The Lost World - Mercedes ML (W163) Montana project

[BoZ-ML]

Update February 2023:
Finally got around to do the wheels. Stupid enough I completely forgot about the center caps of the wheels...

So when we'll do the roof we'll do the center caps also. Until that time it pretty much looks stupid


Sorry about the center caps!

[EdynB]

Just stumbled on this and I AM OBSESSED. I can’t wait to see it fully completed. Kudos to you for taking this very difficult build on. The amount of love and attention to detail in this is incredible.

[JP Junkie]

Wow. That's looks incredible!

[BoZ-ML]

Just stumbled on this and I AM OBSESSED. I can’t wait to see it fully completed. Kudos to you for taking this very difficult build on. The amount of love and attention to detail in this is incredible.

Thanks! Very nice to read this. It's been quite for a while, but the weather was awful here t continue painting.

We did however start with the roof rack (with remote controlled search lights). It's almost finished, so I will update as soon as everything is painted and installed

[BoZ-ML]

Update September 2023:

After our other project (a '68 Mustang Fastback) suddenly went into high gear we got around to the JPTLW Mercedes ML

Roof Rack:
During the crappy weather-days we focused on creating the roof rack. We had a lot of pipe left from the window bars and used one of the tires as a guide for how big this roof rack should be. We wanted it to have about the same feeling as the roof bubble on the movie-car. We picked up a set of some steel sheets with small holes in them. We found the holes to narrow, so we drilled out all of them, so that water wouldn't be an issue.

Lights:
This is also where we deviate from the original Montana movie car. I really, really like the search lights on the Fontana version and so we decided to put them on this ML and use the roof rack as a base. We created some brackets resembling the Fontana car that is (or was) in Alabama, welded them on and installed the lights. And man... I am such a happy camper we did this. It looks bad-ass! Especially from the front, in the dark, in shitty weather! Only a couple of T-rex's could finish this picture


Brackets for the lights


Looks from the side (imagine a tire, some petrol cans and shovels on there).

Painting the roof:
So after the roof rack was done (it only needs to be painted) we could finally paint the roof (and the forgotten center caps).


Color 1


Color 2


This step also required to NOT FORGET the center caps again


Color 3


Color 4


Finished roof (only the gutter strips need to reinstall here)

Next steps:
Next we need to remove the window bars and paint them a darker shade of grey (accidentally coated them in the wrong color). The idea is to give the roof rack the same color.

Rally:
We also entered a rally to the North Cape and back in February/March 2024. It circles through Scandinavia. The route (for us) is around 9.000 km's, 10 countries in 18 days, with the W163. If someone knows what might be a good idea to take along with us as it comes to spare-parts, please let us know!


The official start is in Hamburg, Germany, but we have to get there first.

[BoZ-ML]

Roof Rack and Roof mounted search lights:
So we've finished the roof rack so we can take a full spare wheel with us and some extra gasoline, shovels and some other crap. Because we really like the looks of the Fontana Mercedes ML we've decided to install the roof mounted search lights as well. We know it's not officially part of the Montana ML, but I honestly don't care.


Fully customized roof rack, good for maximum 175 kg.


Roof Mounted search lights. Not part of Montana, but be honest, it looks super cool! Only the rain is missing in this picture!


We've rewired the search lights to be able to flash with them from the toggle switches on the ceiling (they used to work only with the remote). The remote is still needed to do the up/down and left/right movements.

[Matty102]

This has been a very interesting build

[Jurassic Vic]

My favorite ML build