I'm summarizing some things here (only a part of the overall story) so that others may benefit from it and know that, in the end, these cars can really run great (at least until anything else happens, but for 10 years I drove this car previousy with very few issues).

After first getting reamed by an incredibly expensive mechanic prone to lots of error, then accepting I'd have to really do work on this car myself and "own" the outcome of any work by me or anyone else, then after clearly seeing the need to fix everything done by one of my mechanics, at least now there is total peace with this car. An old MB (in this case a 1984 380SL) can run fast, quietly, smoothly, they can run cool, and everything on the dashboard can be what it is ;-) I'm summarizing some things here (only a part of the overall story) so that others may benefit from it and know that, in the end, these cars can really run great. A few observations:

-- Note if you have a good mechanic they are worth gold. They exist, many of them post on this website. But if you don't, and you can't find one, you better learn to work on these cars yourself somewhat or at least learn and manage their work maximally. Working on them is fun. Finding a good trustworthy mechanic is hard work, I have continually been unable to achieve that.

-- I found a vacuum leak under the fuel distributor housing. A mechanic had recently put a new fuel distributor in there. There is a little o-ring there that needs to be replaced and lubricated when you replace the fuel distributor. If you don't you car will idle like crap unless you richen the heck out of it. Guess what. That mechanic used the old o-ring and didn't lubricate it. Lesson Learned? Obviously question the mechanic if you need to (more on that in a moment when we see he wants to sell me a manifold gasket job). Note I found this leak by spraying carborator cleaner in the seam between the distributor and the air sensor housing (and everywhere else before I found the leak). The idle smoothed-out when I did that. The mechanic who screwed this up used the old o-ring. I made him take the fuel distributor off in front of me and there it was, all torn-up. You have to give him credit though, he did it right away when I asked (the next day) and did it in front of me. Note this same mechanic insisted, before I found this problem, that the cause of my problems was a manifold leak and wanted to sell me a manifold job (do all the gaskets). He was consistent on that, his quote was also expensive. God knows what other things would have broken had I ever been stupid enough to go that route with this person in particular.

-- The next lesson though is that, after that, the car was all gunked-up from running rich for so long (I had it adjusted rich). The emissions were still poor (the CO rating was still high in idle). The solution is 1 large container of Chevron Techron. I now swear by that stuff, it is really excellent and had much more of an affect than the comparable BG product I used (though to be fair, I did not do a side-by-side test with all the same conditions, so my observation there could be flawed).

-- After the first two items, here's what I immediately noticed: 1) My guess gas mileage almost DOUBLED. I had really crap gas mileage before. With the Techron in there, I got something like 15 to 18 miles per gallon on average and that was with me gunning the engine full throttle to run it hard. On the highly I imagine it can do better, I haven't seen the original MB manufacturers spec's on the car (I have them somewhere). For 10 years I owned this car I think I had 12 at best, something like that. Before the Techron and this problem, I was getting 9 miles per gallon.

-- I then did another emissions test for all five gasses. Guess what, it tested-out like a new car. Almost no emissions across the board-- less than 1/3rd to 1/10th of the state threshold which is really tough. This car has a similar emissions profile to a brand new one.

-- The 380 engine has A LOT of power when it's running right and the timing is set right (mine is at factory). I owned this car for 10 years and had no idea what kind of power the engine could have. I get immediate response from the accellerator and even at speed this thing really jams on it. I've taken a number of folks for rides in it who own new BMW's and they are really surprised by the performance.

-- The engine's idle is smooth as silk, and I mean it. It's as smooth as my new Infiniti. No hiccups, nothing. The engine just sits there and hums. THese cars CAN have a smooth idle. Note when cold they are like all cars slightly rough but not much. And again, that's with an outstanding emissions result also. In terms of emissions, here are the results:

HC 55 ppm
NO 196 ppm
CO% .19
CO2% 15.2
O2% 0.0

I note there is no O2 in there which surprised me. The percent for O2 at the stochiometric level is only something like .5% anyway, so I'd think I'm probably OK there anyway. There's a new catalytic converter in there that's apparently doing an excellent job (Miller aftermarket-- also two new pre-cats from Miller).

-- Note I was successful at getting this car into what I ** think ** from the performance is lamda without using a dwell meter on the frequency valve to test on/off ratio generated by the oxygen sensor. I used a CO2 meter (GasTester) which I have a love-hate relationship with but, if you are patient, really does work. I set without using the CO2 meter but verified values while in drive giving me some hope that I was on the right track. The actually turn of the CO screw was done without a CO2 meter though. I leaned the car out as much as I good before I got a lean idle miss. I drove to work-in that setting, increased it, drove again, increased it, drove again, and so forth until I had an idle that satisfied me as very smooth (consistently). I stopped there. This is the setting that is currently in the car.

Sounds like I am on the front end of this adventure you just completed.

Outstanding post for all of us with older rides that are trying to get them back to optimal perfromance.

Thanks for the info, it was a great read and sounds like you now have a machine worthy of that seat of the pants rush you can only get by opening it up and lettin it fly.

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89 190E
2.6L
Arctic white
Grey leather
Sunroof
Pirelli P400 rubber
Smoked corners