Boy what a week. Started with a near flat tire due to a 3" sheet metal screw in the tread, then out of the blue the wife's ML350 developed a sudden fuel leak from somewhere in the bowels of the engine bay that required a tow home, then the boys car threw a check engine light for an intermittant cylinder misfire, and now my issue.

The 1983 300D has been running fine. Today I went to leave work after an 8 hour shift, tried to start the car and it cranked but no fire. I looked down and no glow plug light at all. Without tools I checked what I could and then just tried cranking it hoping it was just one plug or two that went out. No dice, it took almost 2 mins of 30 sec crank followed by 30 seconds of starter cooldown until she suddenly fired up. Since it took was so hard to start I concluded I had no glow plugs at all. Let me tell you with an ambient temp of 55 degrees, starting with no glow plugs suck.

Anyway, I got it home, changed clothes and went to mess with it. I turned the key to be greeted by the cheery yellow glow plug light. Turned the key and it started right up. Tried it three more times and same result.

I'm going to troubleshoot the glow plug system tomorrow but what the hell could suddenly cause no glow plugs at all? I'm thinking either the glow plug relay, the 50 Amp metal strip fuse, or wiring. I'm kinda leaning toward a cracked metal strip fuse that made contact once the engine bay got warm. Any tips or suggestions are welcome......With a week like this, I can use all the help I can get!

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2012 Mercedes ML350 Bluetec 91K (hers)
2005 Corvette 55K (fun car)
2002 VW Jetta TDI 231K (mine)
1998 Volvo S70 T5 Turbo 196K (kids)
1994 Ford F150 4WD 249K (firewood hauler)
1983 Mercedes 300D 376K (diesel commuter)