Hello again. I am days away from my first veggie conversion on the 300D. I am going to drive it a few months then sell since I want an SD that is a little nicer. While looking around, I see a few 190's here and there. I like how they look and I could see myself in one if the price is right. Are they reliable? I love the engine in my 84 300D and everything in the car is easy to get to. How are the 2.5 turbo 5 cylinder engines in those cars? Are they as bulletproof as the 3.0? As far as the rest of the car, I am cool with maybe putting in a B2 piston if needed or repairing minor leaks in the engine but nothing major. How about any rust issues with the 190's? I just don't know enough about them. If they are no good then I will stick to a 300SD. Thanks, Eric.

__________________

1984 300D, 246k, veggie, sold
1982 300SD 301k

I've had mine for a little while now, and have the maintenance history since new (bought from first owner), an '87 190D Turbo. The odometer didn't work when I bought it, 179,000 showing, typical failure item, the heater blower switch was bad, also common, and the aux. pump was bad, sunroof stuck, some windows slow. The head was rebuilt for symptoms unknown, and at around 120,000miles the transmission was replaced for slipping problems.

Mine has no rust, an inland Florida car. The rust I see usually is in the rocker-panels, around the jack-holes.

I've been looking for a second one, I decided to keep this one so I'd like to find another for my 17 y/o daughter for a rainy-day car. What I've seen so far on fleabay is four turbo cars, three of which have bad transmissions (not driveable), all of them rusty in the rockers. Another pretty good-looking non-turbo on fleabay has a bad transmission, same year, but no obvious rust.

All of the ones I've seen for sale so far have MB-tex interior, but they all are advertised with leather, a pretty rare option I'm thinking. The tex holds up pretty well but almost everything I've seen for sale has some driver-seat upholstery problems.

My A/C still blows cold, I put 1lb of R12 in it and the gauge shows good. Many cars of this era have either in-op A/C or a refrigerant conversion, I can't speak for how well a converted system works but typically not as well as the R12 refrigerant.

So far this car has been very reliable, and drives nice. Kind of small inside, my hair always looks funny from rubbing the ceiling, not a car for tall folks.

I highly recommend the car, think it's a gas to drive, and so far its simplicity compared to my 300TE 4matic make it cheap to keep. So far. I sold the 4matic when it was about 5years old BTW, got tired of paying a fortune for maintenance. This one I bought used, witn more miles than my 4matic had, and I feel pretty good about the maintenance history. The 300TE was a much more solid car BTW and I preferred it to the 190, was actually looking for a 300D (124) when I stumbled across my 190. I think that if my 124 wasn't such a maintenance hog I would have worked harder to find a nice 300D turbo, I really like the solid body of that car (lowest natural frequency chassis in the industry, benchmarked by pretty much every automaker).

Mileage on mine is around 29 city, and I don't baby it, and highway so far has varied but I'm seeing the numbers average toward 34, not great. I have a long trip coming up and hope to take the "baby benz", will probably gain some best-case scenario fuel mileage figures if I take her.

I suppose a good 300D would still tempt me to leave the 190 to my daughter, but I'd want to see a pretty good maintenance history so I don't have to pay for someone else's crimes. I have other older cars, my '85 quattro for example, which after I've owned her for 20years and driven her hard, has consumed little more than exhaust and tires, so I have little tolerance for constant and major leaks and failures. My land-rover was more reliable than the 4matic, leaked less too. But driving a 124, heaven.

- Jeff Miller
190DT

190DT should have intercooler from the factory. most head problems could be avoided by adding the intercooler.

Intercooler? That would be nice. Never came with one.

- Jeff Miller
190DT

I bought a 1987 190D Turbo w/200k miles last summer after looking at and driving several of the 123 style 300D's. They felt like land yachts to me coming from a Subaru 2.5RS, and I decided I wanted something a bit smaller/sportier for the mountain roads where I live.

I have been running the car on B99 or B50 biodiesel depending on the temperature and am very happy with the purchase so far. Most of the maintenance has been cheap and easy DIY. Diesel Purge worked great, I scored a free aftermarket swaybar that tightened up the handling a bit, repaired a bad parking brake cable, updated the stereo/speakers, etc...

The AC and climate controls are ok so far...knock on wood. Sunroof motor is bad, I think- sounds awful but I haven't delved into that one. The dash is cracked and I have a replacement, but haven't had the will to tackle the swap yet.

The only shop work I have had done was the emergency repair of a bad brake caliper. The guy replaced the motor mounts at that time too and that made a HUGE difference in the quality of the ride, especially sitting in traffic. I got absolutely reamed by the shop though and won't be going back there.

I love how the car drives, especially once the turbo kicks in. Plenty of power,
nice handling, classic good looks. So far so good.

And its kinda cool to be driving one of only 1,000 or so ever made.

Go for it.

__________________
87 190D Turbo- Great Car
Running on B99 Biodiesel form the local Co-Op