R&R Distributor Cap and Rotor
 

Well, I thought it would be a few minutes.... seems a lot of things with MB takes more than a few minutes.... How does one remove the Cap and Rotor on an 89 300E? There appears to be not enough clearance between the Cap and the engine cooling fan to simply pull it off. Cap/Rotor on my car have been on for 230k km and probably at least needs to be looked at. Seems this is one possibility for my slightly rough idle? Any pointers much appreciated.

- cheers

I think you do have to take the fan + shroud off, if only to give your hands more room to work. Assuming you have the right tools, I think the most difficult part of the job is:

1. removing the plug wires from the cap.
2. accessing the bottom allen screw for the cap.

But most especially #1. The rest of it isn't bad.

'seezy.....you will need a 5mm Allen key. There are three allen head socket screws for the cap and the rotor.
One is hidden at 6 o'clock under the cap.

Can do with fan shroud installed.

with fan installed
 

if you do remove it with the fan installed be careful whith the center coil electrode on the inside of the cap, it can be damaged when pulling the cap out, (if you are not going to replace it) or while installing the new one.

That's another reason the fan has a few 'wide' spaced blades. :)



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ah yes lest we forget the wide blade spaces (I suspect they are there to reduce caviation but they sure are handy for the Distributor cap and rotor service.)

dist cap -> 5mm allen
rotor -> 3mm

I always remove the fan 1st.

Ahhh, geez, I've never noticed..... who'd have thunk :rolleyes: Many thanks to Carson 356 for the 'heads-up' re the center coil electrode. No problem getting the 5mm Allens out - even the one at 5 o'clock (hey, I just finished removing my water pump :cool: ). My problem was with the available clearance to try and 'fold' the cap up onto the top of the engine to have a look at it and the rotor and how good/bad things generally looked in there. I did and try to yank the wires off but quickly came to the conclusion that it would be more of the same as getting the wires off the plugs.... only likely worse. Mind you, meanwhile I've learned that simply giving the wires a 'determined' tug at the plug will make them come off.

- cheers, will give this a try

ps. any comments about the 220k km (140k miles) with the same cap/rotor?

You suspect incorrectly...the design brief was for noise. :)




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