dolucasi

Finally I'm done with restoring my original '89 5-sp. Been at it for 7 years now. It pretty much drives and feels like it did 35 years ago.

I decided to rescue another 5-sp 2.6L that would have most likely fallen into the wrong hands.

This one is a 1988 pre-facelift. Someone in Portand/Oregon must have special ordered this one as it is a unique impala brown paint and dark brown leather interior.
5-speeds were very rarely imported to the US. The original owner used it a lot in the first 10 years. Over 100Kmiles quickly. Long story short, the car was sold and brought to SF-CA around year 2000.
Used some and then sat for 10 years until someone brought it back to life. Currently has ~180K miles. Speedo started the slow down already at 178K miles. Only turns when it is cold. More about how to restore a non functioning speedometer in a separate thread.

Needs a lot of TLC but no rust and minimal sun damage due to its location(s). Body is in pretty good shape. Some oxidation at the electrical connectors but not bad at all.
Many things to fix but I have a cabinet full of spare parts, so it will just take time. Started flushing the fluids already.

The muffler was swapped to a noisy aftermarket one. That one is about to be changed out with my spare muffler and an Ansa resonator I just purchased.
The tires were oversized in radius and were slightly rubbing on the passenger side. Sportline rims were swapped in, I moved those to the red car which has a pushed out fender, so no rubbing there.

The impala brown will be restored to its original condition and looks. It already has the original 15 hole gully's now. I will not go aftermarket EURO headlights either. I think I sort of like the pre-facelift look on this car.

Here are some photo's.

190Efan

Great set of W201 bookends! It's cool that you now have both a pre-facelift and a post facelift. That is an unusual color combination on the pre-facelift one. It would be really interesting to know which color combinations are the rarest compared to which are the most common for the W201, Your new to you pre-facelift W201 must have a guardian angel somewhere for it to have fallen into your good hands rather than the beater life and eventual junkyard. The red one looks good and no doubt you'll have the brown one back to its former glory in no time. BTW, it looks like the pre-facelift one does have the post facelift headlights. The pre-facelift one will be a good candidate to eventually show at Legends of the Autobahn once it's back to its former glory.

dolucasi

I wonder when the frame for the headlight change happened. It is possible that the switch pre-dates this car.
The pre-facelift styling makes is feel more like a late 70's early 80's car. A bit more classic. Never thought I would like it, but here we are...

The more rare dark brown interior is going to make it more difficult to source plastic parts. A few years back I found a palomino interior car with a center console carpet in dark brown at the junk yard.
It was in excellent shape but I do not know why it was there or why I even took it, did not even fit my red car. This brown one had its completely damaged due to a phone installation. Now that is restored. Kismet .......

The door cards and front headliner need a little gluing but otherwise in great shape. Maybe even better than my palomino interior. What is missing is the broken sun visors. They are OK but the hinge plastic is broken on both sides so they do not stay up. I will either have to make them black or wait for something to show up on ebay. That may take years.

- Cheers!

190Efan

The headlights changed in 1989 as part of the facelift. I originally had a pre-facelift 1986 W201 and the headlights on your pre-facelift 1988 aren't the same as my 1986. Your 1988 car has the post facelift headlights. It might be a good idea to check with the MB Classic Center to be sure but that's how I remember it. It's remarkable that you bought the brown interior those years ago that now matches the car you're restoring. Try Adsitco to see if they might have the sun visors.