well I thought I would bring this thread up to date, the above 280 was written off when a taxi decided he wanted to sit on the back seat this was 2009. we then searched for over 18 months for another suitable 280 manual, we eventually found 2 I think rayo - bigperm bought the white one and I bought a black one.. (there is one on ebay currently, they seem to pop up like buses none for a while then they all turn up at once).
so the project started again this model has an early FBW system ( its the last phase M104 engine c class they did before moving to the v6) it has only covered 66k miles whihc is nice, although the old one had over 160k and still went like a stabbed rat.
I bought this from newcastle cheap easy jet flight 500 notes later and I was making my way back to south wales I later found out its a cat c but was repaired by the previous owner back in 2001 via a mercedes dealer not much damaged just a new rear quarter but for what I want the car for the history is irrelevant, its drives straight and true and was inspected by vosa after repair so happy days. it wasnt running right it had a huge vacuum leak but still got me back to wales on 1 tank . it turned out to be the inlet resonance valve which I managed to get of ebay for £19 and order was resumed.
since then my brother and I have started all over again with the turbo conversion idea. I have almost everything I need before we finally crack on. we have a proper gt35/t04z dual ball bearing turbo this cost more than the cars purchase price 8-) 8-) 8-) ( it made 700bhp on the lads subaru), aem ecu ;D, 500cc injectors from a mustang, stage 4 clutch from spec in the us ( rated to 525ftlbs), ebay intercooler, turbo exhaust manifold, precision 39mm external wastegate. also ferriday engineering manufactured a decompression plate for me out of an old head gasket, this should lower the cr to a level where we can add some proper boost 8-) 8-) 8-).
the bottoms ends on these engines are very strong all that is needed is a set of rod bolts that I have got from a lad in sweden. he runs a standard m104 at 700bhp with only rod bolts has done for 3 years.
brakes - I have fitted cl500 4 pot brembos with slk320 amg 330mm discs, with some goodridge lines, ebc yellow stuff pads, these will be chnaged to carbotech xp10's very soon.

power to start with will be around 400 see how the gearbox copes, if it fails whihc I expect it too then a 190 cosworth getrag will be needed.
then we can start having some real fun. I would like to max the turbo out eventually
the aem ecu is all wired in and working a few little niggles to iron out but almost there, once the clutch arrives the spare flywheel I managed to source from german ebay will go to ttv to have a light weight version made up. also I am in talks with elite transmissions to make me a plated rear diff unit, or depending on price could just weld it up
it will have a 3" exhaust system from the turbo thanks to my good friend


new brembo cl500 4 pots

ferriday engineering decompression plate

external wastegate

bought some new wheels and got them painted

turbo exhaust manifold

aem ecu

gt35/t04z hybrid from cr turbos

made up some water and oil feed lines

I do like the interior - shame its getting ripped out. also fitted a new steering wheel

Not messing around are you? I used the 280 block on my latest engine because it had the oil squirters in it. The 320 blocks that I have seen on hfm have not. I do not know what the cut off is or when and why. Lots of assumptions out there including my own but I really have not seen an actual pattern. I am guessing that it is compression related. 10:1 has them and 9.2:1 does not. The blocks are the same bore though. Swap the 3.2l crank, rods, and pistons and go.

It's MY1995. It has nothing to do with compression. It's a production break that's listed in the FSM.

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1993 190E 2.6 Sportline

Is it before or after 1995? I have found a lot of conflicting data on m104 engines. I have found different compression ratio info etc. The only thing I have found on oil squirters that has been consistent is the compression ration on motors I have taken apart. That is not a lot of them that I have paid any attention to. But I have two more that I can look at at the shop right now when I get a chance. My 1990 cis m104 had squirters and I am pretty sure that the engine I started with in my efi m104 was a 1994 engine. It did not. The c280 engine does. Flat top pistons vs dished. The two I have right now are 1994s I will look and see.

Sorry the production breakpoint was 1/94. The piston has not got anything to do with it. .94 engines always have flat top/slight dome and the .99 usually have dish. Why? because there is 400cc's in difference and the heads are exactly the same. Gotta keep the compression ratio.

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1993 190E 2.6 Sportline

Will be switching to haltech or link ecu for better controll in the future but for now the aem will do. It is impressive or a piggyback system

Also hoping to fit a 6 speed from a w203 when the current 5 speed dies

Can't wait should be fun

Well that makes sense. I had not thought of the dish being from the increased bore or stroke. That is interesting. Makes me want to actually do some calculations. If the additional stroke from a 280 to a 320 requires a dish to keep the compression at 10:1 then What would it be without the dish. Also on the 3.6 with more bore and stroke and a flat top why is it only 11.5 or whatever? Also the .980 motors have flat top pistons and the bore is only a tad bit smaller. I wonder how many cc the heads are different by.

Awesome project dude! All the best with it good pics too!

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um.....why have men got nipples

Bore is only a tad bit smaller but the stroke is also 80.25mm as opposed to 84mm. The dish may look similar between the AMG 3.6 and the 3.2 but the bore is still significantly larger and compression still goes up, just not as much as one would think. The CC's on all of the heads I've CC'd were the same (44cc's IIRC, I cant remember) .94, .98, and .99. Given that the 3.6 was bumped to 10.5 CR over 10.0, the dish would have only had to go from 7cc to 11cc which isn't that much given that the bore increased 1.1mm (assuming that the HG's of both assumed 4cc's of volume).


Doesn't exactly seem like much when you think about it.

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1993 190E 2.6 Sportline

I am pretty sure that the 3.6 is a flat top piston though. My buddy just had one apart last year and took pictures of everything. I will double check.
It is funny I have had hundreds of these apart and just not paid any attention to them because I was just doing a job. Now that I want to know they are not in every day getting headgaskets like they use to.

You know we should not drag this out on this thread though. I was thinking we should have a sticky thread on engine data that is fact. Like cc of heads and compatible parts between engines. Bore and stroke data etc. Would be handy instead of having to look it up every time.

The 3.6 is flat topped I'll post pics of my internals later

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Jay,
-----------------
-1995 Blue W202 C36 AMG (M) SOLD ;(
-1995 Black W140 S500 (Lady)
-1992 Black W124 E300 (Dima) (Ex-Mosselman
Twin turbo Kit).
-1988 Black W124 300 E 4-Matic.(Nadeen)
-1983 Brown W126 500SEL.(Old Lady)(Sold)
-1981 Gold W123 280CE.(Dareen)(Sold)
http://www.youtube.com/user/jayrasheed

Apparently not all of them. Of all the AMG materials you've posted, none of them allude to altering the combustion chamber in any fashion.

Here's a pic I found of a C36 piston, it's dished just not alot but with 11cc's of dish it really doesn't need to be, you'd also have to check to see what the piston height is relative to the deck height.

The valves are the same part numbers and the only thing on the head that AMG mentions modifying are the Intake cam and exhaust port. The rest of the head is stock 2.8/3.2. Past that it would have to be HG or a change in the pistons so its net compression height is lower.

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1993 190E 2.6 Sportline

Of all the m104 engines I have had apart I have never noticed a difference in the piston proudness. I do not think that all of this is so straight forward as I have said. I have found a lot of conflicting data about compression ratios in Mercedes WIS and other areas. I have a print out somewhere of all the compression ratios. Mercedes has always been horrible in these areas of info though. I can not tell you how many times I have been in an argument with a parts guy or fellow tech about something that we would all assume to be fact based on literature or the parts system to only have a car in front of you that proves that all of that info is wrong. Don't even get me started about wiring diagrams.

Fair enough, but I looked it up and I was wrong the first time, the volume of the combustion chamber is actually 48cc's, not 44 and this is using the dished intake valves. There are a couple of different valves, but they're all 35mm/31mm and from what I've seen the intakes are all dished while the exhausts are all flat.

Edit: with 48mm that means that the 2.8 piston has to make up 3cc's give or take, the 3.2 piston has to loose 5cc's, the 3.0 has to lose 2cc's, and the 3.6 has to loose 9cc's. This isn't including the HG, on the stock bores that's about 2cc's which means the 3.0 comes out perfect (the original displacement/cr on which the engine was designed), the 2.8 needs a 5cc dome, and the 3.2 needs a 3cc dish. I hope you don't think these are exactly extreme. I calculated the bore using 91mm for the 3.6 and assuming the standard .5mm HG of the stock motors, you just need a .7mm dish or 5cc's. A flat top piston (assuming 48cc's + 4cc for HG) on a 3.6 would be 11.5CR I don't buy it's that high...

But you're right, this is for a different thread.

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1993 190E 2.6 Sportline