Junkyard Gem: 1988 Mercedes-Benz 420 SEL

During the 1980s, if you wanted a big, powerful luxury sedan with otherworldly build quality and all the latest technological marvels, there was only one rational choice if you had the money: the Mercedes-Benz W126 S-Class. I see quite a few W126s during my junkyard adventures, including a couple with better than 500,000 miles showing on the odometer, but today’s 420 SEL— found in a Denver self-service boneyard recently — is an unusually clean example with heartbreakingly low miles.

For a W126, even a gasoline-burner, 161K miles is just getting broken in!

The interior looks like it’s 10 years old, not 35.

The sheetmetal is a bit grimy, but there’s no rust and no serious dents.

This car had an MSRP of $58,540, or about $155,357 in 2023 dollars. It wasn’t the most expensive Mercedes-Benz car you could buy in 1988, however; that honor belongs to the rakish 560 SEC two-door and its $76,380 price tag (a stunning $202,701 after inflation).

The ’88 420 SEL has a 4.2-liter SOHC V8 rated at 201 horsepower and 228 pound-feet. If that wasn’t enough power for the S-Class sedan shopper in 1988, there was the 560 SEL and its 5.5-liter V8 with 238 horses and 287 pound-feet (and a list price of $69,210, or $183,673 in today’s money).

If you wanted a manual transmission in your W126, you had to buy it in Europe (and you couldn’t get three pedals with the biggest V8s, even there).

Driver’s-side airbags were optional in the W126 starting in 1981, becoming standard equipment in 1987.

Because it’s always 4:20 in Denver, badges from 420 SELs and S 420s tend to get pried off cars quickly, after which we can assume that they end up on the walls of groovy little hippie pads. Not in this case!