Author Topic: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration  (Read 7099 times)

CAsl

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Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« on: December 16, 2007, 20:16:10 »
Hi everyone,

Now that I'm finally finishing my education, I will slowly have the means to restore my 1969 280sl. My father crashed the front end in 1999 and has been sitting in the driveway since. I'm looking to complete a "street restoration" that won't cost me as much as buying another 280sl. Any suggestions as to any restoration shops in California or nearby states would be greatly appreciated. Thank you all!

Angelo
« Last Edit: January 09, 2009, 07:25:05 by CAsl »

seattle_Jerry

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #1 on: December 16, 2007, 20:44:47 »
Unless you find a used grill somewhere you already have: $3300 for the front grill, $1000 for the front nose, and $1000 for headlights.

If you strip the car yourself you can save some money. Figure just the repair will cost a minimum of $2000 (no parts included)

Now here is where I will get flamed...if after the repair you do all the prep yourself...it doesnt matter too much where you take it to get painted. All painting is, is applying a thickness of paint to metal. As long as a shop can do that with decent paint, that is all that matters.

The time and money is in prepping the car ( making sure it is straight and rust free) and rubbing it out after the paint process.

It doesn't matter if their paint job has some orange peel, because you are going to wet sand and buff the car afterwards.

If you do that, you can get a $1500 to $2000 paint job and make it look great. Or you can pay someone else the extra $5000 or way more in labor to do those steps for you.

I know there are some street racer shops in my area that do amazing paint jobs for reasonable prices ($25/hour) For them, a single color, non-metallic like yours would be a piece of cake. Shops like that are also always hungry for work.

Oh....don't lose the black plates!!!

1967 230SL Havana Brown Auto with A/C

shaf

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #2 on: December 17, 2007, 13:31:39 »
Hi, if you dont restore would you sell it

shaf

CAsl

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #3 on: December 17, 2007, 22:56:50 »
Jerry,

Thanks for your input. I know the body work itself will set me back a bit. BTW, I do plan on keeping those black plates :) If only I could find a black 280sl with California black plates :) that would be nice too

Shaf,
Thank you for your interest, but I am very intent on restoring the 280sl. It has by far the most sentimental value than the other cars I've owned.

Angelo

psmith

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #4 on: December 17, 2007, 23:50:33 »
Angelo,

The margins on these cars are not great so I think it would be hard to restore a car like yours to "make a buck".  But if you want take your time and restore it for yourself for sentimental reasons, I think it's a good candidate.  Which part of California are you in?

Pete S.

CAsl

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #5 on: December 18, 2007, 01:31:47 »
Hi Pete,

I don't plan on restoring the sl for investment purposes nor for making a buck; I just want to drive it again :) I'm located in San Diego now but the car is still in the San Francisco Bay Area. I would have it shipped wherever need be once I find a reputable shop. Know of any good restoration shops in California? Thanks!

Angelo

bsimaz

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #6 on: December 18, 2007, 16:19:10 »
Your front end looks a lot like mine did when I bought it.  Only not as bad.  I fixed mine as a daily driver for very little (compared to what a restoration would be) and I'm very happy with it.  I'll dig up my page and you can see the results.

Well worth it,  especally putting your own time into it.


Bill Simaz
'66 230sl
Back on the Road

bsimaz

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #7 on: December 19, 2007, 10:51:20 »
CAsl,   Found my blog site.  http://bill230sl.blogspot.com/

As you can see I started with worse but it ended up nice.  As long as you're not restoring  to 'mint' condition it should be a fairly easy job.

Bill Simaz
'66 230sl
Back on the Road

Peter van Es

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #8 on: December 19, 2007, 11:36:20 »
Hey Bill, these fender chrome lips... I've never seen those on a Pagoda before (I have on a R107). Are these original ?

Peter


1970 280SL. Also known as 'admin@sl113.org' and organiser of the Technical Manual.
1970 280SL. System Admin of the site. Please do not mail or PM me questions on Pagoda's... I'm not likely to know the answer.  Please post on the forum instead!

Naj ✝︎

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #9 on: December 19, 2007, 13:41:54 »
quote:
Originally posted by vanesp

Hey Bill, these fender chrome lips... I've never seen those on a Pagoda before (I have on a R107). Are these original ?

Peter


1970 280SL. Also known as 'admin@sl113.org' and organiser of the Technical Manual.



another lippy one:

http://www.justinbanks.com/14-Exterior.html

naj

68 280SL
68 280SL

Peter van Es

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #10 on: December 19, 2007, 16:18:49 »
I looked for the Option Codes for it, in http://www.sl113.org/wiki/pmwiki.php?n=DataCard.OptionCodes and couldn't find it. What is the option code for it then ?

Peter

1970 280SL. Also known as 'admin@sl113.org' and organiser of the Technical Manual.
1970 280SL. System Admin of the site. Please do not mail or PM me questions on Pagoda's... I'm not likely to know the answer.  Please post on the forum instead!

thelews

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #11 on: December 19, 2007, 17:51:57 »
quote:
Originally posted by vanesp

I looked for the Option Codes for it, in http://www.sl113.org/wiki/pmwiki.php?n=DataCard.OptionCodes and couldn't find it. What is the option code for it then ?




I'm quite certain it's aftermarket bling.

John Lewenauer
1967 Early 250 SL Red/Caviar, Manual
Enjoy some pictures at this link:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8292359@N06/sets/72157603240571101/show/

John - Wisconsin
1967 Early 250 SL Red/Caviar, Manual #1543
1961 190 SL 23K miles
1964 Porsche 356
1970 Porsche 911E
1991 BMW 318is
1966 Jaguar XKE
1971 Alfa Romeo GTV 1750

bsimaz

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #12 on: December 20, 2007, 09:14:14 »
It's definatly an after market thing.  I was planning on removing them when I got the car.   They were installed when I bought it.  But my body shop guy didn't finish around the wheel well as nice as the rest of the car so I kept them.   It's fine because my car is just a driver and I was going the (fairly) cheap route.  I'm still extreemly satisfied with it.

I've seen them in catalogs for Mercedes stuff though.

Bill Simaz
'66 230sl
Back on the Road

68_white

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #13 on: December 23, 2007, 21:24:02 »
I would hate to see the other car that your SL hit. Totaled??

HARRY

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HARRY

1970 280SL RED
2002 E430 SILVER
1996 911 BLUE

Jonny B

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Re: Help! My 280sl in need of restoration
« Reply #14 on: December 29, 2007, 12:38:00 »
You might contact Silver Star Mercedes in San Marcos. He has a lot of 113's.I don't know what or if he does restoration work, but it might give a starting point to someone in the area that does.

Jonny B
1967 250SL Auto
Jonny B
1967 250 SL Auto, DB 568
1970 280 SL Auto, DB 904
1966 Morris Mini Minor