1999 Mercedes CLK - Back in one piece + new wheels

[rr69h]

Hello!

Thank you for your kind words.

As I'm spending the sunny weekend in the office there's not much to report in terms of progress. So I thought it would be sensible to compile a list of things wrong with the car. This will serve me well as a reminder of what needs to be done and give you a pretty good idea of what you'll get yourself into if you consider getting one of these on the cheap. But first, let's answer your comments and questions:

Ride height on the rear looks so much better, really makes the car look more purposeful than broken as you said. Good call.

Interesting about those drain holes, that's some poor design right there. And that's coming from someone who had a MK1 Eunos so I know all about clogged drain holes and rust..how much did that plate cost you? It's a nice little addition. Looks smart.

Yeah, I think so, too. Plus I've noticed that one of the rear tires is unevenly worn. The new setup will probably get the alignment nearer to what it should be for the moment, but it has to be checked anyway. As for the plate frame: it was about the same price as a box of fags so I got lucky there.

That pollen filter seems to be a common theme, seems they never get replaced even though that's the air you're always breathing...

Great work.

Thanks again! I too have no idea why people don't seem to mind driving around with next to no airflow into the cabin. The filter is relatively cheap and changing it only takes a screwdriver and five minutes of faffing.

Nice work I like these cars and it's another one on my list to own at some point

I'd say do it. These cars are currently on the brink of extinction and it's a good time to get a peach for relatively low money or a slightly rough one like mine for surprisingly little cash. I think in a few years time examples like mine will all be broken for parts which makes finding one much harder. But be warned that these cars do feel very modern, but are in need of old-car levels of TLC. At least that's my experience.

To shed a bit more light on that thought here's my to-do list for the CLK in no particular order:

Mechanicals
- fine-adjust the gas pedal linkage / electric motor for better pedal feel. It's currently way too sensitive.
- fix two small oil leaks on the engine
- check timing chain tension
- do another oil change after 1000 miles since I could see a bit of crud inside the oil filler neck on first inspection
- find out if the fluid on the front of the gearbox means something serious (already cleaned that off, let's see if it returns...)
- Slap on new brakes before winter. There's much meat still left, but one disc is juddering
- Check all crank case breathers for carbon buildup
- See if I can find a bit of extra smoothness on the engine idle. These engines should run virtually vibration-free. Mine isn't as smooth as it should be.
- Fix one exhaust bracket
- Find the reason I can't move the gear lever into the manual gate. The gearbox is fine, the previous owner reported of hearing a bit of plastic shatter in the centre console.
- Recharge the A/C-system and get rid of the wet-dog-smell every time you turn off the A/C

Electrical
- find out why the car indicates a blown bulb every time I switch on the main beams. All bulbs work as they should. The light switch is the most likely culprit.
- have the 2nd key to the car fixed and maybe have the ignition lock restored / resoldered. These are reported to fail on high-mileage cars.
- fix one broken bulb in the instrument cluster
- find out why the sunroof loses its memory from time to time and has to be retrained to properly open/close in one continuous motion instead of just moving 2 inches at a time
- polish the headlight lenses for better visibility

Body
- Clay, compound and polish the whole thing: I just can't stand how scratched and unloved it looks!
- Remove rust from the tailgate
- Remove rust from the rear arches
- Remove first hints of rust from the driver's side sill
- Remove rust from the passenger door
- Remove rust from the passenger side front wing
- Replace the front wing on the driver's side since it's probably too far gone
- Remove rust from the bonnet
- Get rid of the dampness inside the driver's side indicator on the wing
- Repair crack in the front bumper or replace it alltogether
- Leave lots of €€€ at the painter's
- Replace all seals on the driver's side window. These have shrunken badly and have started causing wind noises after I adjusted the window
- Take the driver's side door apart and find out what the mechanic who was in there before me left unbolted. The door makes noises untypical for a Mercedes on closing. Namely: rattling.
- Find out why there's a draft from the lower driver's door when the sunroof is open. The seal looks fine and is correctly in place so I'm a bit baffled as it stands.
- Replace sunroof seal and fine-adjust the mechanism for less wind noise
- Service and lubricate windscreen wiper mechanism
- Polish driver's side window and windshield to get rid of all those fine scratches
- Repaint exhaust tip

Interior
- Give it all a blöödy good clean
- Restore the leather to good health. It has been conditioned regularly so it's nice and soft. It just looks unloved.
- Restore pneumatic bolsters in the driver's seat since it's much slower in operation than the passenger side
- Replace one seat adjusting leaver since it's just gone AWOL
- Repair two rips in the plastics (one on the glove box and one on the centre console)
- Replace speaker grille on the passenger side door
- Replace driver's side door card (it's just shaggered)
- Replace broken cover on one vanity miror
- Polish all interior wood parts
- Get rid of a pretty intense air freshener smell
- Repair cupholer for the rear seats
- Replace cup holder for the front seats (half of it is missing)

Goodies and gadgets
- Find and install an original COMAND 2.0 navigation unit. I'm currently negotiating the price for a reconditioned one. These things were painfully expensive when new.
- Find and install the wheels I want. I've settled on these which were a factory option back in the day:




- Find and install an original auto-dipping rear view mirror with a yellow illumination-LED. DONE! I'm yet to figure out how I can take a picture of its effect for you. It bathes the whole interior in a warm, amber light at night. Already love this feature.
- Install an original PDC-system. The CLK is really hard to see out of and park. Especially after the trip to the painter's I don't want to immediately scuff up the bumpers!
- Find and install collapsible outside mirrors
- Find and install a switch panel including the one missing switch compared to mine: the switch for the alarm system. I just like the look of a switch panel with no blanks.

Phew. It's quite a list already and I feel like I've missed a few things, too. But fixing a car like this is more than half the fun!

Cheers,
Felix

[rr69h]

I've had the day off

so I could dive into something I've never done before: restoring polycarbonate headlight lenses. As it's often the case my headlights were looking battered and yellow-ish, a clear sign that the protective UV-coating had failed. Besides this being a potential fail on the TÜV inspection it significally dims down the headlights so something had to be done. One new headlight is as much as I've paid for the whole car so after a bit of research I've decided on a DIY-approach, particularly on Larry Kosilla's train of thought:


This is what I started with:


Up closely you can see what's left of the original coating. These things were crystal clear when new:


So. Now comes the scary part of "you have to make it look worse before you can make it look better" every pro detailer tells you about when it comes to sanding work. This is during the first dry sanding with 600 grid or the "On my God, what have I done?!?"-phase:


As recommended I've used horizontal motions only during this phase. This got rid of all the grainy yellow stuff. Next was 1000 grid wet in vertical motion:


I must say this is quite a clever trick. Once you can't see any horizontal marks anymore you know you've leveled the surface perfectly. After that I had another go with 1500 grit wet (back to horizontal motion) to make the final polish a little easier. The surface area of my headlights is quite small so it's not that easy getting the DA polisher to work properly.

The two-stage machine polish took quite some time since the heat on the surface builds up incredibly fast. Do a minute of polishing, wait for the surface to cool down and repeat. But gradually the shine returned and I ended up with this:


It does look MUCH better, but only during the final phases of polishing I noticed that here and there I haven't sanded the lenses down enough during the first phase. So I'll revisit these somewhere in the near future. I've had just enough time to give the bonnet a quick once-over. It's now a tad darker than the wings which is a bit tricky to photograph, so just imagine me standing there seeing the effect in the flash saying lots of "uhh"s and "ahh"s.


And this is where we stand. The rest of the car needs a polish desperately so this will be up next. Unless I get side tracked by the original COMAND navigation headunit which just arrived in the mail...

[Geordie]

Nice work on the headlights. It's little improvements like this that take a car to the next level. Excellent.

[rr69h]

Thanks!

On closer inspection I can still see sanding marks so I'll revisit this soon. In other news: I think I've scrambled together everything I need for the COMAND installation. As I'm planning to add an AUX-cable to the unit which should end somewhere in the armrest storage I will need to blow basically half of the interior apart. A great opportunity to get this really clean and polish the woodwork.

Felix

[rr69h]

So the CLK went into hibernation.

Us Germans are able to equip our cars with seasonal plates: saves you the hassle of registering / unregistering your summer car or winter hack as the year goes on. The CLK is only on the road from November to April so now we're about to start on the bodywork and get it all done so it's ready when winter comes. But before I locked it into the shed this happened:


I now have polished as-new wood and a working COMAND headunit with satnav. A five grand option back in the day. Full report to follow!

Felix

[rr69h]

News from the shed.

Tackling the rust on your project car rarely goes as quickly as you want and often enough uncovers hidden horrors. Compared to some of your projects mine was a piece of cake, but it gave me so much more respect for all of you out there welding panels and prepping whole cars for paint!

My adventure started with bubbly areas everywhere.

Front wing, a-pillar:


Rear arch:


The classic - the area around the boot lock:


There were numerous areas around the car looking like this boot lid corner:


As this rust isn't as structurally bad as it might appear I decided to tackle it myself. So out with the grinder to see what's what. This is after the first tickle just to show the extent of the rot. It really isn't that bad:


Although a small piece of the rear sill and this bumper bracket will need some welding:


I've removed the rust mechanically, then chemically and finally treated each and every area of clean metal with a product called Oxyblock. It's supposed to get into the final pores of rust and you can paint over it. After that I've added high build primer and a bit or filler wherever necessary. This is one front wing a-pillar-attachment done:


While I was at it I've repaired the front bumper, too. It had some minor accident damage which was quickly dealt with:


The bumper was looking like it had been sandblasted anyway so I've decided to repaint it completely:


Then came the big day of masking and prepping everything for paint. Note that I've never sprayed metallic before, I see all of this as a learning curve.

Here's the car all masked up showing my first error. I should have made the areas to respray much larger to make it easier to feather in the metallic base coat:


But hey, you live and learn!

As for the results. I'm totally aware that the colour-match isn't perfect from every angle and that I still need to sand down the clear coat and polish the whole thing up. But I'm happy with what I see so far.

The once broken bumper now looks a little like this:




And this is the color-match on the rear arch you've seen in the masking-pic above:


And when I compare the before...


...to the after...


...I'm a happy bunny. It doesn't look completely horrid and it's comforting to know that all the rust really is gone instead of being hidden underneath tons of filler. Well worth the effort.

Up next: BETTER PICTURES!!!! and turning this table for car parts back into a car:


Phew!

[rr69h]

Quick update.

The bumper is back together and bolted to the car:


The CLK now has a face again!

[rr69h]

Many many late nights and weekends resulted in the car finally being back in one piece.

The solitude of being alone in the shed saw the CLK looking like this at the end of October:


I've finished the car just in time before heading off onto a little road trip with the S-class (thread update to follow) and arrived back home only two days ago. Which meant two things:
1. It's November! The CLK's seasonal plates now allow me to actually drive the car!
2. Whoa, this car needs a deep clean desperately.

This was the outcome:







So what do we see here?
- the bodytrims are now in matching colour to the body
- I've added some very fine chrome strips to them
- as for the wheels: these are original Mercedes 17" alloys from a newer C-class. They are approved by Mercedes to use on the CLK, too, so no TÜV-related hassles here
- the driver's side got a tickle with the da-polisher and is now shiny, the passenger side is still on the to-do-list.

The paint turned out ok-ish, definetely nice enough for the winter beater. The car now feels totally transformed to me and dare I say... even a bit pretty? It now makes me smile everytime I see it which is definetely a good sign.

[rr69h]

So here's an update to the to-do-list:

Mechanicals
- fine-adjust the gas pedal linkage / electric motor for better pedal feel. It's currently way too sensitive.
- fix two small oil leaks on the engine Done. This was just a bit of spill.
- check timing chain tension
- do another oil change after 1000 miles since I could see a bit of crud inside the oil filler neck on first inspection Done is the crud.
- find out if the fluid on the front of the gearbox means something serious (already cleaned that off, let's see if it returns...)
- Slap on new brakes before winter. There's much meat still left, but one disc is juddering
- Check all crank case breathers for carbon buildup
- See if I can find a bit of extra smoothness on the engine idle. These engines should run virtually vibration-free. Mine isn't as smooth as it should be.
- Fix one exhaust bracket Done. Tightening up two bolts was easy enough and free, too!
- Find the reason I can't move the gear lever into the manual gate. The gearbox is fine, the previous owner reported of hearing a bit of plastic shatter in the centre console.
- Recharge the A/C-system and get rid of the wet-dog-smell every time you turn off the A/C
- Full alignment

Electrical
- find out why the car indicates a blown bulb every time I switch on the main beams. All bulbs work as they should. The light switch is the most likely culprit.
- have the 2nd key to the car fixed and maybe have the ignition lock restored / resoldered. These are reported to fail on high-mileage cars.
- fix one broken bulb in the instrument cluster
- find out why the sunroof loses its memory from time to time and has to be retrained to properly open/close in one continuous motion instead of just moving 2 inches at a time Done. I suspect this had something to do with the battery not being fighting-fit. I've had to replace it and it now seems fine.
- polish the headlight lenses for better visibility

Body
- Clay, compound and polish the whole thing: I just can't stand how scratched and unloved it looks!
- Remove rust from the tailgate
- Remove rust from the rear arches
- Remove first hints of rust from the driver's side sill
- Remove rust from the passenger door
- Remove rust from the passenger side front wing
- Replace the front wing on the driver's side since it's probably too far gone
- Remove rust from the bonnet
- Get rid of the dampness inside the driver's side indicator on the wing
- Repair crack in the front bumper or replace it alltogether Phew. And that wing was indeed salvageable.
- Leave lots of €€€ at the painter's Did this myself, turned out good enough.
- Replace all seals on the driver's side window. These have shrunken badly and have started causing wind noises after I adjusted the window
- Take the driver's side door apart and find out what the mechanic who was in there before me left unbolted. The door makes noises untypical for a Mercedes on closing. Namely: rattling.
- Find out why there's a draft from the lower driver's door when the sunroof is open. The seal looks fine and is correctly in place so I'm a bit baffled as it stands.
- Replace sunroof seal and fine-adjust the mechanism for less wind noise
- Service and lubricate windscreen wiper mechanism Done.
- Polish driver's side window and windshield to get rid of all those fine scratches
- Repaint exhaust tip Done.

Interior
- Give it all a blöödy good clean Done.
- Restore the leather to good health. It has been conditioned regularly so it's nice and soft. It just looks unloved.
- Restore pneumatic bolsters in the driver's seat since it's much slower in operation than the passenger side
- Replace one seat adjusting leaver since it's just gone AWOL
- Repair two rips in the plastics (one on the glove box and one on the centre console)
- Replace speaker grille on the passenger side door
- Replace driver's side door card (it's just shaggered)
- Replace broken cover on one vanity mirror
- Polish all interior wood parts Done.
- Get rid of a pretty intense air freshener smell
- Repair cupholer for the rear seats
- Replace cup holder for the front seats (half of it is missing) Done. Got a used working replacement.

Goodies and gadgets
- Find and install an original COMAND 2.0 navigation unit. I'm currently negotiating the price for a reconditioned one. These things were painfully expensive when new. Done.
- Find and install the wheels I want. Done.
- Find and install an original auto-dipping rear view mirror with a yellow illumination-LED. DONE! I'm yet to figure out how I can take a picture of its effect for you. It bathes the whole interior in a warm, amber light at night. Already love this feature.
- Install an original PDC-system. The CLK is really hard to see out of and park. Especially after the trip to the painter's I don't want to immediately scuff up the bumpers!
- Find and install collapsible outside mirrors
- Find and install a switch panel including the one missing switch compared to mine: the switch for the alarm system. I just like the look of a switch panel with no blanks.

[cjp1800]

That is quite some transformation.

[Woofwoof]

It looks great. The body colour and the wheels really suit the CLK.

[rr69h]

Thank you!

Next up: a cupholder. The most overengineered part of the whole car...

[Woofwoof]

Yes, the M-B cup holder on the W202 is the same.

As for polishing the glass if you haven't tried it use super fine 0000 wire wool first, well worth the effort, then polish the glass.

[rr69h]

Nov 7, 2017 12:55:02 GMT Woofwoof said:

Yes, the M-B cup holder on the W202 is the same.

As for polishing the glass if you haven't tried it use super fine 0000 wire wool first, well worth the effort, then polish the glass.

Thanks for the tip!

[rr69h]

Happy new year everybody!

It has become some sort of a regular feature to spend Christmas halfway between the kitchen and the garage. Us Germans celebrate Dec. 24th in the evening and with the roast in the oven I had almost a full day of play-time.

One thing that annoyed me to no end was that the car told me about a blown lightbulb every time I switched on the main beams. Now this can mean three things:
1. A bulb really is blown. Check your car's frontend and see if that's the case wearing a . With Mercedeses from this era it rarely is.
2. Something's amiss with the bulbs installed. Wrong output? Or corrosion in one of the electrical joints? An earth-problem perhaps? My wiring checked out fine, so no... no solution here either.

OR!!!!!

3. Your light switch module has had it. With Mercedeses from this era... it's a common weak point.

So this happened:


...resulting in this:


We now see no indicated faults and a funny coincidental mileage-shot (keep in mind these are kilometres, though). Hooray!

If any W210 or CLK-owner reads this: the early cars had a light switch module with the part number A 2105450104. This thing is prone to indicate false warnings about blown bulbs which is why Mercedes started to replace these with an updated version (part no. A 2105451404). On the second hand market the newer switch is often marketed as fitting only later cars, but it's a direct swap.

Other than that there's not much to report. The car performs very well, so I gave it a wash and proceeded to the Christmas diner.

[sprouting]

Always enjoy your threads, thanks for sharing. Do you still have the older mercedes I seem to remember reading threads on from yourself.

[sprouting]

Nevermind, I've just read the w126 update.

[rr69h]

Didn't I just say that everything was working?

Well, the car recently told me to check my...


...which is the lovely sounding German word for washer fluid. Since I had just topped this up a couple of days ago something must have played up.

Joy oh joy:



One headlight washer nozzle has started leaking. I've temporary disconnected its water line and blocked it while I'm hunting down a used part. These are specific to the CLK and not shared with other models, so it might take some time until something comes up at a sensible price.

It still baffles me that a car looking and feeling so 'modern' requires old-car levels of TLC. Well... when I think about it: it's 19 years old. When did that happen?!?

[rr69h]

Today's update concerns some little things and a few bigger ones.

Let's start off with the proper stuff: putting back steel where now is air. Luckily the car only had two rust spots, both in the left rear wheel tub. Once I took the splash guard off, this is what we saw:


This used to be the rear sill back in 1999 and the keen eyed viewer might be wondering where it might have gone.

Then we turned around and introduced the rust to Mr. Grinder:



Both of these were quickly fixed with the sill now looking more complete:


After that I've removed all the lose rust, treated the bare metal to some Branto Korrux and called it a day. I'll soon repaint both sills since they look a bit manky which should mark the end of all rust related problems. Hooray!

Now here things get a bit silly. I belong to the special group of people who actually spend time thinking about door pins. This one exactly:


I don't know if I was dropped on my head when I was little. Or if it were the countless Mercedes brochures I flicked through when I was a kid (and couldn't even read!). I see something like this door pin and immediately start to wonder what the reason behind its original design was and if changing it really is an improvement.
To think that if I do forget to lock the car every car thief in the world could see it from miles away was enough reason to change it back to stock. I know, I know. I'm strange. And while I was at it I've also replaced the broken speaker grille...


...which resulted in this lovely view:


Ha. Miles better.

The madness then extended to the side indicators. After giving them a stern look they still looked naff so they had to be changed. Any sane person would have done the same right? RIGHT?


Small improvements, sure. But I feel they do add up to a noticeable difference. To me at least.

Other than that I've just ordered a few consumables which will keep me entertained on Saturday. The front brakes, engine mounts and propshaft flex discs all need a bit of tlc. There's also an oil leak at the oil filter housing (a common weak spot on the M112 engines) which will need looking at. That job requires a 46mm socket though. I've just ordered one which marks an interesting tipping-point: I now have spent exactly what I've paid for the car on spares. And there's still lots to be done, for example this:


We are looking at the secret diagnostics menu for the a/c which just told me that the compressor is borked. Or indeed the clutch: the error code just says that the compressor cannot be engaged. Oh joy...

Felix

[astranaut]

A friend of mine bought one of these complete with AMG 18" Monoblocks for 400 2 years ago, lovely motor to be a passenger in but never drove it. He removed the wheels and sold it for the same amount a few weeks ago. Went to the local Scrapyard yesterday and guess what was sat in there... he was bit gutted when I showed him. Shame really, a lot of car for the money.




Lovely job you've done on yours, it really doesn't look as old as it Is, and you cannot beat pillarless doors. Shame Mercedes skimped so much on the steel/rust protection.