Hello, I have a 1986 190e 2.3L 5-speed. The car runs well and starts up good when cold, but requires 4-6 cranking attempts to start after it is driven and turned off for at least an hour or so. The idle is sometimes choppy and it has stalled once in traffic while idling. I have resoldered an open joint in the OVP relay that was causing the relay to be inoperative. The relay works now and I load tested it with a test light before reinstalling it. That seemed to help it run a bit better.

Meanwhile the fuel tank started leaking, so I have been fixing that. Once I had the fuel drained, I decided to check the fuel distributor and airflow sensor plate. I had previously noticed that the plate was too far down in the housing, so I adjusted it by tapping the pin up from the bottom until the plate came to rest where it is supposed to, according to the shop manual. I also checked the voltage on the airflow potentiometer, and it stayed low for the first bit of plate travel, then smoothly increased up to 11.7 v (didn't check battery) so it seems to be providing a good signal, I think.

The airflow meter plate still does not rise up high enough to strike the rubber stop above it. The shop manual says that the plate must "audibly strike the resilient stop" when it comes up. On mine, the stop is on a brass bar screwed down to the airflow housing. The bar has a bit of arch to it, and I am wondering if this bar is supposed to be flat, which would place the stop closer to the top of the airflow meter plate. Is this a big deal?

Also, I checked for evidence that the plunger seal was leaking and found that there was a good amount of staining from fuel, but since the fuel system was empty I did not pressurize the system and check for leakage. Is the plunger seal something worth worrying about?

Spark plugs are Bosch Platinum that came with the car, I plan to change them since the center electrodes look like they have receded, and I know they are bad for this car. But the appearance of the plugs seems to show a clean burn, no blackness or weird deposits. So I think the mixture is good, but will it need to readjusted after repositioning the plate?

I don't know how the mileage is, since the odometer is not working and we haven't really had the car long enough to fix everything.