Got a 1985 300D turbo - Page 11 - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

vwnate1 · #1 10-07-2019, 06:32 PM

Looks good .

I fail to see why you don't just scrap all the 1985 California only crap .

Bill's a very good guy and always helpful .

ykobayashi · #2 10-10-2019, 03:30 PM

Oh don’t give me any ideas. I’m really tempted to make one of those Ford conical filter intakes and scrap the 85 Cali intake.

Right now I’m still struggling with the CCU. It still get either blistering hot or ice cold air. Nothing in between.

I’ve taken out the silver box behind the glove box. “Temperature regulator. “

It had a transistor inside that took a lot of heat. Luckily I was able to source it because it was used in pinball machines and people restore those.

I have some on the way and will build soon. The other parts look to be in clean shape.

ykobayashi · #3 10-10-2019, 11:28 PM

Argh. Car still smokes at intersections. It’s funny, most of the time it’s clear but after driving around it makes a little smoke observable at intersections. If I wait long enough it seems to burn off.

Maybe I shouldn’t care much. It is pretty minor. It could be anything, even a bad load of fuel. Obsessing.

vwnate1 · #4 10-11-2019, 08:42 AM

Don't do that unless you want to kill it .

I meant go get a stock intake setup from an earlier car and swap it in . at the same time you'll replace the perished O-Rings that are dribbling oil out .

I occasionally check the two LKQ yards near you and both have OM617 powered cars in on a regular basis .

ykobayashi · #5 10-13-2019, 08:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vwnate1

Don't do that unless you want to kill it .

I meant go get a stock intake setup from an earlier car and swap it in . at the same time you'll replace the perished O-Rings that are dribbling oil out .

I occasionally check the two LKQ yards near you and both have OM617 powered cars in on a regular basis .

Got it. Is there something wrong with putting on one of those Ford cone filters? They looked like a cleaner install. No plans yet to do so.

Funny about LKQ. Stanton, Anaheim and Santa Fe Springs have received one 123 or 126 diesel a month on average for the last five months. It wasn’t always like this. I’d wait forever for one to show up on my alerts. What’s going on, people giving up?

Squiggledog - yes that is something to check as well as injectors. Does chain timing/injector timing make smoke come and go? It seems to clear up. I’ll get home, get,out of the car and there is absolutely no smoke. Somehow I drive, reach an intersection, wisps of smoke drift by my window usually into the open convertible next to me

. I feel a bit embarrassed for a minute then it clears up. Light changes and I take off. No smoke till I get to another light and it repeats. Then I get to where I’m going, get out of the car and walk out while it is idling and no smoke. It is quite perplexing.

Not enough smoke to worry about. The car makes great power and idles smoothly. And most of the time doesn’t make smoke. Maybe I just need to clean the residual oil out of the air cleaner. Some pools up in the bottom. Also I need to remember to check my valve cover baffle when the thing is out.

Squiggle Dog · #6 10-10-2019, 11:45 PM

Maybe the timing chain is stretched? It's a common symptom.

ykobayashi · #7 11-17-2019, 09:03 AM

I’ve finished up working on my ACC. After successfully getting ice cold air and ultra hot air I decided it was time to get control of the thing so I could get something in between.

This led to the purchase of two Programma boxes - a temperature controller and a pushbutton unit. I later found out I had a broken wire going to the temperature switch on the thermostat that controls some fan functions on EC mode. Details posted here:

Blower not turning on with EC button CCU/Programa works with DEF SOLVED

Once all that was working I bought some of the 12v/1.2w illumination lamps for the CCU and the fiber optic spider. Looks good at night.

The oil catch is working well. The amount of smoke at red lights is significantly lower. It clears up faster too suggesting I was a bit of oil into my turbo. After about 300 miles of driving I dump a teaspoon full of oil out of it. I added some Brillo pad as a baffle medium and it smokes even less. I’ll have to remember to examine my valve cover baffle when I set my valve lash next go round.

I’ve been struggling with my remote control door locks I installed a few months ago. I did my usual mod where I use one popper to activate the master switch in the drivers door and have the vacuum system do the work of opening the other doors and lids. This worked well on my 240d and 300sd. On this car I decided to replace the old master switch. I got rid of the slim VDO unit and got the OEM Mercedes on pelican. Unfortunately it needs a lot more tension to hold a seal and my popper trick was more touchy. My diy linkages would rub together the wrong way in the door and the switch wouldn’t make a good seal. I had to fiddle with the actuator quite a bit (bending with pliers) to get it to function without pissing out all my vacuum when I opened the door. I think I have it right at last. We will see.

I figured out how to link my Bluetooth on my $15 Chinese headunit with my iPhone. I never bothered to try because I thought I needed a special code. Now I can talk on my phone hands free and choose my playlists using Alexa (my wife subscribes to Amazon prime) to play their online music. They have a lot of old stuff I like. This has transformed my driving because my wife likes to join me more often for drives as long as I let her play 80s pop. It’s all fun. I ended up putting one of these cheap headunits into my SD last night. It has gotten more important for me not to miss calls while I’m driving since I have some aging family close to passing. I used to disdain hands free phoning (you know, shut up and drive right?) but I’m actually finding it useful when I cannot miss an emergency call from my step sis regarding my dad. When I take a call from her she asks “are you driving?” I’m like, “yeah I’m doing it like you in your 4 series except I’m in a $2000 diesel with a $15 Bluetooth”.

Ok enough of that.

Happy to be driving around. The car gets better every month. Cannot wait to get my injector nozzles put together and popped. I have a second hand m..source tester on my bench bought from another member here. When it’s all said and done I’ll probably sell the system on at a further reduced price in the classifieds here.

ykobayashi · #8 11-17-2019, 09:27 AM

I’d like to add that this little blue car has added a lot of fun to life. When my wife and I drive around we joke around about the times when we were kids in the 80s. Like would she have dated me (we met as teens back then) if I drove this. Her replies range from “no, my roommate would have kept you and I never would have had the opportunity”. Or “no I hated rich spoiled brats who borrowed their daddy’s Benz”. Odd because she used to borrow her dad’s 560SEC gray market euro to go out with me. Once she let me drive it and I did 120 mph on the 55 towards Newport Beach. Her dad would have killed me for endangering two of his “babies”.

As my dad has gotten older and sicker I like driving him out. He dreamt of owning a Benz from Pontons to W124s but never spent the money. He promised my mom they’d get one when they married but stuck with Fords for economy. Maybe this is a small part of my love for these old Benzes.

My mom liked riding out in the SD. She had Alzheimer’s and didn’t really know what year it was. She thought I’d become some rich guy and say oooh ahh as she ran her fingers over the star. Sometimes she thought I was my dad. Maybe she finally thought he bought her a Mercedes. RIP mom.

Man this is how I get. I used to wonder about my neighbors restoring cars from their youth like tri five chevys and old trucks. I think I’ve become that dude with my 80s Benzes.

Love em. Have fun today guys!

vwnate1 · #9 11-17-2019, 12:24 PM

Thanx for that ~ you're lucky to have the family even of they're aging, these fond memories will last within you

.

I courted my Sweet driving her everywhere in a series of old dilapidated daily drivers, I took her to Canada in a battered Metropolitan Nash DHC, and in my '49 Chevy pickup truck to Death Valley, and in my old 1963 VW Beetle survivor .

She says we traveled more in our first year than she did in her life before meeting me .

Don't quit now .

ykobayashi · #10 12-15-2019, 08:28 AM

Some updates. I’ve been really enjoying the car. Runs great and is super smooth. Long summer here in SoCal so I really am liking my cold AC. I like the feel of driving the 123 over my 126. The big car is a nice cruiser to go up to LA on the weekends but around town on grocery and Home Depot runs the 123 is just fun.

So I pop tested my injectors. Given the amount of deferred maintenance on the car I thought they’d be overdue. The car has 167,000 miles on the odometer. The injector bodies looked like the originals on the outside. Well I pop tested them and they were perfect. Perfect balance, spray, pop pressure. No leaking. I think they were recently rebuilt. I didn’t put my Firads in. I didn’t have the heart to tear down perfectly functioning nozzles. I put it all back together and the car runs just fine like it did.

I got sick and tired of the tiny oil spot on my driveway. The car drips one drop of oil whenever I park it in front of my garage. In the past I’d let my old diesels drip but it makes my white driveway look spotty. So I’ve started chasing the leak. I’ve found several leaks now. Or maybe they’re moving around as I plug them up. I pulled my balancer and sealed the front seal. Then I noticed there was weeping around the oil pan. I checked the dozen screws and some were very loose. Oil slowed down a lot. I’ve been power washing the engine and driving and checking daily. Looks like the latest is the vacuum pump gasket. I will get to that next week.

I also changed a cracked balljoint boot. Preventative maintenance. Those BJs are hard to change so I just greased and booted it since it was still tight and relatively clean inside. Got a boot off a $15 Duralast BJ. Turned out to be a TRW resold by Autozone. Got some new boots on order from Poly Boots on eBay. Little Eastern European outfit that makes really nice urethane boots. For cheap. $7.50 for two. I realized it would be nice to have a couple on the shelf for emergencies. It’s nice to be able to catch the cracks early before my ball joint gets ruined. I changed them on my w126 and I do not want to do thatjob anymore.

Kind of like I keep a few Astoria cv boots on the shelf. For my cars. If you can catch a cracked boot early, new grease and a new boot will carry you down the road for quite some time. I’ve made the mistake of driving around with cracked boots and letting water and sand get in there. Then they get toasted and rebooting isn’t an option.

Ok, enough rambling. Keep wrenching.

Fun stuff. It’s been about a year and three months. Things are really coming together for this daily driver. I feel like kind of an idiot for spending close to $5k parts + purchase price but it has turned out to be a nice car and I don’t count my labor because it is fun.

I keep seeing nice cars on Craigslist but I have to stay away. In my mind I’m thinking, oh man if I just started with that one I’d be further ahead money wise. This car needed a lot of little fixes. Like electricals, seals, broken door latches, broken window regulators, broken mirrors, broken AC. But it had a recently rebuilt tranny, a tight engine, no rust, good suspension/steering components.

vwnate1 · #11 12-15-2019, 06:12 PM

Thanx for the follow up .

I've logged plenty of miles on both and for driving enjoyment I'll take the W123 every time .

I tend to drive a bit more spiritedly than most, that may affect one's choice .

ykobayashi · #12 12-19-2019, 09:12 PM

I started chasing my oil leak really hard. The front seal I changed did not stop the leak. There was a leak there but I think oil was coming from other places. The oil pan cinch up didn't help much either even though it was loose.

I noticed the spot moved around on the engine and less and less oil dripped on the driveway. So I was making progress.

Pretty routine stuff. I have done this job on the SD so I'm pretty familiar with the balancer install. I use the same campstove to heat the balancer. Works like a charm. Seal went in without a hitch. I didn't even round out any allen bolts on the pulley this time. Yay!

Vacuum pump gasket was in bad shape. The bearings and swash plate look okay.

Got it all back together and whoa...no oil spot on driveway today after a long drive. I left it on the driveway for hours. Hopefully this is it.

ykobayashi · #13 01-03-2020, 09:14 PM

Oh, still leaked. Not fixed by the prior fixes. The oil seemed to drip from another place.

I tightened up the oil pan again. Then I changed the oil drain plug and washer. I used a shop vac on the crankcase vent on the valve cover to hold the oil in the engine while I swapped plugs. Saw this on YouTube. It works, the oil was held in the engine and I didn’t spill a drop. This was good because I just changed oil and didn’t want to drain it out.

Finally no more drips on the driveway.

The car is really shaping up.

ykobayashi · #14 08-07-2020, 09:23 PM

Hey Everyone,

Hope you're all surviving the pandemic as well as possible.

My blue 300D has been just great. I'm using it as my grocery getter when I enter the outbreak zone on my hunter gatherer trips once a week. Has been really running and handling well. A joy. I got a little knock as I went over some bumps and I decided to regrease my ball joints. Used these great urethane boots I got on ebay for cheap. The joints were still in good shape but the car really quieted down with new grease.

Another bug I sorted today was the blower has been intermittent. I was thinking it was a brush or a bad motor but I took it apart a month ago and the brushes were fine. I have the Seimens motor. The syptom was whenever it got really hot the fan would just quit. I tried tapping on the ccu buttons and wiggling the fuses and wiggling the connectors on the fan resistor but no luck.

The big problem is it was intermittent. Like it would quit when I was shopping in socal heat. Then I get it back in my garage and it starts working again when I get out my tools and voltmeter. Almost impossible to debug when it was doing this.

Well today the blower quit for good. I tried it an hour after letting it cool and it started for three seconds then quit. I got out my meter and saw power at the plug to the blower so that isolated it to the motor. Then I tore down the motor and checked the resistance of the coil. 15 kohms!

So then it was just a matter of tracing the problem through the leads, connections and to the brushes to find out where the bad connection was. I was expecting to get a few ohms end to end. Found the bad connection on a corroded and burned crimp between the brush braid and a coil on the positive side inside the motor. Here are the images for future reference.

I saved a few dollars today. I was ready to buy the URO blower but I think I got it. Just resoldered the connection and it goes now.

Stay healthy friends!

vwnate1 · #15 08-08-2020, 01:19 AM

Nice ! .

I've discovered that the standard BOSCH blower motor will still draw a lot of current with new brushes unless I take them apart and clean out all the dust and soak the oilite bushings in oil, then they work *much* better .

It's a seriously fiddly job and the delicate fiber thrust washers are easy to break so I keep a could old motors on hand .

I'm really looking forward to trying the re designed Uro blower motor .

I'm in Indio, Ca. to - day and running the A/C flat out in my '82 240D, it's working great but I want to replace the blower motor on my '84 wagon ere long .