just bought an '81 300D!

Hello everyone!

I just recently got into diesel Mercedes vehicles (from tinkering on my uncle's '78 300D) and well I decided I wanted one of my own, so I bought an '81 300D! I fell in love with it when I test drove it! The blue MBTex? interior is in pretty good shape (no tears), 197,000 miles - no smoke from engine!, mostly rust-free California car, drives beautifully. All the vacuum locks (doors, trunk, fuel) seem to work flawlessly and the engine shuts off immediately w/ the key. A/C even blows bone cold, but unfortunately the automatic climate control goes 'funky' and switches from full-cold to full-hot (doesn't really let me select something in the middle). Any ideas on that? It has some clear coat 'burning' on the roof - but aside from that, the paint is in good shape. It is silver in color - with what seems to be a very very slight tint of blue. Who knows, maybe I'm seeing things - but 3 others seem to agree with me that it has the slightest blue tint to it. Makes me wonder what the name of this colors is... Pics will be available on my website once I get the film developed and scanned.

Anyway - being new to the Mercedes scene, I was wondering if anyone could tell me some good 'resources' for parts and other information for this car? My goal is to make this car into a reliable car that I could use daily - so any tips would also be greatly appreciated! Thanks, and happy motoring!

-Darren