ShanMan

A couple of weeks ago I was cruising down the freeway and leaned on it to pass some cars and catch my offramp. Much to my surprise, I saw a huge plume of steam or smoke behind the car, and I instinctually slowed down and rolled down a window to see if I could smell what it was. It was coolant. I was two blocks from home, so I limped it there without letting it get too hot. very lucky!

So, I hosed down the car to rid it of the coolant film and upon opening the hood, immediately discovered the reason for the failure. The top rad. hose had come loose from the neck of the radiator. Further investigation revealed that the barbed portion of the rediator neck has essentially disintegrated and allowed the hose to pull off. The steel reenforcing tube that sits inside the neck of the radiator went with the hose and was undamaged.

I was able to reinstall the tube into the 85% of the neck that was remaining. I inspected the neck as best I could and determined there was no additional damage beyond the end that had broke off. I cleaned up the jagged edge and reattached the radiator hose. I test drove the car after refilling the system with coolant and everything seemed to be working perfectly.

Until today. I jumped on it again, and almost immediatedly the same thing happened again...only this time the hose is still attached so I have to assume the neck has truly failed. New radiator time I guess. This looks to be the original, and the car has 147K miles now, so all in all that isn't too bad I guess.

Have any of you gone with replacement style radiators with good luck or do you recommend going with an OEM (Behr) rad. to maximize reliability? Lastly, has anyone taken it upon themselves to replace one? If so, are there any tips or tricks or warnings I might need to know to keep the job as simple as possible? Thanks in advance.

Shannon

battlecat714

stick to behr. replacing radiator (not that hard DIY): http://www.mercedesshop.com/Wikka/W124Radiator I bought mine for about $160

ShanMan

Thanks for the reply....it helps to know as much as possible going in. I'll order the new radiator tomorrow (looks like the best deal on a Behr for my car is $335) and I'll throw in a thermastat kit as well while I am at it.