I got Lucky! Big Lesson in '87 300D...

[BenzDriver]

I learned something very important yesterday in my '87 300D. I was going down the interstate (in the middle of nowhere) at cruising speed when the engine intermittantly started losing power. I wouldn't hold 70 MPH. I pushed on the gas, the turbo kicked in and it would speed back up just fine. This went on for about three minutes.

Then I was in the left lane and the engine started dying big-time! I moved right and there just happened to be an exit ramp at the EXACT RIGHT TIME so I exited, went up the offramp, and turned right into a gas station that sold diesel. The car idled fine and had no problems driving at low speed.

I called my indy on the phone and he asked "how much fuel do you have?" I responded, "an eighth of a tank, but the light isn't on yet". He said "you're lucky, you just ran out of fuel - don't run it below a quarter tank or so".

The car took exactly 16.4 gallons to fill up (28.5 MPG if anyone cares) - even though the capacity is supposed to be over 18 gallons. What gives?

My indy said that there are two pickups in the tank and sometimes the lower one gets clogged??? Does this make any sense to anyone? Has anyone else seen this?