5,920 miles '12 C300 4M Sport Build
 

Hello everyone,

I had been looking for a 2012 C300 4MATIC Sport with the M272 engine for over a year and finally found one in October 2018. I bought it from an auction in the US as it was involved in a front right accident, but the car is pretty much brand new with only 5,920 miles on it as confirmed by Carfax, MBUSA, and the dealership where it was serviced (New Jersey).

The car arrived in Lebanon last week and I took delivery of it last night. I plan on repairing it and owning it long-term so I will document everything in this thread for those interested. Your advise, tips, comments, and questions are more than welcomed.

I would also like to know if there is another W204 in the world with less mileage than my car. I'm very curious about this because this is the lowest mileage car I ever own.

Thank you.

Delivery last night

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Day 1 - Quick Inspection this morning
We did a quick inspection this morning since the body shop owner was busy with other cars. The real work starts tomorrow morning at 8 AM.
My findings so far:

• The interior is in immaculate shape. Straight from the factory.
• The battery needs to be charged or is bad and needs replacement because the COMAND shut down on me suddenly and the panoramic roof was having trouble closing despite resetting it twice. It opens fine, but does not close well right away.
• It seems the right fender can be saved and repaired, but the hood and the front bumper (came in the trunk) might need replacement. More on that tomorrow.
• I will definitely remove the left-side headlight and sell it because my plan is to get a DEPO+Xenon setup in the front.
• I will also sell the grille and emblem because I want to install the SL single slat sport grille.
• We ran the engine and it's so silent and smooth. I plan on changing the engine oil and filter as soon as possible to MB229.5 Valvoline SuperSyn 5W-40.

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congrats, cant wait to see the outcome of your repairs.
I love my 12. I know you will enjoy yours for many years to come.

Will be cool to see how this progresses!

change the brake fluid too. It breaks down as a function of time, not mileage.

Thank you. Definitely looking forward to enjoying it for years to come since it's practically brand new and basically 4 years old per say because it looks the same as a 2014 model. Updates from today will be posted in 30 minutes.

Thanks. Updates from today will be posted in 30 minutes.

Will do. It's on my list. Thank you.

Day 2 - Tear Down and Purchase of Parts
This morning, the body shop crew started tearing down all the damaged parts so that we can inspect everything and generate a parts list.

The part list from today can be found below:

• Front bumper cover
• Crash bar
• Airbag sensor & plug
• LED fog light plug
• Fender
• Fender liner
• Fender liner pins
• Shock abosrber strut
• Inner tie rod
• Xenon headlights
• Headlight frame
• Bumper rail
• Sport Grille

I spent a good 4 hours getting quotes from different shops before settling on one. The total came out to be $1,150. The Xenon headlights ($600) are not the original ones because those would have cost me $1,500 alone in parts, labour, and retrofit, but I went with a good chinese brand (better than DEPO) with a 2-year warranty. Since I bought all the parts from the same supplier, he was super friendly and nice and offered a no-question warranty on everything so I feel very comfortable dealing with him. He said if I don't like the headlights after I install them, I can return them and get my money back, but he showed me that he has the same ones installed on his C63.

While sourcing the parts, the body shop owner was able to straighten and fix the hood. With all these parts ready now, the remaining work will start on Monday. He says the car should be all done by Thu or Fri.

I also spent half an hour cleaning the car's interior because OCD ;)

Pictures below

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Sweet, that's a really good deal (of course, we would have nothing like that in the US)

​​​​​​It will be done pretty quick!

The estimate from the insurance company in the US, which was left in the car, totaled $7,000 ($5.24k in parts and $1.77k in labour). I am sure they missed some parts as well too like the shock absorber and the inner tie rod. Their parts' prices were so inflated by the way compared to mboemparts.com or parts.com.

Stay tuned for more updates.

wow pretty cool that you are going to restore it. Can't wait to see the end result.

Yeah, with that extremely low mileage, I couldn't skip on it at all. I knew this was the car for me: rare mileage and rare color in Lebanon at least.

Stay tuned. New post being drafted now.

Day 3 - Body Repair and Installation of New Parts
Today, work started with the body shop owner straightening the front part of the car's frame as can be seen in the pictures below. Once that was done, the impact bar, the headlight frame, the support brackets, the fender, the headlights, and the front bumper were installed each in turn. He then spent a good amount of time matching the hood with the headlights by further straightening the hood and changing the hood's and headlights' adjustments to get a flush look. He will need to continue working on that tomorrow in better lighting conditions to perfect it.

I am very glad we were able to attach the bumper cover and the headlights to get a glimpse at the final look.

The plan is to finish assembly tomorrow and to replace the shock absorber and the inner tie rod. Hopefully, we will be done with all that by the end of the day and ready to hand over the car to the paint shop. They will need 2 days to paint and polish the car so hopefully I'll have it for the weekend.

Pictures below

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Day 4 - Body Repair and Replacement of Suspension Parts

Today, the body shop owner continued working on the hood until it was perfected with its shape matching the headlight 100%. The mechanic then removed the damaged strut and inner tie rod and replaced them with the ones I bought. I had to buy the strut used ($150) so that it matches the other side because a brand new one would have caused a difference compared with the used one on the other side. The inner tie rod was new though obviously.

After that was done, I drove the car the paint shop where I was promised I will get the car back all done and polished by Friday morning. The drive there though was buttery smooth. The car literally drives brand new and I love that stock engine/exhaust sound compared to my CLK.

Pictures from today below

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Damaged and Bent Inner Tie Rod
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On my way to the body shop

Cool!

Now it's just left down to the mods you want to do.

What are your plans? Maybe we can help you out.

As I mentioned for the E63 exhaust tips, eBay is the place I got mine. I got the h style, not y style.

I purchased all the mods I want to do.

1. Xenon headlights (pictured above)
2. Single-slat SL-style grille (pictured above)
3. Quad Exhaust Tips which look like this (same as you I guess)
4. Quad Diffuser which looks like this
5. Spoiler which looks like this
6. Paddle Shifters that I sniped on eBay for $40
7. iCarsoft MB V2.0 from eBay for $130 to keep handy

What do you think? Looking forward to your feedback and suggestions.

Thanks.

1. Xenon headlights (pictured above)

A must have

1. Single-slat SL-style grille (pictured above)

I prefer oem or Pana/diamond but this is all personal preference

1. Quad Exhaust Tips which look like this (same as you I guess)

I have the square ones, same idea tho

1. Quad Diffuser which looks like this

​Nice fins

1. Spoiler which looks like this

black I assume

1. Paddle Shifters that I sniped on eBay for $40
2. iCarsoft MB V2.0 from eBay for $130 to keep handy

I think changing out the sidemarkers would also be another option, or at least getting them tinted. Could probably just even Plasti dip.

Otherwise that's a pretty solid list 👍

Yeah it's personal preference because I couldn't stand at all the silver OEM grille. The black one maybe, but the silver/grey one is just NO.

The spoiler will be painted the same color as the car: Code 183 Black Magnetite Pearl. The spoiler on my CLK is the same color as the car and I like that look better than just black.

I don't have to worry about doing anything to the sidemarkers because I specifically bought the Euro-spec bumper which does not have the sidemarkers openings. I asked the body shop owner to tie the bulbs in a neat way so that they don't throw an error yet are easily accessible to be changed if they burn.

Thank you for the feedback. I'd love to see some pics of your exhaust tips on the car. Can you post some?

Sure thing, let me find and upload some in a minute...

Also it's a bit late now but if you wanted to, you could have done the eibach handling kit. Although this is unnecessary to most people, and idk how Lebanese streets are.

Thanks. The road conditions are pretty bad here. The highways are decent, but the town roads have potholes and a lot of speed bumps. I can't have a suspension that's too stiff.

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There ya go

Oh these ones look like the C63 Black Series ones but your inner tips' shape does not match them. Do you agree? I just checked them out on Google.

They are E63 tips from the same years as W204

I see. Nice ones and pretty unique. Did you notice any exhaust/engine sound difference or fuel economy difference when you went to quad tips?

Thanks, the exhaust tips have no effect on anything.
Only way they would is if they were shut closed haha.

Day 5 - Assembly
I started the day today by picking up the car from the paint shop after it was painted, polished, and waxed. Oh what a sight to see the beauty of the this paint with the "pearls" sparkling very clearly in the sun. I am very happy with the color to say the least.

I then dropped off the car at the body shop again where I had to wait quite some time before we could start working on it so during that time, I removed and cleaned the engine covers and I also inspected the engine air filters which looked brand new except for some dust that I eliminated via wall-slapping and compressed air. I was then told by the body shop owner that he may not be able to get to it today so I went back home, but to my surprise he sends me the last picture below a couple of hours ago: I LIKE WHAT I SEE!

So the plan is to head there tomorrow early morning to finish installing the fender liners and any other small pending items before tackling the following:

• Alignment
• Quad tips and diffuser
• Paddle shifters
• Engine oil and filter change
• Brake fluid change
• Reset of any remaining fault codes via Xentry

I'm hoping to be all done tomorrow so I can drive it back home.

Pictures from today below

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