Just wrote a long post to start a new thread, but apparently lost it some how. Will start again as I need to find a way to get my car running.

My car suffered a radiator hose/gooseneck break while we were nearing home. Drove it into my drive to find the entire front quarter of the car drenched in coolant. Was able to reattach the hose and refill the coolant. Allowed the car to run twenty minutes to see that it was running ok and there was no apparent problems with the car as a result of the hose break.

The next morning the car tried to start for a split second as I cranked it, but that was it. Turned over fine for an entire fresh battery, but not another sputter.

Drained the already low tank of gas and replaced the fuel filter. No signs of any abnormality here but because of the commotion of the hose break, I had forgotten my tank was nearly empty and letting it run to see if it was ok after the refilling the coolant, had run the tank really nearly empty.

Check the spark coil, and found I had nearly a half inch of arch to ground seemed fine to me. Pulled the plugs and found heavy brown grey ash on the back plugs to almost no ash on the front plugs. Car had been running well (although I can not see how with the level of buildup on the back plugs,) but now and again would die at a light, but would restart quickly and not have the problem again for a while. Never any indication that it was burning oil - always a clean exaust.

Replaced the plugs, plug wires and coil wire, and found that the rotor and cap were badly burned. I scraped and cleaned the rotor and cap and replaced it until I could get new. With new plugs and wires, the car started with difficulty, and ran with difficulty - seemed to be missing and lunging when I drove around the block. Let it run a bit more sitting, and then shut it off, waited a bit and restarted it. Started with out difficulty.

Next morning, it would not start at all - cranked with no problems, but nothing doing with any signs of ignition - did try to run-on a bit after I turned off the key and while in the process of coming to a complete stop.
Replaced the rotor and cap with new. No help, still gave no signs of starting.

Pulled the new plugs and from the night before, going around the block and the morning starting effort, the plugs had a strange buildup of a sticky oily substance mixed with gas. Plugs were drenched in gas, but there was a residue on them that was more at the back two plugs than those toward the front.

Purchase two new sets of plugs. One Champions, one Bosh Platinum. Put in the Champions and nothing happened. Shot some ether into the air intake, still nothing. Pulled the Champions and put in the Bosh. The car tried to run, but could not get much going. Shot some ether again into the air intake, it tried more to run but still could not quite get there and little if any difference than from the gas line alone. Let it sit for a bit, tried without the ether, still tried to run but could not quite make it.

Pulled the Bosh plugs and found that only one plug, the very back one had any sign of firing. It was dry and grey on the porcellen. The remaining five plugs were clean and coated with clear liquid that smelled of gas and ether.

It is now sitting with the charger on the battery.

Any suggestions.

My thoughts at this point are that either it does not have enough spark, it is bringing transmission oil into the engine and I had not noticed it (the ash level on the back two plugs was amazing,) or that some how, there is too rich of a mixture.

My guess is that it is none of these, but I do not understand the fuel system enough to find the problem, and I keep thinking that somehow the liquid from the radiator hose has fouled something up that is at the bottom of the problem.

Suggestions and advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Marsden

Here's my thoughts,

I just went through a similar problem 3 months ago. I was about 2 blocks from my house when the bypass hose from the thermostat to the water pump blew and spewed coolant all over the engine and also ruined the hood pad.
The next morning I looked things over and after determining that I had oil in the coolant, (it was obvious and really messy), I narrowed it down to a bad head gasket.
I removed the head and could see the head gasket failure and apparently the cylinder compression got into the coolant passages and blew the bypass hose. I did a complete head rebuild, all new rubber hoses, new hood pad, and a few other things and everything is good now.

Check your coolant for oil contamination and do a cylinder compression test. Your spark plugs are a good indication of some type of problem that you mentioned. Sure sounds like a head gasket failure.

Good luck,

Dave

__________________

1993 190E 2.3
2001 SLK230
1971 LS5 (454) Corvette Convertible

Dave,

Thanks for the response.

I checked the coolant and found that there was no signs of oil at all. Also, the car ran fine after I replaced the coolant immediately following the break in the hose/gooseneck on the radiator.

You are right though about the hood pad. I had forgotten that, but now every time I open the hood, the pad drips another segment of it onto the engine. Yauckkk... I think I will just scrape the whole thing away.

Thanks again.

Marsden

About 2 months before my hose blew, I noticed the upper hose radiator hose was getting oily looking on top and slightly swelled at the end connections. I first thought was that my new A/C compressor was slinging refrigerant oil, but in my case it turned out be oil in the coolant was contaminating the rubber hoses. That's the reason why I had to replace all of the hoses.

Mine ran good too, but I knew there was some type of problem so I didn't just replace the hose and coolant. Hopefully, yours is just a simple hose failure.
You need to determine what is causing the fouled plugs. It could be head gasket oil passage failure. I think a compression test would be needed to verify the head gasket.

One other note, you should be using non-resistor spark plugs. I tried Platinums once and the car ran crappy, so I switched back to the non-resistor Bosch plugs. Check this link from the first sticky:
Danger: RESISTOR SPARK PLUGS

Dave

__________________

1993 190E 2.3
2001 SLK230
1971 LS5 (454) Corvette Convertible

I think a compression check makes sense. I will try to come up with a compression checker. I had one years ago, but have not worked on vehicles for some time. It would be good to understand just what is happening on these back two plugs.

At the same time it is hard to see how it would go from starting with no trouble to not starting at all based on this condition overnight following another out of the ordinary situation like the hose break. It is also complicated by the back plug being the only one firing with this last set of plugs. Not exactly what one might suspect if there was a gasket leak near this plug. However, something is definitly different on these back two plugs. It is what made me wonder about the idea of transmission fluid being drawn up into the engine - I noticed this idea on some of the old posts. I do not know where the vacuum connection is to the intake manifold, but it might be that it is at a location that would effect some of the plugs more than others...??

The hose break more correctly is a breaking of the plastic gooseneck that comes out of the radiator. The expanded portion of the plastic at the end of the gooseneck that is used to lock the hose over the gooseneck extension, snapped, leaving the hose clamp with no grip on the remaining portion that was left attached to the radiator. I think that this is a natural weakening of plastic that brought this about - finally gave way, I think.

I must admit, I wondered about the plugs. The ones that were last installed were H9DCO's. The only replacements that I could find were HR9DC. All the stores said that this is the present Bosh recommended plug. At the same time, the plugs that were in the car at the time were not that old, so the shop that worked on it, that specializes in MB had to have thought the non-"R" plug was the right one. I will shop around tomorrow and see if I can find some of the H9DCO's

Thanks again,

Marsden

I also went through the top radiator connection problem a couple of years ago. The plastic neck was cracking so I installed a new Behr radiator.
When I did my head gasket job, I installed new Bosch H8DC's, the same type that I had last used. I couldn't find them at the parts stores, so I got them from a MB indy shop.

Dave

__________________

1993 190E 2.3
2001 SLK230
1971 LS5 (454) Corvette Convertible

I went over to check this vehicle in person.

Compression test:
#1. 150
#2. 150
#3. 150
#4. 170
#5. 180
#6. 185

Weak yellow intermittent spark, roughly every 15 - 30 crank shaft revolutions.


Note:
Look at this link for the broken resistor.

PART NUMBER SEARCH RESULTS WITH PRICES
Vehicle 1992 Mercedes Benz 190E 2.6
Part: Aux. Fan Resistor
Note: Auxiliary Fan
.2 OHM : Black bracket
Chassis: F000000-F637529
G5040-51923 Aux. Fan Resistor Beru IN STOCK

Not sure how to include this quote from Roy,
but I must thank him for his help!

Thank you Roy!

Marsden

Here's an idea since you think your spark is weak.

Check your Crankshaft Position Sensor, located at the Ignition Control Module. It goes from the ICM to the rear of the engine at the bell housing. It supplies a voltage signal to the ICM. No CPS voltage and the engine will not start or run.

Or, it could be a bad coil.

__________________

1993 190E 2.3
2001 SLK230
1971 LS5 (454) Corvette Convertible

Thanks Dave.
I replaced the coil and it ran fine. Once I had the coil off and took an ohm reading, it looked like that was the problem.
Thanks for your posts.
Marsden

Does anyone think there is any cause and effect here, or just complete coincidence that the coil went bad at that time?

__________________
1998 C230 330,000 miles (currently dead of second failed EIS, yours will fail too, turning you into the dealer's personal human cash machine)
1988 F150 144,000 miles (leaks all the colors of the rainbow)
Previous stars: 1981 Brava 210,000 miles, 1978 128 150,000 miles, 1977 B200 Van 175,000 miles, 1972 Vega (great, if rusty, car), 1972 Celica, 1986.5 Supra

100% guarantee direct cause and effect...

Coil age = it was marginal before this issue (data from discussion in person) + engine temperature + coolant flashing to steam + spray/blast directed onto running coil for three miles stop/go drive.

During one hour of compression test and diagnosis, it sparked three times weak yellow.

Final proof:
He replaced the ignition coil and it runs.

I think that there is a high possibility that there is an add on from the broken hose link. By add on, I had noticed that the car had been stalling at lights now and again, something that it had never done before. Looking for the new coil, I found indications that stalling at idle is an indicator of a coil going bad.

The parts that I find odd was that the car started up with no problem after the break had been reattached. It was the next morning that it would not run at all. Then when I looked for spark when it would not start, there was consistant arch of significant length away from the coil wire at the distributor - albeit a yellow arch. Also, when I pulled a plug and left it attached to the distributor wire and grounded the threads, the plug was sparking consistantly.

When Roy was able to stop by, and we applied his spark testing rig, there was next to no sign of a spark, and when I tried to recreate my test approach with copper wire to ground the spark line, this time there was no arch. On removing the coil I found that the secondary showed an open on the ohm meter.

My feeling is that I have not given this car the care that it has needed, and it has run like a tank for me for a long time, and while it had been running well, I kept putting off working on it until it started to tell me that it needed help. The radiator break and the drenching of a significant area of the engine compartment was simply too much for many tired elements of the system.

To complicate the simplicity of it just being a coil problem - while it did start immediately on the replacing the coil the other day and ran strong - it would not start this morning!!!??? It tried to run numerous times, but I could not find the right combination of pedel and continuing. It clearly had no interest in running by just turning the ignition key as it did the evening before.

After I had let the battery recharge and considered how it had responded durning the first effort, I started the second attempt with the idea that it had started the night before after the engine had been turned over and the flooded with the old coil. When I put in the new coil, it ran immediately. This morning I had noticed that when the pedel was pushed clear to the floor, the car would immediately try to run when I let up on the pedel. This afternoon, after again seeing no interest in running just by turning the key, I floored it for just a few cranks and backed off immediately - the car would run for a bit. I continued the process for a while, with the car running longer and longer each time until final it was running at idle. If I pressed down the pedel when it was trying to run, it would die immediately. After letting it run at idle for about ten minutes, the car ran really well. I took it for a drive for the first time since the radiator problem, and it truly felt like it had no problems, turned it off, and it started again with no trouble at all. After letting it set for another three hours in the cold, (low 20's here in Detroit) it would only start using this method of flooring it and backing off - until it again idle on its own.

I think that there is a direct cause and effect, but I am afraid that the effects are multiple, and I will be learning a lot more about some of the details of this fuel system as I catch up on lacking attention to maintenance.

Again thanks for all of your help and Roy for you time as well.

Marsden

P.S.

Did I mention the ABS light now comes on all of the time?? It never did that before! At least I know a way to get it to run, and it runs strong once it is warm. I'll figure it out.

In a past life as a electronic maintenance tech, I always listen to my system operators who understood how to operate the systems but not a clue on how to repair them. Now that I find myself more in the operator mode than the repair mode, I will put forward two occurances as I work on my car that I find odd but maybe tell-tell signs for someone with more experience.

1. When my car finally achieves a rough idle, the "economy" meter on my insturment pannel rises significantly, 1/4 t0 1/2 of its range. When the car is warm and running at a higher rpm idle, the meter shows no rise in the needle at all.

2. When I crank the car to get it to run, as the battery gets lower and lower, the windshild wiper activates for one very labored swipe across my windshield. This with the wiper switch definitly in the "off" position.

I hope someone has some answer for these riddles.

Thanks.

Marsden

Well, I think I have it fixed this time. At least it is starting with no problem and running immediately.


When we checked the ovp relay, we did not get it firmly back into its socket. With this, the ABS light came on and stayed on even when the car was running. It had never done that before. Told me immediately that we had caused a new problem, but it took some reading to find what that was.

This forum has a lot of information to sift through.
For me the bottom line of this exercise has been:

If you have a six cyclinder 190E that is approaching 200k miles and after running great for all of this time and it starts to have idle and starting problems, expect that it is an intermittent coil, and just replace it.

This situation appears to repeat itself over and over in these pages, with a lot of great input and things to check, but the number of times it is the coil at this point in life appears quite high.

I found that a disconnected ovp causes the ABS light to come on, but I would bet that it also causes the wiper to draw enough current to run as well.

The true test if this car is now working will be if it starts in the morning.

I'll be back to eat a little crow if it isn't, or to thank you all again if it is.

Thanks again.

Marsden

Eureka!

24 degrees, frost covered, turned the key and it started instantly and ran strong!

Thanks guys for a great information site!

Marsden