It is SHOCKING what symptoms a bad battery can give.

So my friend brought over his 83 300D for an air filter change. We cleaned the air filter housing up very nicely and got the new air filter installed. He then goes to start his car and.. click.... nothing. click nothing. Click then very very slow cranking but not enough to start.

So I bring my 85 300D over and we try jumping it after letting it charge for 15-20 minutes and raving. Same thing.... very very slow cranking. We thought starter for sure but I swapped batteries JUST to test and it started immediately. Drove him to Canadian Tire and got a Motomaster and he's fine now.

I just think it's so strange that it didn't even have enough juice to fire, even with being jumped and etc. Crazy.

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1976 Mercedes 240D (Sold)
1985 Mercedes 300D Turbo Diesel: 500,000KM
1986 Mercedes 300E (Sold)
1988 Mercedes 300E (Sold)
2002 Mercedes C240 (Sold)
2008 Mercedes C350 4matic

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Jumper cables require a GOOD connection to charge the battery. Even with 4 gauge cables, you can forget jumping the car and simply cranking it to fire off. A poor connection will take ages to charge the battery, if it even has enough connection to charge it.

Some batteries will also fail in a way that one of the cells opens up from internal corrosion and usually happens suddenly. If that happens, the battery is junk, no amount of charging will fix it. Sounds like a new battery was the best solution.

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Current stable:
1995 E320 149K (Nancy)
1983 500SL 120K (SLoL)

Black Sheep:
1985 524TD 167K (TotalDumpster™)

Gone but not forgotten:
1986 300SDL (RIP)
1991 350SD
1991 560SEL
1990 560SEL
1986 500SEL Euro (Rusted to nothing at 47K!)