My 240 is a slug compared to others

[bennett]

Sorry but I have to try to get to the root of the problem. I posted last month about some of my symptoms. Here is a little more detail. My one owner previous 81' 240d is so slow on take off compared to another with many more miles. I just have no- get up and go in first gear and it slowly gets better in second. There is no hestitation in any gears just lack of any power in 1st.Flat out highway and 65+ is no problem. #rd gear is a real puller. The car flies in higher gears.
I ran it next to another 80' 240d and this other car smoked me bad on take off and performance. I invite any Utah peeps to come drive them. It really approaches the performace of a 300D.

Here is what I have ....
81' 240 purchased in Germany 1981 on the MB Import program.
Car lived it's whole live in So cal and Las Vegas. The car was garaged and
maintained by a Independent MB dealer in Vegas.
The vehicle was driven by an older couple, mostly driven by the elderly lady. I spoke with here after I got the car at auction. It had a minor fender hit.
Oodmeter is 136xxx and is actual
What I have done:
Adjusted valves
Changed filters
Change oil to Delo 400
put one can of Greased Lightning ( as suggested on this forum) in the tank and saw no difference.
No visible chain stretch.
Very little blow-by

MY questions are this...

What should the IP be set at using the bubble method and accounting for my 4500' elevation.
I see 2 banjo bolts on the IP.. do they need attention/cleaning?
The other 240d I raced.. (yeah like you can race) looked to have his IP retarded heavily( rotated away from motor about 3/8 more than mine..
I would figure worse performance on his but again his is a rocket ship compared to mine.
I know this motor is capable of more power in 1st gear and beginning second cause I have driven one that does.
Help with suggestions...After 2nd .. 3rd and 4th it goes like a cut cat but
i need to purchase binoculars to look for oncoming traffic when entering the freeway as it is now... Help?
IP or injector problem.. what do you think?

thanks
and I did search.. most of the post's suggest to live with 240 low power but I know there is something wrong at takeoff.

[leathermang]

As the owner of a 1980 240d manual shift myself I suggest that you turn up your turbocharger a little...since you are at such an extreme elevation.. it sure helped on mine....
LOL....

The first and cheapest things to do IMO is to do the Diesel Purge by the book, check your timing chain stretch and set the IP. I do not know about the bubble method .... I have not seen that in the FSM... I think that was gotten from the guy in Waco....

I don't know what you mean by " no visible chain stretch".... the FSM specifically says " if you have a performance complaint" and YOU DO,.... then the stretch must be checked using the 2mm movement of the number one intake valve method.....

I bought my car cheap because number one cylinder read very low compression and it was using a quart of oil per 300 miles... but it is very perky and always gets 24 mpg...it had some oil leaks and I know it needs valve seals....

[barry123400]

It was possibly mentioned on your previous post. Are you positive you are getting full linkage movement at the pump by observation. The pedal when on the floor should have the pump arm fully advanced. Just get someone to hold the pedal down and see if you can push the pump arm any farther. Seen too many 240s with less than optimum linkage movement. I would even hazard a guess there are still a lot of 240s out there with this problem although it might not be yours.

[300SDog]

An old lady's diesel benz? The car might be dead meat since diesels combust on their own accord they are alot like creatures of habbit and will break in at different optimal torque and hp power bands depending on how they've been driven especially for the first 150k miles. I've seen this myself with fleet vehicles. Among several issuzu diesel trucks there were some that cooked and others were slugs. The ones used for local city deliveries tended to be slowest of the lot.

Carbon build on pre-comb chambers, piston crowns and valves can be major factor too..... If it was me, i'd take the car out and beat the crap out of it at high rpms for an extended road trip.

[ajb]

Hi,
Maybe running a can of diesel purge through the injectors might help. It made a big difference on my 240d 3 years ago. Make sure you run directly into the IP - not in the tank.

A. Berzins

How are things with fuel delivery to the IP (Tank not under vac., strainer clean, good fuel, etc).

Just a thought

[Diesel Giant]

Run some diesel purge through it and then a good "Italian" tuneup

[Big J]

I've got an '81 240D with 102K miles on it. I purchased it with 95K miles on it. An older lady owned the car and drove it very few miles each day to work (in town driving). This car was a slug as well. When I first purchased this car I babied it, 60 mph max on the hwy. After all it is a 24 year old car. After reading on this forum, it has been suggested that you, "drive it like you stole it." So, on takeoff, I come close to flooring it and drive on the hwy at 75 to 80 mph. After about 4K miles, the difference in performance is amazing. I do run Diesel Power in each tank of fuel. I am also running slightly larger tires than spec.

All that being said, when the A/C is on all bets are off, I'm like you and grab the binoculars to see if it is clear to pull into traffic.

[300SDog]

Yeah but why 'almost floor it' ? If that's a stick shift then you can hammer down and mash the accelerator through the floorboards most of the time and even take it 5mph above the shift range before grabbing your next gear.

If its an automatic then teach yourself to feather the pedal off the floor and control the shifts that way. Of course when the automatic finds its next higher gear, gotta let up on the accelerator to engage it smoothly you understand.

And if you wanna downshift the automatic then hammer down hard when the engine starts to lug at low rpm's and begins to bottom the gears. Otherwise tendency of the torque converter is to lug along at rpm's far below the optimal power band and thats what gums up the engine.

These are not fragile or delicate automobiles that need to be babied. And dunno what the big deal is about driving 25 yr old cars. Full throttle aint gonna hurt anything. In fact its likely to keep yer injectors and pump running more smoothly with greater fuel pressure applied most of the time. Whatever excess fuel pressure is produced gets routed through the return lines back to the tank anyhow, you understand.

When I think of diesel MB's being babied, the image of riding the clutch and brake pedals while hardly sending any fuel pressure through the system at all comes to mind..... and that's probably the worst thing you can do to the 240D aside from never changing the oil, bouncing off curbs and grinding the gears.

Old lady cars are great to find for having excellent cosmetics and low mileage. But I think it takes up to 6 months of driving em real hard to clean 1/8" carbon off the pistons crowns, valves and pre-comb chambers to get em to run right. These are self combusting engines, you understand, and have gotta have clean combustion chambers to fire hot for best performance. Otherwise they just foul out and never completely burn the fuel, varnishing the jets and layering carbon all over the pist crowns, valves and pc chambers instead.


(edit: This is the truly great feature of the 240D that 5cyl 300's cannot match: With the stick shift 240D, you can litterally be driving full throttle maxing out the engine and constantly shifting gears in narrow power band with all sorts of special effects that make you feel like a genuine animal behind the wheel...... all this and more while taking an ordinary drive abiding with posted speed limits. Sure there are some uber fast turbo cdi's out there now - but nobody hardly ever gets to max em out or run the engines at levels of maximum performance and thats something that 240D drivers are doing all the time.

[t walgamuth]

dont forget you can race everybody every day.... and they dont even know it.

tom w

Originally Posted by t walgamuth

dont forget you can race everybody every day.... and they dont even know it.

tom w

Last week some kid on a Big Wheel caught on that I was racing him in the 240D.

[t walgamuth]

who won?

tom w

Originally Posted by t walgamuth

who won?

tom w

Still waiting for someone to cross the finish line.

[t walgamuth]

answer.

tom w