Mercedes-Benz W123 230E: Powered By Toyota
It’s time for a confession. I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for the W123 E-Class Mercedes-Benz. To me, the car just oozes cool. But the idea of adding a high-powered 1JZ engine from a Toyota Supra? That’s a bit bonkers, in all the right ways!
MBWorld.org forum member JYT has just done that. It’s not his first W123, but with the engine being almost gone, it was a great starting point for the project. The engine fits snugly under the hood, almost looking stock. JYT smartly opted to use all of the Toyota’s electronics and throw out most of the Mercedes stuff. It made it easier to get the engine working properly, plus it should add a bit of Toyota reliability to the mix.
Not content with letting the Toyota transmission handle the shifting always on its own, JYT built a custom paddle-shifter setup and attached it to an aftermarket steering wheel. Yes, it’s still an automatic, but hopping into this car with the paddle shifters adds a bit more lunacy to the project.
The interior was in bad shape, so it was quickly replaced for a custom setup with new seats. The suspension was replaced with SPAX performance parts. Finally, the car was repainted to Tungsten Silver (from the Nissan Skyline).
It looks like it was a really fun project, and not something you’d typically expect to see. For that, I think it’s really cool.
via [MBWorld.org]
