes mis-spelled and nobody else bid on it. The car was described as needing a new radiator, but actually it needed a new water pump. This was better for me. While...
The motor mounts were changed on the 300SE around six months ago, but there was not time to do the Transmission mount. It was obvious it would need doing from the condition of the motor mounts. In addition, I was feeling some vibration from the drivetrain at various times. changing the W126 transmission mount is generally a simple affair. The transmission is jacked up...
You can own a car for years and still find interesting design details that you never noticed. I’ve owned W111’s for around 10 years and today discovered for the first time that the W111 fuel filler cap door can be held open with the fuel cap. Another example is the little brackets on the DS bumper that keep the rear wings from scraping. There...
The windscreen washer has not been working on my 450SLC for a couple of months. The wipers started up, but no water squirted on the windscreen. On quick inspection, I assumed it was the pump as it was rather rusty. The W107 windscreen washer pump is a poor design in my view. It appears that the motor is below where the water is...
I don’t feature the E350 Wagon on this site much. It is the main family car, mostly driven by my wife. The S211 is (in my view) a much better option than the plethora of SUV’s on the road. The lower ride height makes loading babies and prams easy and it drives and handles like a proper car. Just after Christmas, the rear...
When I last replaced the battery in my W111, I was unable to fit the correct sized battery. In the end I fitted one smaller than I would have liked, but it was the only one that fit into the mounting frame I had. I knew the mounting frame was not original to the car as the previous owner purchased it on eBay. ...
In recent years a nice 560SL is going for 3-4x the price of other R107s. They have always been the most valuable of the series, but are they worth the extra money? I would argue they are not event he the best model of the series. They might be the newest, and have the largest engine, but that doesn’t make them the best....
The saga of my non functional A/C is now over. The 300SE is blowing cold air. It would want to after all the parts I had to change to get this far. The final piece of the puzzle was the Klima relay. This relay controls the engagement of the compressor and had burned out when the clutch shorted. I ended up buying a rebuilt...
I have always admired the W116 model. However, since the introduction of the W126 in 1980 the W116 has lived in its shadow. My 450SLC has been my primary car for most of the time I have owned it, but with three children, this is no longer possible. As I needed something that could fit three child seats in a row, a W116 would...
My fight with the W126 Air Conditioning system is almost over. When I purchased the car, the A/C worked rather well. After the water pump gave out, it looks like it shorted out the compressor clutch. Changing out the clutch is not much different to changing out the whole compressor, so I sourced a new compressor and receiver/drier. This was rather irritating as working...
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