Justas22 / GG. - W126 SEC

[Apple]

Pradžioje rašė GG.

Turite labai dėmesingą akį. Sorry for the google translate

I recently picked it up as a daily. It is a 2004 CL55 AMG. The front was slightly damaged, just left it today at a bodyshop to get it fixed. Won't take long. As a matter of fact, I ordered all the parts at RRR.lt. Lithuania rocks

I love it, such a wonderful car. Will keep it as a daily for the summer and the c126 for weekends








Thank you

Wonderful choice for daily car!!! Congrats! :lithuania
PS google translate works perfect

[GG.]

Pradžioje rašė Apple

Wonderful choice for daily car!!! Congrats! :lithuania
PS google translate works perfect

Hah, very good! Thanks mate! I was in Vilnius last Sunday to see a concert and I loved Vilnius. Had not visited in a long while. A very pretty and lively town. Can't say that about Riga tho

[Apple]

Pradžioje rašė GG.

Hah, very good! Thanks mate! I was in Vilnius last Sunday to see a concert and I loved Vilnius. Had not visited in a long while. A very pretty and lively town. Can't say that about Riga tho

Because you are used to Riga. Yes, Vilnius is a wonderful city, but Riga is also great. Ofcourse I was there ~ 8 years ago but memories are the best!

[GG.]

Hi there folks,

The project hit the 1 year and 6 months mark already.

Lots of small things have been done, while I am waiting for the body to be finally painted. I am starting to doubt if it will be on the road this summer.

I cleaned and regreased the window wiper mechanism. Then moved on to cleaning the windshield washer tank. I replaced all rubbers and it turns out the windshield washer heating system was adding fluid to the tank


Got a replacement heater coil from a donor, much better condition. While browsing the catalogs, I noticed that the same washer thermostat is being used up to w222


I bought a stock steering wheel with an airbag. Before the car had a wooden steering wheel which I didn't like, plus the RS light was on, as the airbag was not connected. If anybody wants it, let me know. It is a Nardi Gara 4 in good condition. PM for photos.


I started preparing various parts of the interior for the reassembly. Turns out there were many coffee spills on the seats and carpets



I had not noticed how terribly dirty was the interior. Especially the headliner.


The back part of the headliner and the sunroof panel were the worst. Since this car did not have AC, I imagine the sunroof was always open.




The trunk seal and taillight seals were leaking and the boot liner was covered in mold. I cleaned it multiple times with vinegar and an extractor and it does not smell now.



The front seats were the dirtiest part, but they cleaned up nice. The fabric is a little worn in some spots, but it is practically impossible to buy the dattel velour fabric.


The rear seats are almost perfect. Before/after. The color became much more vibrant.


Some buttons on the Reiserechner control panel were badly worn. I assembled one good panel using a donor.



Talking about the Reiserechner. I had noticed that when the car was cold the display would work fine, but as soon as the interior warmed up the display became very dim. I suspected bad solder joints, and I found them. If you look closely, you will notice cracks in the solder. Also, both lenses were cracked. The bottom lens can be replaced, but the upper lens can not be removed without destroying it. I used a replacement cluster, which was polished.

[GG.]

Look close and you will see cracked solder joints.


Aliexpress FTW


Assembly. The dials are very delicate due to age.



Psst psst plastidip


Voila


The rear shelf was sooooo dusty that I was sneezing the entire evening.



Rear compartment lids before/after


Clean parts piling up. Everything is ready for assembly.


I lightly polished the exterior chrome trim. You can't be too agressive as it is aluminum with a very thin coating of chrome or nickel.


One of the headlight lenses was a little cracked. I sourced a good used lens.



The reflectors were just dirty, no problems there. Wiped them clean with a microfiber.


Need to wrap the lenses in PPF


As for the dessert: the engine is pretty much done.


Ceramic coated headers, just for looks.



This is the paint shop progress, dated last Thursday. It was primered one last time and should be painted by now.






Thank you for your attention!

[FUN500]

I am really impressed your passion level. As well as much as can see it is going right way. When you expect to finish the process and start to get satisfaction? For enthusiastic people process giving an emotional as well, but if this is not a commercial project, on my opinion you can not get full relax, until you become a one part with the car. I mean when you not just a regular driver on a regular car, but you know exactly what you expect to get, you predict car reaction and it response to you.

[GG.]

Pradžioje rašė FUN500

I am really impressed your passion level. As well as much as can see it is going right way. When you expect to finish the process and start to get satisfaction? For enthusiastic people process giving an emotional as well, but if this is not a commercial project, on my opinion you can not get full relax, until you become a one part with the car. I mean when you not just a regular driver on a regular car, but you know exactly what you expect to get, you predict car reaction and it response to you.

Thank you! For me, a big part of the satisfaction is the process of building and getting to know the car. When you put your hands on each and every little part, you sort of become one with the car, as you say. You know every little sound the car makes, you know what to expect. This is my first experience with Mercedes, and through this process, I really fell in love with these cars. The attention to detail is amazing, everything is engineered with longevity and repairability in mind.

I was hoping to be on the road around May/June, but due to the delays in the paintshop, I start to doubt that it will happen this season.

[FUN500]

How is about spare parts? Where are you getting? Because when I was looking couple specific parts for w126, I got 2-3 phone numbers from Riga and Liepaje, but due conversation, prices get me shocked.
What you gonna do with exaust system? Stock or? M117 has the most purest sound of all MB V8 engines.. IMHO

[GG.]

Pradžioje rašė FUN500

How is about spare parts? Where are you getting? Because when I was looking couple specific parts for w126, I got 2-3 phone numbers from Riga and Liepaje, but due conversation, prices get me shocked.
What you gonna do with exaust system? Stock or? M117 has the most purest sound of all MB V8 engines.. IMHO

Yeah, I know the guy from Liepaja, he is a perekupas His prices are astranomical. I have bought some things from him. Wear parts, like suspension etc are no problem, they all can be bought in standard shops. For small bits and pieces my friends at Family Garage in Riga always help me out and their prices are fair to say the least. Coupe specific parts are very expensive, but it makes sense, it is a pretty rare car and not that many of them are left on the market. Plus good ones usually don't get parted out. I paid 500Eur for a whole front bumper because I needed the middle chrome piece. I got the headlight lens with an entire headlight, swaped the lenses and sold the cracked one. The difference was about 150eur. The biggest problem is the rather unique interior. There are veeeeery little coupes with the Palomino/Dattel interior in velour.

For the exhaust I want to do a replica of AMG exhaust. When I bought the car, it was very quiet, and I only later realized that the two middle exhaust silencers (the kidneys) are removed and there was only the catalyst and rear silencer. But it still was very quiet. I don't want it to be loud, as I like driving a lot, especially long trips.

[GG.]

Good evening, keeping the thread alive. Not much progress, but it is moving forward.

Started working on the belt presenters that worked intermittently. Turns out the plastic gears are partially stripped and one of the microswitches was dangling in the air.





Since I had to learn solidworks for another project recently, I figured out I will sketch and print the gears myself from nylon plastic.
While working on the mechanism, I really appreciated the very analog overload protection built in to the mechanism. When there is too much resistance on the belt presenter arm, the part that holds the bigger gear swings downward and presses the mircoswitch that stops the motor. Fantastic and very analog design to avoid damaging the gears and/or motor.

Next up, I restored the rain tray plastic. The car did not have these parts, so I bought used ones. They were wrapped in plastic and I did not check them when buying. Turns out they were covered in silicone (appearantly somebody tried to repair a leaking winscreen) and the metal mesh was all bent.

Kinks in the mesh


Sketching the lost shape of the mesh


Wooden blocks and a rubber mallet do wonders.


Pssst pssst


The glovebox looked like it had suffered water damage, it was too deformed to restore.


I bought a good used glovebox plus some bits and bobs for the interior.


The seats will not be reupholstered at this time, since I cant find the striped fabric. But I still needed some fabric for other parts, namely the rear parcel shelf and rear door cards. I found a matching fabric in a local upholstery store. Given the fact that the original fabric is very faded, the match is perfect.


Somebody along the way had installed a "very neccesary" thrid brake light by drilling holes in the parcel shelf.


I removed the original fabric which was super fragile from the UV damage.


Making the template



Heat resistant adhesive does magic




I think it turned out very good!