I got a great deal on 2008 E320 Bluetec that has spent more time torn apart in my garage than on the road

About two weeks into ownership and just past my warranty expiration I noticed a fairly substantial oil leak. I put the correct oil in the car and it just poured out of the bottom, seller put super thick oil in to hide it I am pretty sure. Car drove perfect the whole time.

Took the car to indy shop by me, $2,400 to replace the oil cooler gaskets and they wanted to put new air intakes on it. Could not swing that so read forums here and spent $150 on parts another $50 or so on tools. Got through the whole oil cooler gasket replacement and everything went pretty good (so I thought).

The car would crank fine, heard the fuel pump, but would not start. I first thought no big deal I had the fuel filter out and one rail off it has to get rid of some air. I turned it over several times, but never more than 5 seconds or so at a time and not more than a few times without resting. Left the key on for the fuel pump to run. I got a blast of diesel out of the top of the filter housing that looks like what I would burp air out of with my chevy/dodge diesels.

Well the car never started so figured something was screwed up. Took all the easy stuff off the engine and checked all my wiring harness connections all was fine. I had batwing and air filters off car and bumped starter a few times and no issues checking for fuel leaks. I did eventually find that I had one of the fuel rail cross connections hand tight. I thought great I'll tighten that sucker up, build fuel pressure and be back on the road.

The car turned over fine for days in my garage. Now the car has ESP inoperative and will not crank. The cooling fan goes wide open. My little code reader had various stuff I cleared and charging the battery tonight. I had jumper cables to my truck a few times to turn car over a little better, no change when doing that after this ESP thing. Tried turning ESP off and that did nothing.

Thinking about a) reporting car stolen b) buying the Launch Creader VII to reset ESP c) hate this one taking soewhere to shell out $$$ d) any ideas by you fellas

Any help would be greatly appreciated....

At least on late 90's MB, the cooling fan will run full speed if the engine computer isn't getting power or the ground is lifted.

You need to find a wiring diagram and start probing, I bet a power feed isn't plugged in or a fuse has cleared.

Make sure you have everything plugged in.
From my memory:
Injectors
Fuel pressure regulator (drivers side rail front)
Fuel pressure sensor (passenger side rail rear)
EGR valve
Turbo VNT actuator
Swirl Flapper motor
PCV valve
Cam angle sensor (top of passenger side bank)
Glow plugs
About 4 things in the mixing chamber on the front of the passenger side of the engine
Glow plug relay (big battery cable, plus the harness cable)
Both MAFs in the bat wing
Delta P sensor in the drivers side air box

There is a ground wire from the main harness trunk, on the passenger side, that screws in near the vacuum pump, be sure you hooked that back up.

Be very very careful with the leaky lines, if you manage to build pressure you are looking at 30,000 PSI, if you cross into the stream it is like getting a tattoo with diesel fuel. You will need to go immediately to the ER or risk serious medical complications up to and including death.

I did not try to start my engine until I had everything plugged back in. You need to have all the low pressure fuel lines installed and the fuel filter in place. And the high pressure lines all installed and torqued. This isn't the same as an IDI engine where you are trying to get the air bubble out of the hard line to let the injector spring pop. The injector "pops" when the computer tells it to, so it self purges the line. Everything self purges in the fuel system on this engine. Just get it all tight.

It did take about 4 or 5 full crank cycles to get mine restarted. 20 seconds of key on with the low pressure pump whining, full auto crank cycle, wait 20 seconds, another 20 seconds of running the LP pump, full auto crank, etc.

I would double check the fuses in the box there in the engine compartment. I recall someone posting on the main oil cooler thread that the PCV valve copper insert is electrically live, and if it is plugged in and hits something grounded it will blow a fuse and shut the whole party down.

__________________
The OM 642/722.9 powered family
Still going strong
2014 ML350 Bluetec (wife's DD)
2013 E350 Bluetec (my DD)

both my kids cars went to junkyard in 2023
2008 ML320 CDI (Older son’s DD) fatal transmission failure, water soaked/fried rear SAM, numerous other issues, just too far gone to save (165k miles)
2008 E320 Bluetec (Younger son's DD) injector failed open and diluted oil with diesel, spun main bearings (240k miles)

1998 E300DT sold to TimFreeh
1987 300TD sold to vstech

you gotta be freaking kidding me....

The first fuse I pulled was blown. A 25 amp fuse, not sure I have those, but will get more tomorrow. I work on cars a lot I did not think i grounded anything. I feel stupid, but thanks for pointing me towards this...

Strongly hope this gets the Benz back on the road.

The larger issue is why did the fuse clear. Find out what is on that circuit and track it down, you might have a pinched wire.