With the sale of the 300SDL, I’m motivated to start doing some serious work on the 300SEL. Once the engine is running, the following things need to be done at nearly the same time in order to actual drive the car a bit:
- Brakes (replace everything)
- Suspension (new air bags in the rear, at the very least)
- Tires (nice ones)
This is a short, but fairly expensive and time consuming list. In order to get a bit ahead, I decided to pull off the calipers and send them off to be rebuilt. I was happy to find everything came apart nicely. The wheel bolts weren’t too tight and nothing was very rusty. This further supports the low mileage of the car, and an easy life. After about two hours, I ended up with this collection of parts:
It was nice to see the brake pads were original Mercedes parts. The star was still visible on one of the rear pads. I suppose the aftermarket parts business was non-existant in the 1970s and 80s, or these were installed at the dealer. It was also worth noting that the brake hoses were marked with “Ate”, but had nothing else visible. This makes me wonder if they’re original. The hard brake lines broke free from the hoses and calipers up front easily, but things were not so eager to come apart in the rear. I removed the calipers, but both ends of the brake hoses look as if they’re not willing to come free from the lines. These lines are pretty short, so getting replacements won’t be such a big deal.
Once the calipers get back from the rebuilder, I’ll order up a new master cylinder, pads, rotors, hoses, hardware, and any hard lines I may need. I don’t want to take any chances with the brakes, so replacing everything is the way to go.
Are you planning on replacing or rebuilding the servo? I did on my 250SE when I did the brakes as it leaked, as did two other used servos I tried from ebay. was much easier the first time when I was doing the master.