So I am buying a bad decision... (help make it better)

1983 Mercedes 300SD.

Some back story. My uncle and I are watching TV, Dirty Jobs to be exact. It's an old one; Mike Rowe was helping a guy convert used grease into biodiesel. My uncle remarks that his nephew was going to do that on a Mercedes he bought years ago, which immediately piques my interest. I asked what happened with it, and apparently he abandoned the project when the engine's timing chain broke. This set off a light bulb in my head, as I remember seeing a Mercedes on craigslist very close to where I live. Living out in the middle of nowhere, one takes notice of such things. So we head over there, and sure enough, it's the one from craigslist.

So the car. It's been sitting inside a new garage for the last 9 years. It's dusty, but the bod appears to be in good shape, as does the interior. He had started taking the engine and transmission out from the top, and then he stopped, and that's where it sits today. The car comes with two engines and three transmissions. For $1000, it sounds to me to be a good deal, but I am curious if the engine in the car now even needs to be pulled. The engine should be non-interference, right? How hard is the engine swap? Am I nuts?

(2016 Challenge car - Aristocrat class)

Your nuts but in a good way. Do it!!!!!!

I'm not useful in terms of any of your questions but that episode of Dirty Jobs takes place in my home town!
I used to eat at the restaurant the dude was getting oil from, before their prices got berkeley-ie

For less than a thousand bucks, you can start with one that is already running. I think that would be a better starting point, even for an engine swap.

I dunno. Body and interior are the difficult parts. Drivetrain is easy. I agree, for a thousand, that looks like a deal, especially with the spares, if you've got room for all that junk.

Hot Rod Mag made over 1000 HP out of a junkyard 4.8 before it blew up (stock internals). Add junkyard / eBay turbos and mate that to a 4L85-E, and you will have a Mercedes 480E.

You know what the proper answer is here...

So, ginormous Holset turbo and a stolen wheelset from a CP car it is, then!

If it's rust-free, that's gold in our neck of the woods. The few 126's for sale around here, along with most things of interest, right now seem to look like they were recovered from the Titanic.

If its a diesel, which, based on the "grease" comments I presume it is, the engine is scrap after a timing chain failure. Might save the crankshaft.

The kid is right. LS swap with a ginormous turbo.

Nah, if its a diesel, keep it a diesel. 6bt and a 23 speed manual.

LSx would break that rearend. And you'll need to do some mods to the steering system to fit it, possibly go rack and pinion. Oddly LS's don't swap into w126's as easy as you'd think. Tunnel cutting, need right headers, requires front sump. Thought about a ford 5.0? Cheaper than an LS option now-a-days and they've always fit in Mercedes better.

I have a rearend from an 88 560SEC if you are going through with a v8 swap. I know a fellow with an LS6 560SEC with the stock rear. Still holding up!

Do me a favor though. Swap in a Cadillac 500. Please!

Those engines are VERY interference, they don't just bend valves, they will actually rip the cam towers off the head. It's pretty standard practice to throw a chain and guides at them every 200k/20 years or so, the plastic guide surfaces can crumble with age and make it jump time as well.

No V8 swaps. An LSX swap is reserved for the wagon. This diesel is staying diesel. It comes with another OM617.951 that'll be swapped in. Sucks to hear that it's interference, looks like its original engine will become something I break down and study.

Small Kubota turbo diesel. Just to confuse the masses.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOvjN6b3Jzk

Esoteric Nixon wrote: No V8 swaps. An LSX swap is reserved for the wagon. This diesel is staying diesel. It comes with another OM617.951 that'll be swapped in. Sucks to hear that it's interference, looks like its original engine will become something I break down and study.

Time for an enormous holset turbo off of a Cummins?

This should do it:

I bought a running one just like that for $500 a few years back, so I would try to get it for less. As previously stated the engine is junk if the chain broke, but swapping a new engine in is easy in a weekend. These cars are dead simple.

Well, it's family, though. And he paid $4500 for it back in '04. It really is a nice car; the transmission was rebuilt just before the chain went. It really is a good deal here in NE Ohio. For reference And another.

I'm hoping that the junk engine will at least have a few good parts I could scavenge.

Also, I am a complete diesel noob, and engine swap noob.

On the engine with the broken timing chain, the head is for sure junk, but the rest of it may or may not be still usable at least for parts. They are pretty well made and not hard to work on, although there are a lot of parts available that are so badly made that they don't even perform their intended function (at least not for long). At best running WVO isn't terribly good for the engine, at worst it will cause carbon build up in the cylinders that will score the cylinder walls and rapidly destroy the engine. Also, if it has over 200k miles you are looking at a minimum of $1200 if you don't want the front suspension to be loose and noisy. Just the factory spring compressor and lower ball joint press are over $2500. I had one for several years and I liked it, but the transmission was starting to die, and the A/C and heater didn't work and I didn't even know where to start to try to fix them so I sold it.

So do i need to start keeping my fry oil now? Since family, any chance you can yank old out and bolt new in while at current location?

Get a 50 pack of baggies and a sharpie and bag/label every bolt or nut in groups, ie bellhousing bolts, ac compressor bolts, etc. then you are not digging through bucket of random hardware trying to fit things back together

Travis, I sure hope to avoid paying anywhere near $1,200 to refresh the front end. We'll see. I have to get the car running first. Good thing I work at a place where I can get parts for cost+10%.

Pat, I don't think I'll be running a conversion anytime soon. And luckily, I can work on it right where it is. Only downside is that he has yet to run electricity out there, so I might have to bring a generator.

Good suggestion on the baggies, but I am afraid that he already has the bad engine completely disconnected. I forgot to ask where he put everything. This should be interesting.

If you don't have them already, go buy the W126 service manual DVDs off ebay or whatever. I think they also exist for free somewhere or other, perhaps in some digital bay of piracy, I know I had a copy I definitely didn't pay for when I was thinking of getting one. This is the sort of car where you really do need the book to work on it effectively.

Yeah, I am hoping to find a paper service manual, as I just can't do digital copies.

I've also seen a lot of videos on youtube under the Mercedessource channel. Has A LOT of resources, but it would appear that he makes you pay for access for all of that.

In reply to Esoteric Nixon:

Print the relevant sections? The paper ones are rare, and presumably huge. It's something like a gigabyte in PDF form.

In reply to Kenny_McCormic:

Duh. That's not a bad idea at all. I'll just blame my brain fart on being at work. Yeah, that works!