Hi All,

I am having a problem locating an ignition module for our 1992 300CE. I found a site that states that they can rebuild our old one for about $600.00. This guy also had an auction on e-bay to sell a repair...when I called, the gentleman was gruff and was evasive to every question I asked him... I am wondering if anyone has heard of him or used his service located in Pompano Florida, before I make a decision as to what to do. My car is currently an expensive paperweight in the driveway since I can't find a module here in the U.S., Canada or even Germany that will fit....any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Eacogirl

Contact Steve Brotherton at Continental Imports in Gainesville, Fl. If anyone ccan procure a module at a honest price, he can.

http://www.continentalimports.com/

You 300CE owners should organize or unionize or something and start talking to MBUSA. It's ridiculous that 15 year old Mercedes are off the road for such a thing. They need to not only support the car but price the part reasonably - not as if they are trying to get the cars off the road. This is a potentially embarassing press story - expensive automobiles sitting in the driveway because they have been forsaken by no less than Mercedes Benz - that one time paragon of durability. The problem is allegedly some sort of a chip shortage, but more than likely the real problem is a lack of attention.

i have been through this with one of my client's cars.if you find a used one they are expensive.it also seems that they will all go out after about 13-15yrs.so if you buy a used one no way of even guessing how long will last.i am afraid you have no option but to buy a new one.they are not much more than they were 6 yrs ago.the reason they cannot be rebuilt is because they were filled with epoxy to make them last. david poole european performance dallas tx.

Certainly, their function can be reverse-engineered (although how this would ever pass any pollution control board I don't know). Looks like an opportunity!

__________________
86 560SL
With homebrew first gear start!
85 380SL
Daily Driver Project

http://juliepalooza.8m.com/sl/mercedes.htm

On a similar note, I bought a 420SEL module as an emergency spare for my 560. They apparently have very slightly different advance curves, but I'm hoping it will work if I need it (it might even work better...). All I can think of that could be going on in there is a big-a$$ transistor, a vacuum transducer, tach input (from the crank sensor), etc, and a CPU with a map of rpm-vacuum-ignition timing. MAYBE in that era this was done entirely with analog circuitry but I doubt it.

There is a guy on eBay who is selling a 3rd party (euro) version of a 380/500SEL (sl?) module, so cloning these modules apparently can be done.

As I see it, there can be two main electronic failure points in the thing, one obvious, one not-so-obvious:

1. High temperature, "wear-out", or possibly bad ignition wires or a coil can blow the output transistor. I thoroughly cleaned and sanded the bottom of my "new" module, and I will install it if I ever have to with heat sink compound (basically, what MB had on it in the first place). If it's misinstalled or if the compound gets old or washed away (from age, for example) the module may not be able to disappate heat into the body mount. Given the value of these things, If I ever need to replace one, I'll replace the coil and ignition wires preventatively.

2. More worrisome, the CPU inside may use one-time-programmable EPROM technology to store its programming; chips of that era generally were guaranteed by the manufacturer to store their programming only for 10-20 years or so. It would only take one bit out tens of thousands to cause a "checksum" fault and the entire thing would probably not work by design - potentially bad programming will automatically cause it not to run.

__________________
86 560SL
With homebrew first gear start!
85 380SL
Daily Driver Project

http://juliepalooza.8m.com/sl/mercedes.htm