Nojodas67

Hello,
Newbie forum user here. Although I recently purchased a 2010 R350 and I'm new to this forum, I'm not new to MB; I also own this Mercedes Sprinter long-wheelbase passenger van which I bought brand new 14 years ago.


We bought the Sprinter van brand new, have put about 70k miles in 14 years and have had practically no problems with it; We mainly used the Sprinter for travel when our 4 children were small and growing up. We have 2 in college now and were needing a smaller vehicle for shorter trips. Not wanting another large vehicle or an SUV, but needing seating for 7, I thought about the R-class. I looked at them for a while a year ago and even took one for a test drive but didn't purchase one until very recently.

The new spare vehicle would not get used that much either so I wanted something used but with low miles and at a low initial investment. I have always done all mechanical work on every car I've owned by myself, since I was old enough to own a car (about 40 years or so) so I knew I would not be afraid to purchase something that needed work, if need be.

One of the absolute MUSTS when looking for a w251 was that it had to have low miles and I wanted to stay under $7500 for a spare car. All the R's that I found for sale in that price range by dealers, as well as private owners, had high miles (above 100k). The ones with mileage under 40k were priced at around $20k, so I put the search off for a few months.
But then I remembered my younger days, that I had purchased no less than 50 or so cars that needed mechanical or body work, and I would drive them for a while, while at school, and later resell them for a profit. That is what put me through college and what enabled me to get my mechanical engineering degree (and later a master's degree) with no student loan debt, just by buying damaged cars and flipping them after bringing them back to life.

With that previous knowledge and experience I started looking in IAAI. I found this 2010 R350 with low miles (30,000) that I was able to purchase for under $5k, but it needed cosmetic work. I rented a car trailer and brought it home. After searching online at car-part.com, I found all the used replacement body panels in the same exact color code rather inexpensively. However, right before pulling the trigger on all the used parts, I wondered how difficult it would be to give it a face lift. I never really cared for the front end of the first generation, especially the rounded headlights and long sloping front end. After looking at several 2011-13 R-class cars, taking measurements, comparing inner structure panels with that of my 2010, I discovered that it would be possible to put a 2nd generation front end on my first generation R-350. I had to replace most of the front body panels anyway, so I figured what the heck. I would have to replace one extra part though needlessly: the hood panel, since the original hood was undamaged, but that would be a small price to pay to have the best of both worlds: a low-mileage R-350 but with the nicer front end and at a much lower price. I did have to modify the front body wiring harness so that the newer style headlights would work in the 1st generation w251, but after some doing, all lights work perfectly and I get NO malfunction messages in the dash.

I was able to find both front fenders, complete front bumper (cover and bumper bar), and passenger door and hood off a donor 2011 R-350 at a local salvage yard all for under $1,500; and all body panels were of the same color code. There were some scratches on the front bumper so prior to putting that on, I had a local body shop give it a fresh paint job for $400. I purchased Euro style headlights on eBay which were shipped from Germany. I like the look of the Euro ones better than the USA spec headlights. I installed aftermarket HID kits and they are very bright. I also installed a LED star grille emblem and wired it so that it is illuminated whenever the ignition is turned on. I also purchased LED DRL lights for the lower bumper on eBay. All in all, final investment is around $7500 (my goal) and I was able to get the low mileage car I was after, but with a newer look to boot.

The car drives flawlessly, since it has such low miles, and the interior has virtually NO wear. The only thing I had to repair mechanically was replace the rear suspension airbags (30 minute job for each side) which were damaged by the forklift operator at some point while the car was being moved around at IAAI.

So if any of you have ever wondered if you could give your first generation w251 a face lift, the short answer is YES, it's doable and pretty straight forward. The inner structure of both are the same, only the outer body panels were changed for the facelift. And if you're able to find used body panels in the same color, then you could save money on painting, provided the donor panels are in good shape. Even though the body panels are not original to my car, they are better than buying new, since they still retain the original quality paint and rust protection from an undamaged donor car that was rear-ended and ended up at a salvage yard. I will be glad to answer any questions and offer tips to anyone thinking of doing this swap.

Before and After pictures below:

Onnzo

Great job and a bargain to boot!

hyperion667

Looks kind of like the rest of the mini vans now But still a cool upgrade.

Nojodas67

Thank you. I think it turned out great and the wife likes it...that's the most important part.

Tsumi

Looks great. I would love to do a full facelift (front and rear) on our R500 but it doesn't make much financial sense to do so. Also recently replaced the projectors in the headlights so I don't want to go through that process again anytime soon.

Nojodas67

Thanks. It would only make sense in case of a front end collision where the front end has to be replaced anyway, since basically ALL front end body panels, plus headlights would have to be replaced. Unless you're able to find all the parts used and in the same color, like I did. It's pretty simple to swap them out.

ODIOUS

Nice job.
Have you thought of changing the side mirror and tail lights to complete the conversion?

Nojodas67

No, a complete conversion was not the main goal, I just wanted to get this nice low mileage car back on the road and it didn't make sense to me to buy an old style front-end for it, since I didn't like that look anyway. I don't mind the current mirrors or tail lamps.

ODIOUS

Understood amd appreciated. Did that steering wheel come with the 2010 or did you replace it with one from a 2nd gen too?

Nojodas67

I didn't do anything to the interior of the car; I'm not the original owner so I couldn't tell you for sure either.

ODIOUS

So either you got a unicorn or perhaps it was replaced by the seller (airbag deployment?).

There is a thread around here where the Gen2's steering wheel was replaced with the latest one but to get it to work they had to lathe out some bits in the back.

Good job on the restoration. Im partial to the 2 round DRL myself.

Nojodas67

That was a toss-up, the LED's in the later style DRL's are very very bright and a brighter white, which I preferred over the halogen bulbs in the 2-round DRL's.

ODIOUS

Or you could have installed LED bulbs in them like i did 😀

Nojodas67

I've tried LED bulbs on other cars...they all burn out after a little while. That turned me off to them.

ODIOUS

When i bought LEDs off of ebay/amazon i used to have that problem too.

I now shop exclusively on Superbrightled anything LED bulb related. It'll cost 2-3x more in some instances BUT you'll only buy them once for that application. The LEDs I installed in my DRLs have been running for YEARS without as much as a single flicker issue.

I also put 55w morimoto HIDs in the headlights and have been pleased with their output, quality and performance in these projectors made for halogens. Paid a few times more than I would have if i bought unknown name 35w HIDs off of ebay but again...ive been running them for years without much of an issue. They flicker a bit at startup but thats them showing their age i think.

Im impressed with the Sprinter you used to roll around in. Anyone else would have opted for a Nissan Armada or some other gargantuan SUV. Most Sprinters i see in the road are either commercial vehicles or event rentals.

Nojodas67

Good to know about the 55w morimoto HIDs, thanks. I've tried HID kits off ebay on my Dodge Ram pickup and they flicker, so I took them back out. I'm looking for another set, I'll try those and see how they work out.

Still have the Sprinter, use it only on [size=13px]occasion[/size] now for long trips. Took all the emissions restrictions off, runs better, although it only has 57k miles on a 2007.

Tsumi

I'm biased towards doing full projector retrofits. The light output is far better than just replacing the bulb alone, and you get the added benefit of bi-xenon headlights.

Our R500 had the front end damaged, unfortunately it ended up not making much financial sense to do the facelift conversion. Finding the facelift hood and fenders in the matching color was pretty much impossible, and the local yard that had the facelift stuff was just too unfriendly. I am converting the mirrors to the facelift version as we use our R500 for towing and could use the larger mirrors.

mustnged

Very nice facelift. Very nice finding donor parts for that cheap.

Nojodas67

Thank You. It still runs great and has just under 45k miles now. I just put it's second set of tires on recently. Besides tires and 3 oil changes, that's all it has needed so far.

Tdott

Awesome work!

Does it have a rebuilt title? Did you do all the inspection / documentation to get it rebuilt yourself? or was it a clean title?