diesel smoke question

[sd300td]

How many of you here have excess smoke coming from the tailpipe? Smoke of any color will do. By excess smoke I mean, "any" smoke.

My wagon will smoke rarely, and lightly if at all, under heavy acceleration or heavy load/uphill. I really have to try and get it to puff out a cloud of smoke. No smoke at all under normal driving conditions. I see many other 123's with little or no smoke driving all over san diego.

I ask because I was behind a 240D last night on my way home. I've never seen a smokier MB diesel. Had to roll up the window. Sort of got me to thinking that cars like this 240D give other MB diesel's a bad image. I felt compelled to get the driver's attention and tell her to get a tune up.

[Rocketrider]

Before I performed a turbo transplant, my 300d was the equivalent of a mosquito bomb. I only drove it a block when I bought it and then quickly found a donor.

[Chad300tdt]

My wagon has a tiny bit of smoke when I first start it until it warms up ... even after a fresh valve adjustment.

Originally Posted by sd300td

I felt compelled to get the driver's attention and tell her to get a tune up.

All that would have done is gotten you the finger.

[Chad300tdt]

Originally Posted by ForcedInduction

All that would have done is gotten you the finger.

Those are delicious.

[sd300td]

Originally Posted by ForcedInduction

All that would have done is gotten you the finger.

yes I know. It was just a thought. She wasn't the MB "pride of ownership" type.

[Skippy]

My 240D blows a faint whiff of white smoke at idle even when warmed up, and running on B20. It puts out a little more on cold start, and a lot more on cold starts in cold weather. I'm pretty sure it could use a set of injectors. They're on the list. My 300D only makes visible smoke when flooring it, and it's only visible at night with headlights behind me.

My gas pot smokes a lot more than either diesel. From the timing of the smoke events, and the behavior of my transmission, I suspect the modulator is bad and feeding doses of tranny fluid into the intake under certain driving conditions.

[erizo715]

Mine 300 sdl underwent repairs at a local shop and after replacing lots of things, getting injector replaced, fuel pump rebuild and a rebuild engine do to local owner shop starting engine with wrong fuel pump timing (half of the listers crack up) i do have now a lot of black smoke out of tail pipe, it maybe a faulty install vacuum because when ac is off there is not smoke at all, riding with ac off is not a option here in sw florida in July of course so i got a lot of weird looking people looking to my mb who looks like a russian truck on a stip climbing. Ac is also repaired by same guy who almost destroy my car and charged me $8500 in repairs. any help will be appreciated.

[Cervan]

i get some light smoke during the morning when its cold and i start er up, because my spray pattern is off on my injectors. but other than that, theres not alot of other smoke.

[Cr from Texas]

Originally Posted by sd300td

How many of you here have excess smoke coming from the tailpipe? Smoke of any color will do. By excess smoke I mean, "any" smoke.

My wagon will smoke rarely, and lightly if at all, under heavy acceleration or heavy load/uphill. I really have to try and get it to puff out a cloud of smoke. No smoke at all under normal driving conditions. I see many other 123's with little or no smoke driving all over san diego.

I ask because I was behind a 240D last night on my way home. I've never seen a smokier MB diesel. Had to roll up the window. Sort of got me to thinking that cars like this 240D give other MB diesel's a bad image. I felt compelled to get the driver's attention and tell her to get a tune up.

If it's been driven a lot around town without an Italian tuneup (my wife's been driving it), I can and do make it smoke a lot if I get someone tailing me too close. Just pedal to the floor, make it down shift, and bury the tailgater in black smoke. They usually get the message.

[JimmyL]

Man I loved this old wagon.



My first MB and The Flash had loads of personality. He also had a problem that neither me with the advice of pretty much everybody on here at the time, nor my indy mechanic could find:







It was unbelievably embarrassing to drive. It didn't smoke during accelleration, only during idle or coasting to a stop. I even got pulled over for excessive smoking, but of course I was "legal".
Sold him on ebay to a guy from Florida. Watched it drive off down the road, SMOKING!!!!!

BTW, it wasn't steam. Compression was good, valve stem seals and guides replace,d valves adjusted and verified 2 more times, injectors twice, injection pump, vac. pump OK, etc...
I'll never know........

My wagon and the 240's smoke some if you are driving behind them, but you can't see it out the back when you are driving.

[Hatterasguy]

If its in proper tune you should get a nice puff of black smoke when you floor it, thats the rack dumping fuel into the engine before the turbo can catch up. All diesels unless its a CDI with tons of computer controls should do that. Also maybe a little puff when you start it, more so when its very cold. A very cold diesel will smoke a bit at idle, not much you can do about that.

Other than that you shouldn't see any visable smoke in your rear view mirror. You can make smoke, if you keep the rpm's below 2k for 500 miles than get on it. Or with a 603 if you drive it around town than get on it, it will smoke a bit. I wouldn't let a diesel soot up for long, they are ment to be run pretty hard.

Every diesel I have owned, even the 300SD which I thought smoked a lot always passed CT emissions at laughable low levels. The SDL almost doesn't register on the scale. I said to the emissions guy this is a joke. He said some MB's don't pass. I was like they must be real POS's because even my junk smokey beater was only at 1/4 the legel level.

[bgkast]

I have a bit of smoke on startup, but it goes away once the engine is warm. I also can see some smoke when it is dark with a car's headlights behind me when I floor it, even with the VNT and 15 psi of boost. I think my injectors could stand a rebuild.

[KarTek]

My E300 puts out a haze of blue smoke on cold start which clears within 30 seconds. I get a small puff of black smoke if the computer is not paying attention and I accelerate quickly from a stop. I also get a light haze of smoke when accelerating even after the turbo has spooled up but it's only visible to me at night in the trailing car's headlights.

[Cervan]

Yeah you will never get rid of the haze in the headlights at night. even with a brand new 617 it will allways be there.