Reflections
Jim Luikens
Wrapping Up Project Gift Horse
Wow! I’ve reached the end of this project already and it seems like only last month, not a year ago, that I picked up Project Gift Horse in Kalamazoo, Michigan. I’ve learned a lot this past year and enjoyed my time working on the car despite some unexpected, and costly, twists and turns.
The original W126 American models – the 300SD and the 380SE – were introduced to America in fall 1980 as 1981 model-year automobiles. That was a whopping 32 years ago and W126s are now old cars despite their modern feel and drive. In fact, their age does nothing to diminish their driving ability or desirability.
I graduated from high school in 1965 and bought a brand new 1965 Chevrolet Impala convertible. If you were to subtract the same 32 years from 1965, you would have a 1933 automobile. While 1933 seemed impossibly ancient to a teenager in 1965, a 1981 Mercedes does not feel all that dated to me today. That incredible analogy shows how far automotive technology, especially Mercedes-Benz automotive technology, has advanced in recent decades.
Despite all of the advances the automotive industry has made in recent years, owners are simply not holding up their end of the bargain. The biggest thing that I learned from this project is that preventative maintenance is an unfamiliar term to most Americans. And, 32 years of deferred maintenance does nothing but boost the cost to make these cars like new again.
To cut to the chase, I invested about $5,500 in recommissioning my SEL. While $500 of that money could be legitimately claimed as discretionary spending, that still leaves about $5,000 in repairs that have been performed. By the way, these are real dollars, not in-kind dollars for parts that I already had on hand. In fact, I did not charge any money against this project for parts that were already on my shelf or in my bone yard.
The $5,500 is not a bad amount to have invested in a W126 that has everything working and operable.
However, please remember that I paid nothing for this vehicle in the first place. If I had paid, say, $3,500 to start, I would be extremely upside down now with a total investment of nearly $9,000 in a 1986 vehicle.
Young-timer – as opposed to old-timer – is a term that the Germans apply to vehicles of the W123, W124, W126 and R107 eras. I used to tell any prospective young-timer buyer who came to me to expect to spend at least $1,000 for updated maintenance and repairs on their new purchase. I now see that I am going to have to up that dollar figure because $1,000 really won’t get the job done anymore. Although these are still new cars in my mind, too many years have elapsed with too little maintenance to realistically expect to put these cars back into daily service without significant costs.
While it might be said that someone wouldn’t have to do everything that I did to make the car operable again, I have to wonder what I could have bypassed without impairing the driving experience.
Since the last installment, Art and I spent our time wrapping up the dozens of niggling details that it took to declare the project complete. Nothing was major, but each job took some time and required some investment.
One job was to have both bumpers refinished by my friends at Bob’s Collision. Although the car was generally in fine shape, all four corners of the bumpers were scratched. Bob’s has been my go-to body shop for the last 40 years and they have never let me down.
In fact, they know me so well that they even remember my preferences. For instance, when I stopped in to check on their progress, I discovered that they had filled the front license plate screw holes without me asking them to do so. Michigan is a one-plate state and they knew I detest the unnecessary front license plate screw holes.
After all of the necessary work was completed, I felt like splurging a little. To put the icing on the cake, I purchased a set of eight-hole replica alloy wheels from the Tire Rack and an Alpine CD deck that is iPod- and USB-friendly to replace the archaic cassette deck that came with the car. Finally, a set of the latest Sisal mats with contrasting stitching from the Palm Fiber CocoMats people (www.cocomats.com) wrapped everything up in a pleasing bow. Now I’m just looking forward to spending some time behind the wheel after all the work.
Jim Luikens
Wrapping Up Project Gift Horse
Wow! I’ve reached the end of this project already and it seems like only last month, not a year ago, that I picked up Project Gift Horse in Kalamazoo, Michigan. I’ve learned a lot this past year and enjoyed my time working on the car despite some unexpected, and costly, twists and turns.
The original W126 American models – the 300SD and the 380SE – were introduced to America in fall 1980 as 1981 model-year automobiles. That was a whopping 32 years ago and W126s are now old cars despite their modern feel and drive. In fact, their age does nothing to diminish their driving ability or desirability.
I graduated from high school in 1965 and bought a brand new 1965 Chevrolet Impala convertible. If you were to subtract the same 32 years from 1965, you would have a 1933 automobile. While 1933 seemed impossibly ancient to a teenager in 1965, a 1981 Mercedes does not feel all that dated to me today. That incredible analogy shows how far automotive technology, especially Mercedes-Benz automotive technology, has advanced in recent decades.
Despite all of the advances the automotive industry has made in recent years, owners are simply not holding up their end of the bargain. The biggest thing that I learned from this project is that preventative maintenance is an unfamiliar term to most Americans. And, 32 years of deferred maintenance does nothing but boost the cost to make these cars like new again.
To cut to the chase, I invested about $5,500 in recommissioning my SEL. While $500 of that money could be legitimately claimed as discretionary spending, that still leaves about $5,000 in repairs that have been performed. By the way, these are real dollars, not in-kind dollars for parts that I already had on hand. In fact, I did not charge any money against this project for parts that were already on my shelf or in my bone yard.
The $5,500 is not a bad amount to have invested in a W126 that has everything working and operable.
However, please remember that I paid nothing for this vehicle in the first place. If I had paid, say, $3,500 to start, I would be extremely upside down now with a total investment of nearly $9,000 in a 1986 vehicle.
Young-timer – as opposed to old-timer – is a term that the Germans apply to vehicles of the W123, W124, W126 and R107 eras. I used to tell any prospective young-timer buyer who came to me to expect to spend at least $1,000 for updated maintenance and repairs on their new purchase. I now see that I am going to have to up that dollar figure because $1,000 really won’t get the job done anymore. Although these are still new cars in my mind, too many years have elapsed with too little maintenance to realistically expect to put these cars back into daily service without significant costs.
While it might be said that someone wouldn’t have to do everything that I did to make the car operable again, I have to wonder what I could have bypassed without impairing the driving experience.
Since the last installment, Art and I spent our time wrapping up the dozens of niggling details that it took to declare the project complete. Nothing was major, but each job took some time and required some investment.
One job was to have both bumpers refinished by my friends at Bob’s Collision. Although the car was generally in fine shape, all four corners of the bumpers were scratched. Bob’s has been my go-to body shop for the last 40 years and they have never let me down.
In fact, they know me so well that they even remember my preferences. For instance, when I stopped in to check on their progress, I discovered that they had filled the front license plate screw holes without me asking them to do so. Michigan is a one-plate state and they knew I detest the unnecessary front license plate screw holes.
After all of the necessary work was completed, I felt like splurging a little. To put the icing on the cake, I purchased a set of eight-hole replica alloy wheels from the Tire Rack and an Alpine CD deck that is iPod- and USB-friendly to replace the archaic cassette deck that came with the car. Finally, a set of the latest Sisal mats with contrasting stitching from the Palm Fiber CocoMats people (www.cocomats.com) wrapped everything up in a pleasing bow. Now I’m just looking forward to spending some time behind the wheel after all the work.