Merxus Benz
New Member
It always starts off innocently enough, Brought a cheap merc with a blown engine off ebay with the idea of fitting in a replacement engine and flogging it off again for a nice profit.
Then my partner sees it and decides its alot trendier than my 2001 toyota Avalon. (She works in fashion, mercedes sounds better in discussions) I've owned fast E30 beemers, A worked S2 rx-7 among others before doing the house thing.
So if im replacing the engine, i need a more powerful one. In Victoria, Australia, you're not allowed to fit an engine older than the car itself unless its on LPG (and then it still needs to pass emissions checks) So looking at the merc v8 from the sl500 which is around Au$5,500 for a front cut. The sl500 uses the w124 chassis but with a modified larger trans tunnel. So i went for a 1991 52,000km (Seems to be genuine mileage did check) ls400 (celsior) front cut for Au$2,200. :silly:
That was the easy part. Started pulling the merc apart inbetween working long hours and keeping the relationship alive. (they lose interest if you dont see them for a month for some reason) Pulling the ls400 apart i found that even though toyota pulled several german makes apart to build the lexus, they ignored most everything and built cars like the japanese do. That means nothing is compatible and alot of stuff is on the wrong side of where i need it to be. :eek5:
Im pulling out all of the mercedes bits behind the dash and using the toyota incl. the climate control. It will still look like a merc inside, i will use the same controls and switches hooked into the toyota loom and wire in the dash instruments. I need to change the speedo over from manual to electric operation but thats fine as i want it to read higher that 220km/h i have photos but have missplaced the card reader so will update soon.
Then my partner sees it and decides its alot trendier than my 2001 toyota Avalon. (She works in fashion, mercedes sounds better in discussions) I've owned fast E30 beemers, A worked S2 rx-7 among others before doing the house thing.
So if im replacing the engine, i need a more powerful one. In Victoria, Australia, you're not allowed to fit an engine older than the car itself unless its on LPG (and then it still needs to pass emissions checks) So looking at the merc v8 from the sl500 which is around Au$5,500 for a front cut. The sl500 uses the w124 chassis but with a modified larger trans tunnel. So i went for a 1991 52,000km (Seems to be genuine mileage did check) ls400 (celsior) front cut for Au$2,200. :silly:
That was the easy part. Started pulling the merc apart inbetween working long hours and keeping the relationship alive. (they lose interest if you dont see them for a month for some reason) Pulling the ls400 apart i found that even though toyota pulled several german makes apart to build the lexus, they ignored most everything and built cars like the japanese do. That means nothing is compatible and alot of stuff is on the wrong side of where i need it to be. :eek5:
Im pulling out all of the mercedes bits behind the dash and using the toyota incl. the climate control. It will still look like a merc inside, i will use the same controls and switches hooked into the toyota loom and wire in the dash instruments. I need to change the speedo over from manual to electric operation but thats fine as i want it to read higher that 220km/h i have photos but have missplaced the card reader so will update soon.
