See post #15.

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84 300D, 82 Volvo 244Gl Diesel

I have smelled coolant leaks before and also Oil on a hot exhaust manifold. It did not smell like a coolant leak but then I was on the freeway.

The mistake made was not looking at the tem gauge.

New Water Pump is already on. Waiting for the new thermostat, belts, radiator hoses and new coolant recover tank because a few years ago I patched mine.
I already have new fire wall heater hoses which I bough like in 2010.

Also i am changing the oil which despite the overheating smelled normal.

I am going to put an coolant temp alarm on. I have some electric fan switch sensors and the buzzer is already there from my old low oil pressure alarm.

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84 300D, 82 Volvo 244Gl Diesel

Yes. See post #15 I had block sealant that has copper particles in it and I later added some reddish colored radiator sealant tablets. That is why there is a reddish coating on the inside of the coolant system.

I did that 5.5 years ago when the other water pump leaked incase there was a head gasket issue caused by that overheating.

Maybe I will use block sealant again.

The next time I take a picture of a part I am going to clean it off first and avoid the controversy.

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84 300D, 82 Volvo 244Gl Diesel

Perhaps "former" would have been a more accurate description.



Old is relative. My 81 yr old bike riding friend has a 65 year old wife. Seems to be doing pretty well - drives a Mercedes, recently down sized to a 5000 sq ft house with less maintenance and has a young(er) wife.

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85SD 240K & stopped counting painted, putting bac together. 84SD 180,000. sold to a neighbor and member here but I forget his handle. The 84 is much improved from when I had it. 85TD beginning to repair to DD status. Lots of stuff to do.

Well, to be fair, I'm going by the color, the visible sediment around the gasket, the necessary part swapping, the coolant leak fix in the form of that copper solution and the fact that you've overheated twice now.

You've got more time on the experience clock than I do by an order of magnitude. And no deduction is ever fool proof. Though based on what I've learned and experienced since owning my 240, when it comes to the cooling system in these cars, there is either a maintained and optimal system or one that is waiting to fail. Yours sounds like its on borrowed time.

Curious to hear how it goes.

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1981 240D 4sp manual. Ivory White.

I don't know if anything was seriously damaged and won't till I drive it again.

The thing is with the Mercedes I have never overheated due to a radiator being plugged. The fist time it overheated it was due to a leaking water pump and while My Wife saw the temp gauge her response was to pull over and let it cool off. When it cooled of she continued driving till it over heated again and did that one more time to get her home.
She had no clue about adding more water or coolant.

I put the 2 sealants in to deal with any head gasket issue if there was on.

Then with the recent over heat I see a Water Pump leak again and later I find the broken Thermostat.
I can't connect either of those to a light reddish particulate coating.

I grew up with Cars that only used Water in the Cooling System so at least at one time I was more familiar with rust in a coolant system then now. I don't ever recall rust in the system eating Water Pumps.

I do recall the rust plugging radiators and over heating mostly being caused by that. If the Engine over heating badly after several weeks later I have seen Water Pump Bearings or seals go bad and I think it was from the over heating.
Only occasionally did Water Pumps leak and I have always owned used cars that who knows how long the Water Pump was on there.

A different issue is that except at the Naval Shipyard most of my Mechanical experience is with Vehicles that people made money off of. The emphasis was on getting the Vehicle running and back making money for the owner.

There was some times when the Customer actually stood next to me while worked just waiting to jump back in his truck and get back on the road.

The short story is the work I did was no frills and had to be reliable but that was it.

The Naval Shipyard was entirely different. There the most important thing was you had to follow procedure. And you got a lot of time to do that and you could waste a lot of time doing it. You could take all of the breaks you wanted but you had to either be drinking coffee or outside smoking a cigarette.
You also got paid if you want to the Credit Union at the Base.

Depending on what you were doing a quality control guys checked on what you did and your measurements.

Since we were rebuilding Engines and components we did little troubleshooting although we did take apart the Engines on the ship and bring the parts in to work on them.

Whole different environment.

I never was a Car Mechanic. Although I did maintain the Gassers of my employers.

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84 300D, 82 Volvo 244Gl Diesel

This is off subject sort of. When I stared up with this forum and I also was signed up with several other Mercedes forums I found that there is some people that have chronic high temp (not overheating but close) issues and chronic low charging system issues that seem not to be solvable despite their numerous attempts to fix the issues.

It is almost like their particular cars are lemons. My car has never exhibited any high temp issues (except with the coolant leaks mentioned) even when I have driven out to the desert and my charging rate had been low but adequate.
I was able over the years to gradually to raise my charging voltage.

In particular I always though it was odd that that they never seemed to be able to deal with the high temp issue.

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84 300D, 82 Volvo 244Gl Diesel

I wouldn't bother with the alarm.

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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.