Build 1973 Mercedes R107 build

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Wasn't enamored with the intake. Had the powder coater out to do the linkage. Gave the bottom plenum a coat of the random unlabeled powder I had. I liked it. I had just enough to do the intakes.

TPS is a Mitsubishi unit that has the same bolt pattern and D shaft diameter. I removed the auxiliary air tube to clear the TPS. I'll use a stand alone IAC motor with the speeduino.

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I had house pests over the weekend. We were pondering the front of the 78 with the bumper off and the 73 bumper.

The holes were in the body, but no threads in the boxed section of the bumper support. A smidgen of drilling and some 10mm nutserts and we had threaded holes. The bolts aren't tight. The wing mounts aren't moved over yet. Everything needs to come off for paint anyway.

Mounted the new driving lights that came on the 78.

Cleaned up the turn signal lenses and housings after a quick Google search. You never can tell what is available cheap. The square later lenses are. These early ones appear to not be though. Sandblasted the housings. Powdercoated the bodies with chrome powder. Polished the lenses with plastic polish. Mounting holes are in the body behind the grille slats. Early lights need to trim the slats.

Sandblasted and painted the mounting bracket with black wrinkle finish.



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Intake with mystery color powder, brushed warm up air bypass, and GM rally silver powder 9th injector housing. Brushed isn't really an option for all the aluminum bits. I'm not going to use any of these parts so it's OK to use them to check colors. I like the rally silver. I think it'll do for valve covers.

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Well, I see a lot of this stuff for crazy prices for unknown condition. I know it all works. I also know it will all fail at some point and I'll have to pay crazy prices to replace any of it.
I was going to use as much as the harness as I could, but being that there isn't a lot of reason to and ECUs with full harnesses are hard to get, I think I can switch the couple of Bosch parts I was going to use to more modern versions. I have no idea what a complete good running d-jetronic set up for a 450sl is worth. I also have a complete k-jet too, but that might be worth core prices.
The distributor has some kind of aftermarket electronic ignition too.

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Threw the cleaned up parts on for mock up, then put the 78 intake and valve covers on for the powerwashing. I'm glad I mocked it up. The IAC plumbing has some options. I'm currently thinking about the stock cold start injector manifold. It has PCV provisions too.

If I don't run the Benz harness, I don't have much reason to run the Benz injectors. There's a modern Bosch number that fits. From a Ford maybe.

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Mostly dinking around today. Sick yesterday kept me out of the shop and on light duty today. New front submember mounts came in, but more than I wanted to do today.
Thought I would do the intake and exhaust.
Media blasted the exhaust manifolds. Debating a coating or just let them patina. Checked on price and availability of exhaust heat shields. Ended up welding them up, blasting them and hitting them with 400 degree primer and paint. Had to get all 4 bolts out too. Two weld a nut on trick and 2 drill and tap.
Media blasted and powdercoated the coolant tube that runs under the intake and torqued the intake down.
Injectors came late in the day. 44# Ford modular motor injectors. The hold down clamp fit perfectly and the plastic cuts off the top to hook a hose to so I can use the D-jet fuel pipes. I can use the high impedance drivers in the speeduino, modern injectors I can easily replace and I don't have cut the d-jet harness.

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Pretty busy long weekend. Lots of interruptions. Turkey and football and whatnot. Lots of time in the shop though. Went through some wood in the new boiler keeping the whole shop warm. The Benz is on the hoist and the hoist is on the cold side of the shop.

New injectors trimmed for hose connection. Dremel with a carbide burr cut the plastic pretty well. Still waiting on a few more fuel injection hose clamps. Wired up the injectors. Fuel rail is all plumbed up except the cold start injector. I'm thinking maybe a fuel pressure gauge there. Powdercoated the hold down clamps and used the bushings and snap rings from the d-jet injectors. New m6x1 flanged head bolts.

Intake air temp is a GM unit so I didn't have to cut the D-jet harness. Same with the Engine Coolant Temp, or CLT in speeduino. The D-jet threads are smaller in both cases so I should be able to just drill and tap.

The engine control harness is about all built. Still need to build the crankshaft position sensor mount and run the wires.

AC bracket is powdercoated and fresh paint on the clutch. AC tensioner pulley and bracket got blasted and powdercoated too.

I think I'm going with the 78 power steering pump and mounting bracket. I like the rack gear tensioner and the lanturn shaped pump housing. I used the 78 alternator bracket for the same rack tensioner. Haven't done those pulleys yet, but I suspect they will get powdercoated too.

The unibody channels were mostly yellow, suggesting the engine didn't come out for the first repaint. I went around and around about what to do before I put the engine back in. I decided I didn't want to strip the whole engine bay until I'm ready for the color change, and I'm not 100% on the final color. I decided against grey sealer and went with POR-15.

Dropped the crossmember to change the subframe bushings. It's a common thing, but the ones I took out looked good and came apart easily, so they were probably done before with OEM parts. Took the subframe out into the snow and powerwashed it. Got the top painted in POR-15. I'll hit the bottom in a couple of days.

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It's honestly paining me a little to have the subframe out and not to take the control arms off, but the engine is going in this weekend. It needs to keep moving forward and it kinda needs to move back to the heated side of the shop.
Finished the POR-15 on the subframe. Touched up the engine compartment too. Didn't get any on my hootus.

Painted the exhaust manifolds. The 45 minutes between coats kept me puttering in the shop all evening. Eastwood cast iron high temp manifold paint. It's pretty close to the dark grey I was looking for.

Buttoned up the injection harness. Had to pin the IAC connector and then put the wire loom on. I didn't remember every time I needed to put shrink tube to terminate the loom. We'll see if I ever unpin connectors to fix it. Prolly not.



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Gumby said:
Didn't get any on my hootus.

Painted the exhaust manifolds. The 45 minutes between coats kept me puttering in the shop all evening. Eastwood cast iron high temp manifold paint. It's pretty close to the dark grey I was looking for.

Buttoned up the injection harness. Had to pin the IAC connector and then put the wire loom on. I didn't remember every time I needed to put shrink tube to terminate the loom. We'll see if I ever unpin connectors to fix it. Prolly not.



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gotta watch to not get Herculiner on your hootus. POR-15 isn’t nearly as bad. Or so I’ve heard.
 
Exhaust manifolds came out nice. I needed a couple of studs so I bought a box of 20. The lock nuts were rusty so a box of those.

I swear the original plan was the exhaust was not coming off.

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Lot of stuff done this weekend, but not much to look at. Just buttoning up the power train swap. Lots of little things to do.
Plumbed in another heat exchanger to the wood boiler to heat the less insulated side of the shop where the hoist is. Pretty nice to be warm.
Trans filter and gasket, with, of course, a media blasted and powdercoated pan.
The exhaust downpipes were a giant PIA to get bolted up.
The brass contact pad for the kick down solenoid wire got dinked somewhere coming in or out. I had to pull it out to clean up the threads. It was worth it to check it. They are known for getting sticky.
Made a block off plate and gasket for the warm up valve on the front of the intake.
Finished up the heater hoses. The heater core sticks out in the cowl vent area. There's just no room to tighten the clamps. The 73 intake and hvac is different so the hoses had to come off. While the blower motor was out the cowl area got scrubbed and POR-15.
Wiring harness terminated to the Deutsch connectors that will connect to the speeduino.
Put the crank trigger wheel in the press today to get the little bit of warpage from welding out. Should put me in good shape to make the ckp mount, then the rest of the front end can go back together.

Maybe some pics if I can find something to take one of that's interesting.



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