I’m back in the USA for an annual conference I attend. I normally have a free day before it starts, to get acclimatized to the time zone and to allow a buffer for flight delays. The conference is in Las Vegas, which has become really expensive. I’m not all that interested in spending money on overpriced entertainment, or gambling when I could...
I just got my 450SLC back from having the timing chain, tensioner, camshaft oiler tubes and valve stem seals replaced. These are all jobs that any owner of a Mercedes V8 of this era will need to undertake at some point. The primary driver behind this was the need to replace the valve stem seals. A couple of my sparkplugs, #1 in particular, would...
I’ve wanted to visit the Fox Collection in Melbourne for over 10 years. I used to have a job where I would commute to Melbourne twice a month but the opening hours never lined up with when I was there. This weekend I am traveling through Melbourne and happened to have the Saturday morning fee. I went along for the morning with my...
One of my favourite day trip drive near Sydney is the Oberon to Goulburn Drive. I’ve done this drive in both directions and its a great mix of different roads, plus limited traffic. I even incorporated this road in my recent trip to Melborne. I had also seen that the parallel road that goes south out of Bathurst was also paved in the last...
This month’s night drive was a bit different. Instead of meeting up and doing a drive for 60-90 minutes, we did a very short drive and then went to check out the club library. I’ve been a member of the Mercedes Club for between 10 and 15 years. I knew the club had a library, and I heard it was pretty good, but I...
The choice of radio for my 1965 Mercedes 250SE Cabriolet was not an easy one. I don’t know what radio the car had in it’s early years. It is a diplomat delivery car, that was picked up from the factory in Stuttgart. The original radio would have either been a slimline model, or perhaps a radio delete plate. At some point, some butcher...
My 250SE Cabriolet had a feature I was not aware of. Underneath the injection pump is an oil/coolant heat exchanger. This was also an option on late 230SLs. Instead of a separate cooler that the M130 engined cars have, the heat exchanger helps warm up the oil when the engine is cool and cool it down when the engine is hot. There...
by Nick Gruzevskis · Published March 12, 2024 · Last modified September 14, 2024
Editors Note: This is part three in a series by Nick Gruzevskis about owning a Modern Mercedes convertible – in this case his R170 SLK230. The first part can be found here and the second part here. There are times when you feel like you’re making progress on a classic car and other times it just feels like you’re procrastinating. As I have just...
On my trip to Victoria last last year, the alternator on my 560SEC packed in. I was able to limp the car home by swapping batteries with a friend in another W126. I also purchased another battery on the road. When I arrived back in Sydney, it was this new battery that was still in the car. I was just going to leave that...
Today I went to a cars and coffee event at Gough Whitlam Park. It was organized by Enthusiast Insurance. I had been invited by a friend, and assumed it was a regular cars and coffee event that they were sponsoring. I think it was more an event for their customers. I’m not an Enthusiast customer, but it didn’t seem to matter a...
I recently drove down to Canberra in my 1965 250SE. This was the first time I had taken the car on a longish trip in a couple of years. The main reason for that was the running issue had been experiencing with the car over the last few years. I finally solved this issue last year by fitting a new electronic distributor. On the...
I’ve known that the blower motor needed replacement on my 300TE since purchase. It didn’t like to work on low settings and would make pretty bad squeaking noises. The second to last owner had even planned on replacing it, but ran out of time before he sold the car. I had it on my list to do and ideally planned to do...
This months night drive fell on a leap day, September 29. The next time a leap day falls on a Thursday will be 2054, so it was a night not to be missed. The main part of the drive was to drive the back roads of southwest Sydney, starting with Mulgoa Road. Last year we had a drive that started from Krispy Kreme Penrith. ...
Editors Note: This is part two in a series by Nick Gruzevskis about owning a Modern Mercedes convertible – in this case his R170 SLK230. The first part can be found here. Sometimes the journey on improving a classic car seems to be more fulfilling than using the car. I’ve now owned the Sally the SLK since July 2022. Every time I looked at...
Today was the annual Wheels car show in Queanbeyan. This is one of the biggest multiple marque car show in the Canberra area and is akin to the Eastern Creek show in Sydney. I joined the Mercedes-Benz Club of the ACT as part of their display. MBCACT always puts on a special display for this show and Wheels 2024 was no different. The goal...
We started our 2024 night drive schedule with a drive south. This month’s drive was held a week earlier due to the holiday long weekend and the absurd double demerits regime in NSW. In the days before the drive, there had been torrential rain, but luckily the weather fined up on the day and it was just a bit overcast. The recent rain...
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