W140

[219]

This wasn’t even on my radar , but I’ve just been told about a W140 which is coming up for sale . It isn’t advertised anywhere and I was just told by word of mouth .

The seller is an MB enthusiast from which a friend bought a W124 , he still has several cars , including another 124 , a 107 and this 140 , which I saw briefly a couple of years back when at his house to collect said W124 , but didn’t give it much more than a passing glance .

The car in question is a late model ( 97 or 98 ) S320 in Almandine Red with mushroom leather , reportedly with only 54000 miles on it , and very tidy inside and out , always garaged in one of his two large outbuildings. The car is currently SORN , don’t know how long for , but has been regularly started and moved around ( the owner has a very large house with outbuildings and large garden with 200yds+ long drive , so plenty of room to drive in the grounds ) , from what I saw before , and the one my pal bought , his cars are generally well looked after , but I still need to see this running , check things like air con , tyres , brakes etc as I don’t want to buy a money pit .

I was wary of the M104 engine wiring loom issues , but apparently that does not affect post 1995 cars ? The owner is the sort of chap who would’ve sorted it anyway , but still on my list of things to check .

I know it has a lot in common with my R129 , which remains a good car after 5 years and approaching 100K covered by me ; I know the 140 had similar electronics and will be sure to check everything works .

Any current or previous 140 owners who can add any specific points to check on ?

Apparently the lady of the house has decreed that the owner has too many cars and this one must go .

Having said that much I’m not telling the lady of my house anything about this till decided one way or the other .

The other factor is that , because it has no current MOT , the asking price is only £500 ; having looked round , 140’s are getting scarce and tend to be priced upwards of £2-3K for nice ones ( which I believe this is ) .

I’m interested enough to go and look , but prepared to walk away if anything isn’t right .

 

[Deleted member 6183]

£500?

Why would you hesitate, a few parts sold off it would recover your outlay.

 

[219]

Her ladyship would disapprove ; I broke my 124 after it got written off on the drive and I got nagged rotten for it over the three or four months before I had the unwanted bits taken away ...

 

[poormansporsche]

You dont need to strip it - if its a wrong un - bung on ebay.de and our German cousins will be over quicker than a flash with a trailer

 

[grober]

My guess is that at £500 it has quite a list of things wrong with it. Nothing insurmountable on paper but locating affordable parts [ electronics] may be problematic now. Many have non operating Air Con. They are heavy cars so tend to knock out their suspensions/bushes etc . It may have air rear suspension--Is it LWB? quite a few smaller engined ones were-- carriage trade original owners. Don't know if the later ones were affected by the Jurgen Schremp era steel issues or not? As already stated a basically sound car will be worth that in parts alone but if you don't want that hassle ??

 

[219]

I’ve yet to see it , I’m fairly sure it is SWB . Don’t think it’s had many owners , I think the current owner has had it a while ; he has around half a dozen cars and works away a lot , hence they get little use .

My vague recollection was of a tidy car , but most of my time there , apart from picking up the 124 my pal bought ( which was a good car ) was looking at his pride & joy R107 which he took out of its carcoon to show us .

I am wary , but I know a little of the guy and that he does look after his cars , so cautiously optimistic.

I’ll decide fairly quickly whether I want it or not , without wasting his time or mine .

 

[Scott_F]

You dont need to strip it - if its a wrong un - bung on ebay.de and our German cousins will be over quicker than a flash with a trailer

Eastern Europeans will beat them to it.

 

[Deleted member 6183]

Ponto, why do you leave a space before your punctuation marks?

 

[219]

I had dismissed this car as her ladyship had forbidden me to get another car .

However, in the last few days , events have taken another turn .

My friend in The North , who has the 2.6 rear axle I was awaiting delivery of ( after the 2.6 differential I had bought turned out to be a duffer ) had asked what I wanted for the pair of genuine front wings I’d bought for my car , as his mum’s 190 was in need . I replied that I wouldn’t sell the wings on their own ( but being fed up waiting for delivery of said rear axle ) I said I would trade the whole car plus parts I had accumulated for a good 124/210/211 estate.

Then it came to pass that the W140 S320 was still available; on further enquiry , the vendor is the second owner , he bought it at 3 years old with only 10K , on it , the car has now covered only 44K ( not 54K as I was originally told ) and has FMBSH . It has apparently sat unused for about a year , only because the owner works away and has 6 or 7 other cars .

Long story short , my pal James now wants my 190 and is prepared to pay the asking price for this 140 .

I’m going to see the car within the next few nights, but can’t see that I’ll lose out ; and her ladyship is OK as long as the number of cars on the drive doesn’t increase .

To my mind a 190E with 160K and a duff diff , for a W140 with only 44K and reportedly nothing wrong sounds like a good deal ( subject to inspection and a run up the vendors driveway ) ...

Watch this space

 

[clk208]

I had dismissed this car as her ladyship had forbidden me to get another car .

However, in the last few days , events have taken another turn .

My friend in The North , who has the 2.6 rear axle I was awaiting delivery of ( after the 2.6 differential I had bought turned out to be a duffer ) had asked what I wanted for the pair of genuine front wings I’d bought for my car , as his mum’s 190 was in need . I replied that I wouldn’t sell the wings on their own ( but being fed up waiting for delivery of said rear axle ) I said I would trade the whole car plus parts I had accumulated for a good 124/210/211 estate.

Then it came to pass that the W140 S320 was still available; on further enquiry , the vendor is the second owner , he bought it at 3 years old with only 10K , on it , the car has now covered only 44K ( not 54K as I was originally told ) and has FMBSH . It has apparently sat unused for about a year , only because the owner works away and has 6 or 7 other cars .

Long story short , my pal James now wants my 190 and is prepared to pay the asking price for this 140 .

I’m going to see the car within the next few nights, but can’t see that I’ll lose out ; and her ladyship is OK as long as the number of cars on the drive doesn’t increase .

To my mind a 190E with 160K and a duff diff , for a W140 with only 44K and reportedly nothing wrong sounds like a good deal ( subject to inspection and a run up the vendors driveway ) ...

Watch this space

Sounds like a good deal.

Imposing car the W140 and love the double glazing.

 

[219]

Sounds like a good deal.

Imposing car the W140 and love the double glazing.

I’m thinking I can hardly lose out ; with summer on the wane , and time to do the rear axle swap before winter ( and expiry of the 190’s MOT in October drawing shorter ) getting another car which I can easily put on the road is an attractive proposition.

Besides , once the W140 has a new MOT , there could be a good chance of trading it for a reasonable E Class estate ; although the S Class does have a good sized boot , and with a towbar fitted I do still have my trailer ; and a 470L roof box !

 

[219]

Well , I went to see it last night , while I was out in the direction of Lanark , where it is located , still in the company of four other Mercs ( 2 MLs , an R107 and a C124 , also sharing space with an A4 estate , a Golf and a Mondeo ) the owner has also just bought a G Wagen , but like me , the lady of his house won't allow another car to appear till this one is gone .

Anyway , some of the information I got proved to be inaccurate , some spot on . I was first told the car had 53,000 miles , then last week 43,000 ; turns out it has actually done 73,000 , still not excessive for a 20 year old car , but it does have only two owners , current owner had it 10 years , and it does have full service history ( MB initially , then MB independent , last done last year and ) and a wad of receipts ; mechanically it is fine , starts and runs fine ( in as much as I could tell running it the couple of hundred yards down the drive to the lodge house at the entrance to the owner's property ( the owner is a charming but eccentric old gent , reminds me somewhat of David Attenborough's character in Jurassic Park , looks a bit like him too ) . The car has been off the road , but kept in a garage , just under a year , MOT expired Oct 18 , and last year it had both front coil springs and various brake pipes replaced following advisories from the last MOT ; it needs two front tyres although current ones look just about legal , as it happens I have two good tyres one size down which I'd got for my SL ( 225's as opposed to the 235's currently on the car ) which will do initially ; the interior is like new and , as far as I could tell , everything works , even the air con blows cold .

The worst things are four rusty wheel arches , especially the back ones , and a damaged passenger door mirror ( but I think these later ones are the same as W210 , so shouldn't be hard to find ) . I can get new pattern wings for £100 apiece and already found one genuine MB rear wheel arch repair section on eBay.de ; however I'd run the car for a bit without spending on it till I see where I am , so a set of cheap , black plastic wheel arch trims , around 20 Euro from eBay.de would hide the rusty arches till fixed properly , although a session with wire brush and can of hammerite should stop them getting any worse , and they're better than the arches on my 190 !

Anyway , after a bit of thought , I decided to go for it , it is still a lot of car for £500 , and my pal has agreed to buy my 190 for the same amount . If for any reason it doesn't work out I'm sure I'll get that back out of it .

Just need to get the 190 gone now .

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Looks great to these old eyes.

 

[MercedesDriver]

Love the colour and not being black. Congratulation, you got yourself a true bargain.

 

[219]

It's a cheap car , but I've seen a lot worse .

 

[219]

Love the colour and not being black. Congratulation, you got yourself a true bargain.

Ruby Red according to the VIN decoder .

 

[MercedesDriver]

View attachment 88233

Is it a Long version, on this photo it looks like it is?

 

[merc85]

Lovely!! It will be nice to see that turned around , that will clean up a treat

 

[gaz_l]

Looks like a lot of car for a monkey.

Cheers,

Gaz

 

[219]

Is it a Long version, on this photo it looks like it is?

I don't believe it is , but not sure .