I have a 4 speed manual in my 230CE and often times while in 4th gear I try shifting into 5th but DUH, there is no 5th! I think I'll have to search around for 5 speed as I find myself doing this far too often.
Anyone else willing to admit doing this?

__________________
DJ


84 300D Turbodiesel 190K with 4 speed manual sold in 03/2012

Yup, did it all the time. Revs too high for my tastes on the highway.

Brian , you just need to make sure your engine compartment is well sound proofed.... these engines are very well suited to the gear ratios provided by the factory...
In fact, I will bet that most people are lugging their engines 90 percent of the time... a very bad thing.... I am going by when I ' want ' to shift compared to the little marks on my speedometer.... indicators of ' speed to shift'.... feels and sounds like it is going to explode when I actually go all the way to them....
Or maybe someone changed out my third member to the wrong numbers... LOL

Always...

I would also do that on my old Datsun 280ZX.

__________________
Michael LaFleur

'05 E320 CDI - 86,000 miles
'86 300SDL - 360,000 miles
'85 300SD - 150,000 miles (sold)
'89 190D - 120,000 miles (sold)
'85 300SD - 317,000 miles (sold)
'98 ML320 - 270,000 miles (sold)
'75 300D - 170,000 miles (sold)
'83 Harley Davidson FLTC (Broken again) :-(
'61 Plymouth Valiant - 60k mikes
2004 Papillon (Oliver)
2005 Tzitzu (Griffon)
2009 Welsh Corgi (Buba)

Why is lugging a diesel a bad thing-enlighten me(I always heard that mileage/efficiency on a diesel was better at low rpms-not that a good italian tuneup hurts once in a while)

__________________
1982 300DT 190K (Diesel Purge + synthetic oil=smoothness at last!!!)
2004 Ford E-350 6.0 L PSD 227K
2006 Dodge Ram 3500 SRW HO Cummins 4X4 48RE 42K (brute force tow vehicle)
2005 Scion xB wife's rolling pop can
1993 GMC Sierra C3500 6.2 142K

I would do that on my 240D but now im so used to it that when im driving my 5-speed toyota truck, i find myself forgetting about 5th gear...

Yep, I did that in my Euro car for a half million miles, but it may be geared a little lower than a US car.

Lugging is a bad thing for ANY engine. You are imposing incredibly high pressures on the bearings, and crankshaft. It will flatten crankshafts, add extra wear to the thrust side of pistons and cylinders and it's just un healthy.

Have a great day,

Bullwinkle....
Think of it this way... the difference in wrench pressure needed to get the same pulldown on a fine thread bolt compared to a coarse thread.... you are lugging when you are not using the proper number of turns of the engine for the amount of load you are needing to deal with...
And this winds up ( pun ) being bad on the internal parts of the engine ...