I have always been very mechanically inclined, however, fear of the cost of screwing up make me nervous this year. At the end of April this year I found a 1999 E300 with only 47,000 miles Shaver Import in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Both my wife and I wanted the car so we bought it.

In June the glow plug light came on. My first thought before studying the access to the glow plugs was that this is no big deal because I have done this on my 1985 300D and performed much more extensive repairs before. Once I saw what was required I was concerned and I knew my wife would not be happy if I had to pay the dealership to do this. The big scare was hearing of glow plugs breaking off and needing to remove the intake manifold. If you are not familiar with them the E300 is a sophisticated car with sophisticated controls for a rather basic diesel engine.

Well, to make a long story short I did the work using some instructions posted here and I did it in the estimated time. Now I do not fear this. In fact I have the manifold off again right now to replace the fuel lines that were so poorly engineered.