economy gauge

the needle on my economy gauge is stuck to the right side of the gauge on the red is it
operated by vacum ?any help would be appreciated. by the way this is a w126

mannyfc,

If everything else that operates on vacuam still working properly? If so, then the problem is probably the line to to guage, and yes it is a vacuam guage.

If there is anything else vacuam operated, that isn't working correctly, you should be able to use this as a clue to find the leak. If the engine is running, it is obviously making at least some vacuam. Therefore, you should be able to isolate down to your problem. If you can't find it by looking around and tracing the lines, you may need to get a diagram to make any sense of it.

Since the vacuam is all the way to zero, you should be able to disconnect a few things and see where you have vacuam and where you don't. Just use your thumb over the end of a vacuam source line as your test instrument.

Good luck,

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Larry Bible
'84 Euro 240D, 516K miles
'88 300E 5 Speed
'81 300D Daughter's Car
Over 800,000 miles in
Mercedes automobiles

thanks larry for the imformation . evrything
that is operated by vacunm is working fine
except the gauge itself. i will try what you
told to do. thanks again.

manny.
1985 380SE
1980 280E
1976 450SEL

[jeffsr]

Your vacuum line is broken or split. I believe it enters the pasenger compartment through the firewall in the vicinity of the fuse box. I think there is a y connector there. Follow that line to the engine to determine the vacuum source take off. If you can pull the connector apart, try that, with the engine running to see if you have mainfold vacuum at that point. If you do, then your problem is inside the car. May have to remove the cluster to find it.

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Jeff L
1987 300e
1989 300e
1987 BMW 325

How is this guage supposed to act?? I mean, my gauge will drop into the red under light throttle, unlike my bimmer that only drops into that area when I have it floored.

Tom

[jeffsr]

It's a vacuum gauge. Partial throttle produces high manifold vacuum. Open throttle produces low manifold vacuum. Actual response depends on the car, etc. My BMW is completely different from the MBZ's. The 300E will dip initially into the red, but then stabilize somewhere above that after vacuum is stabilized. Don't get wigged, those gauges don't give you any really useful quantitative info. Any car driven without mashing the throttle will give you better mpg than the car which lives under a "throttle masher".

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Jeff L
1987 300e
1989 300e
1987 BMW 325