Cosbysweater's '84 245 Lifted Diesel Wagon

[cosbySweater]

Well here we go again with another build thread...... I recently sold my turbo ls powered 244 to get a early wagon. I talked to my friends at sts machining and they had one. Ive always been a huge fan of the early scotia cars mainly because my first real car was a 1985 scotia wagon. So we settled on a deal and my girlfriend and I flew up and picked up the wagon. We drove it back to california just as the horrendous oregon wildfires were starting and it was a bit of an adventure. under the hood is just a stock b23f and a aw71 transmission. The engine feels pretty tired but it made it the whole way back. we had a tire blow out on grants pass but other then that. that was the only issue. So here are some pictures of it as it sits and i will update this with all the things that have happened so far and what is going to become of this beast!

When i picked it up



Where it sits as of today

[cosbySweater]

rsvd

[cosbySweater]

Engine\Trans

So for the engine and transmission I had a little bit of a change of heart, initially I pulled a 2jzge from a wrecked gs300, the engine was in really nice shape, i went through the whole engine and resealed everything, checked ring gaps and had the head decked. i installed the late model oil pump and timing belt gear and set the whole engine up to run on ms3, made a ls coil bracket adapter, made a cam sensor adapter, threw in some 75lb injectors i had laying around. put on a sheetmetal intake with a ls1 throttle body and a tubular manifold. I also got a gt35 based billet turbo for it with a t4 flange. I got a 4l80e adapter for it and everything pretty well sorted and ready to do the swap. then i thought about it for a long while and based on what the plans are for the car the 2jz just seemed to be less and less practical. Ill have to upload some pictures of the engine but needless to say its in the corner of my garage for the time being. maybe it will end up in another car but for now its put together and ready to either sell or keep.

I have always loved mercedes diesels so i started cruising craigslist and looking for a mercedes i could use as a drivetrain donor. In one weekend i managed to strike up conversations with 5 people and 3 of them were sold out from under me while i was on my way to get them and the others ended up ghosting me. So i ended up going on facebook marketplace and found a add for a w123 diesel for sale, noticed at the bottom of the add that the dude was including a 1999 e300td with the sale of the car. I contacted him and he told me the engine had a sticking valve in it but it ran. he ended up selling his w123 and the guy had no interest in the e300td. so i picked up the complete running (poorly) car for 200 bucks.







After towing it my buddy and i yanked the engine and transmission out in 30 minutes flat, lol. i had the junkyard next door come grab the carcass and because it had a full tank of diesel and a catalyst they gave me 100 bucks for the car. So for 100 bucks i had a om606 engine and trans! i was excited about it but it did run very very rough. So i took the manifolds off and leakdown tested it and found that the number 5cyl was junk. and boy was it ever junk. The number 5 injector prechamber burnt off and got eaten for lunch!























So yea.... this engine ended up being pretty hammered. made the best out of it though. i had a buddy of mine put 2 new valves in and we punched out the number five cylinder .020 over. im not super worried about it because it not going to be a race car, just a fun camping rig for me and the lady.

Also i made the decision to convert the engine to rear sump so i could slide it further back, i dont like hacking up oil pans. That ended up being a massive pain in the ass. The oil pan and pump setup off of a e320cdi are needed for that, i found a pan from a wrecking yard for 3 times as much as the engine (score). and i could not find a complete oil pump setup with pickup and relief tube. The relief tube is nla from the dealership but the pickup tube is still available. so what i did was source a oilpump, pickup tube and relief tube off of a m270 cdi in france and i ordered that. the relief tube is the same but the pickup is different. luckily the pickup tube was 40 bucks from the dealer. So it still ended up being pretty cost effective to piece it together and not pay the near 1000 diesel pump uk cost.

So the engine is going back together now and man there is very little information or forum help for fixing these things, seems most people just buy used engines and throw them in and when they brake they get replaced. however i like doing things the hard way

For the trans i got a 722.6x out of a big body amg car which is rated for around 700ftbs, i changed the bell housing and torque converter over from my diesel transmission and its near ready to mate to the engine.







So to avoid the prechamber debacle again i decided to pop test the injectors, it was more cost effective to do this myself so i bought a tester and set to work checking the injectors, sure enough the injector on number 5 was leaking like a sob. i took apart all the injectors and cleaned them and was able to get them all to pop and atomize properly.







my plan initially was to use a dsl1 standalone and the factory edc pump, the pump worked fine and i was about to order the standalone until i went to the junkyard and found a 1991 350sd that was wrecked, these are very desirable pumps, they are fully mechanical, they already have the boost reference and they also have the 6mm elements which is perfect for my end goal. so for the sake of simplicity i grabbed it. the guy at pick and pull had no idea what it was and i said it was a mechanical fuel pump off a old mercedes. sooooo 15 bucks later i have my superpump! i went through and cleaned everything so it will all go back together nicely.





i hacked the egr to intake flange off in favor of a straight pipe. i harvested everything i could from the junker car so im going to use as much factory mercedes parts as i can



keeping to my tradition of reduce, reuse, and recycle. I checked headbolt stretch. they fell within spec and are the oem mercedes ones so im going to reuse them.



also i didnt mention above, this thing had 441k on it and it still looks brand new on the inside. for piece of mind i had the one rod checked that had damage and it didnt seem to be twisted or anything

[cosbySweater]

Suspension

So for the suspension, i did all that work first. i wanted to make sure i liked the lifted volvo deal before i did anything else.



I ripped all the stock suspension out of the front of the car and went to town, i bought new control arms for it in the front and had them extended and did some light boxing. i put super pro bushings in it and made them greaseable. i extended the front arms the normal 2 inches, i had a fresh rebuilt zf rack that i used along with some 2000 ford focus inner tie rods which are about 3 inches longer, i trimmed them down and installed the rack and it fit and works perfectly. I also made adjustable endlinks for the car to keep the swaybar in its stock location. For shocks i used 740 bilstien tourings because they are about one inch longer, i extended the front tubes 2 inches so a one inch spacer was put in at the bottom of the strut. for the rear i used vanagon bilstien tourings. I got a set of brand new xj front springs for the rear and a new set of 240 diesel front springs from fcpeuro. for the rear i made the torque rods and panhard bar on car adjustable and made everything greaseable. i used johnny joints for the rear trailing arms and moved the axle back 3/4 of an inch. the wheels and tires are volvo geminis and im using general grabber 215/65r16s whish are 27 inches tall exactly. i went with the 16s because i didnt want the car to feel floaty on the road and it ended up working perfectly. the car drives like a bone stock 240 down the road. It has a bit of prerunner stance right now but i am going to address that once i get the engine and trans in to make sure it evens out!













stock vs lifted comparison

[cosbySweater]

rsvd...

[122power]

Looks sweet. What did you do for the lifted set up?

[Coupid]

that looks great! Can't wait to hear more about engine and suspension

[IansPlatinum]

[cosbySweater]

oops

[cosbySweater]

ooops

[Stiggy Pop]

for the trailing arms with the heim joint at the body, what are you using for a bushing at the axle?

[cosbySweater]

Originally Posted by Stiggy Pop

for the trailing arms with the heim joint at the body, what are you using for a bushing at the axle?

The stock tab was amazingly in one piece so I used powerflex poly inserts for now before I decide what I'm going to do with those bushings but as of now it feels good

[IansPlatinum]

Why not at least 1 Johnny joint on the torque rods?

Beautiful work otherwise. Straight 6s are sick

[cosbySweater]

Originally Posted by IansPlatinum

Why not at least 1 Johnny joint on the torque rods?

I wanted to do it on the cheap at first. I had the bushings already. But that is in the future for sure

[IansPlatinum]

Originally Posted by cosbySweater

I wanted to do it on the cheap at first. I had the bushings already. But that is in the future for sure

The amount of articulation available with longer shocks, rear sway bar delete, and some johnnys/heims is ungodly. Like way more than anyone driving a volvo would ever need. But still sick to have. This pic is with my limiting straps too. With 20" springs you can go without limit straps and then its just stupid how much droop & max articulation is available

[cosbySweater]

Haha that's amazing! I'm going to get the power train sorted and maybe I'll do a similar setup probably a bit milder. Looks amazing man! Sorry to see you got hit, I hope everything works out for you.

[2turbotoys]

I love it! What are the end goals? I never heard of a Benz TD into a Volvo and I feel I have been missing out lol, great idea!

[cosbySweater]

Originally Posted by 2turbotoys

I love it! What are the end goals? I never heard of a Benz TD into a Volvo and I feel I have been missing out lol, great idea!

Just basically mpgs and stockish power. It's just for camping trips and mild offroading. There is one om606 240 that I have seen, it's on youtube. The 606 is a fantastic engine and I look forward to driving the 240 with it. I'll probably pick up another to keep as a spare. While the engine is out I'm going to try and make some 2jz mounts as well since I have the engine already and why not!

[IansPlatinum]

Originally Posted by cosbySweater

Haha that's amazing! I'm going to get the power train sorted and maybe I'll do a similar setup probably a bit milder. Looks amazing man! Sorry to see you got hit, I hope everything works out for you.

I think you've already ruined your chances of going milder by extending your control arms and fabbing up a johnny joint trailing arm!

This thing's gonna be sweet. Love camping 240s

[cosbySweater]

Originally Posted by IansPlatinum

I think you've already ruined your chances of going milder by extending your control arms and fabbing up a johnny joint trailing arm!

This thing's gonna be sweet. Love camping 240s

Haha yea you're right about that! Right now it's so fun to drive. I need to do a lsd of some sort and really rip it before I do the swap. This thing is such a turd with the lift, tires, and tent haha

[IansPlatinum]

Originally Posted by cosbySweater

Haha yea you're right about that! Right now it's so fun to drive. I need to do a lsd of some sort and really rip it before I do the swap. This thing is such a turd with the lift, tires, and tent haha

How difficult will it be for you to deploy the tent?

I've always been a big fan of sleepin in the car, never tried the roof tents. I've discovered that if I deploy a tent it will definitely rain and be windy. Twin mattress fits perfectly in both thw 240 and the fzj80

[cosbySweater]

Originally Posted by IansPlatinum

How difficult will it be for you to deploy the tent?

I've always been a big fan of sleepin in the car, never tried the roof tents. I've discovered that if I deploy a tent it will definitely rain and be windy. Twin mattress fits perfectly in both thw 240 and the fzj80

its not to bad really, its a bigger 3 person tepui and with two people it takes maybe about 5 minutes to open and maybe about 10ish to close

[122power]

So when you gettin married?

[Stiggy Pop]

Funny I have a GS300 in my yard for the same reason, except at least you got to doing your motor mine is just sitting there. Did you have to change the pan/sump location to prep for the 240 swap?

[cosbySweater]

Originally Posted by Stiggy Pop

Funny I have a GS300 in my yard for the same reason, except at least you got to doing your motor mine is just sitting there. Did you have to change the pan/sump location to prep for the 240 swap?

front sump fits with a notch on the back of it, you can get the pan off a is300 and its a little easier to work with, may not even need as much of a notch. its not worth spending the money on a mid sump, you're still gonna have to hack up the k member to make it fit. use whatever you have imo