Mercedes W113 "Pagoda" restoration

[retropower]

Another project with metal progressing nicely now, so thought it might be of interest to some folks on here.

The starting point, which goes to show how years of "maintenance repairs" plus bodywork tidyups can keep a rather tired car looking pretty nice:









time to strip it down and see what's what









next its time to face the blaster, and see what really lurks!

[retropower]

Hold your breath, here we go!

































there we go, a lot to fix! We removed the front wings first, as they were pretty good, and can be reworked off the car, giving access to blast the surrounding structure.

Anyway, on to repairs

[retropower]

An inner wing seems a good place to start!































and finally a bit of metal that was bought not made!

[SV8Predator]

retropower said:

Mercedes W113 "Pagoda" restoration

Looking forward to seeing progress!

One question:

How is this a Pagoda?

[retropower]

I have no idea! That's just what they are called in the Merc world (gosh I sound ignorant!)

[mrtwisty]

That's pretty scary really! It's like a paper thin metal colander in quite a lot of places

Looking at the first couple of pictures, some would never guess at the horrors that lurk beneath...

[SV8Predator]

retropower said:

I have no idea! That's just what they are called in the Merc world (gosh I sound ignorant!)

Pagoda refers to the shape of the roof in the closed (fixed roof) version.

Yours is not a Pagoda, I'm afraid. But a magnificent car, all the same. Looking forward to more pics.

[qureshia]

SV8Predator said:

Pagoda refers to the shape of the roof in the closed (fixed roof) version.

Yours is not a Pagoda, I'm afraid. But a magnificent car, all the same. Looking forward to more pics.

Are you sure ?

I thought pagoda was a reference to what the cars look like with the hard top installed

[retropower]

SV8Predator said:

Pagoda refers to the shape of the roof in the closed (fixed roof) version.

Yours is not a Pagoda, I'm afraid. But a magnificent car, all the same. Looking forward to more pics.

are you sure?

this is listed on ebay as a pagoda and matches all on the net that I can find listed as pagodas, and have the same roof as the one we are working on??

[retropower]

lol looks like I'm not alone in thinking that! perhaps I should have mentioned that we do have the hard top, its just not in any of the photos!

[qureshia]

Forgot to add , great restro post - I just love them

Just goes to show how much work is involved transforming a good running car into a bare metal restored example

[retropower]

mrtwisty said:

That's pretty scary really! It's like a paper thin metal colander in quite a lot of places

Looking at the first couple of pictures, some would never guess at the horrors that lurk beneath...

you get used to it!!

We have blasted show cars and found similar, and to be brutally honest, we have seen work not much better from some "restorers"!!

[deltashad]

When I hear the words 'Pagoda' I think of this car, as every other person on this thread really thinks. So pedantic at times...

Beautiful car, really absolutely without question one of the most beautiful cars made. Stick a V8 in it her...

[LordBretSinclair]

Some lovely fabrication work there :thumbup"

Keep the updates coming.

[retropower]

time to look at the o/s sill





hmmm needs work

following lots of bracing higher up, and some cutting out



everything at the bottom of the sill has been attacked by the tinworm, even the thicker stuff





a complicated structure around the b post in these cars, and it needs a careful sequence to the repairs. I haven't got this properly in these pics as I'll concentrate on the sill



some new metal to make it less depressing

[retropower]

deltashad said:

Beautiful car, really absolutely without question one of the most beautiful cars made. Stick a V8 in it her...

I agree, and in fact, across the full age range at Retropower (30 to 55) we all, without exception love the shape of it. And yep, left to us it would get a v8, but that's down to the owner, who I think will probably want to go for originality, but we'll see!

[retropower]

quite a few more pics, both the inner wings and the inner wing reinforcers are now done, and all the surrounding frilly bits, as well as the n/s floor structure which was time consuming in the b post area!

lots of the pics are a bit obscure for general interest (unless you happen to be restoring one) so will wait till we upload the 1/4 panel replacement pics next week then do an update

[Lotus 50]

Just going back to the is it/isn't it a "pagoda" - I'm also pretty sure it is. As others have said pagoda refers to the shape of the hard top.

Seeing the results of the blasting session is indeed scary, a timely reminder (for me) that fibreglass does have it's benefits...

Edited by Lotus 50 on Sunday 5th January 10:08

[ecurie]

SV8Predator said:

Pagoda refers to the shape of the roof in the closed (fixed roof) version.

Yours is not a Pagoda, I'm afraid. But a magnificent car, all the same. Looking forward to more pics.

All SL's from this type (W113) are convertibles.
There is no fixed roof version of this car (only a concept by Pininfarina).
The name indeed refers to the typical shape of the (optional)hardtop. Even those without the hardtop are still called Pagodas.

[POORCARDEALER]

Pagoda is indeed the shape of the hard top roof.

I love these cars, when stripped down from what looked like a reasonable car, you can see why they are so expensive to restore.




How many hours does the strip down to a bare shell take OP?