Why would leads to auxiliary water pump be cut?
 

Getting acquainted with my new 1998 E300D....noticed that heat was weak at idle but fine otherwise, so I figure I have a bad auxiliary water pump. But when I look at the pump, I find that the leads have been cut. Why on earth would anybody do this? I mean, if the AWP were causing some sort of problem and the PO didn't want to replace it, why not simply remove the connector?

Any ideas?

I'll call the dealer on Monday to see if anything shows up in the maintenance history.

it starts
 

maybe he was mad

Connectors can be difficult to remove in adverse conditions. Once I wanted to disconnect the kickdown switch and it wouldn't oblige. I pried off the connector with a screwdriver breaking the retention clips.

Sixto
87 300D

I know that on my 190 the connector is super suck on the aux pump. I think an animal chewed through one of the wires and I was going to redo it but couldn't get the connector off..so I just cut them and taped them.

I'm sure that's what happened....dealer couldn't get connector off so just cut wires.

Oh well....I have other cars that deliver piping hot heat at idle!

That circuit has been thought to lead to in-dash fires. Maybe it's not properly fused. In any case, you pull over w/smoke coming out of the vents and watch your car get reduced to a scorched engine donor.

On the first gen 126 and the 123's the aux pump potentially could do that. You would have the aux pump fail and draw current out of the climate control push button unit and then a fire occur.

A popular and recommended mod is to install a 1 amp fuse in line to the aux pump.

I was told that this was fixed in the later iterations of the climate control system.