psfred

I'm currently working on an 83 300D with 132 kmiles that I recently purchased. The body and interior are nearly perfect, but the PO only did the bare minimum on maintanance. He told me the valve were adjusted right before he bought it , IN 1989 at 70kmiles !!!!!

The car idles roughly (and seems to have what I think is called "nailing"), has poor power at low RPM (slower off the line than my 240D), but jumps to life at higher RPMs, even before the turbo comes on.

If you remember, I discovered the injector element on #1 leaking, and have received the washer and oring after ordering them from fastlane. I was able to remove the element with better tools and your help, and now I have to finish the valve adjustment before I can start her up to see how she runs.

I'm a bit concerned about the quality of the fuel in this car, as the PO didn't put hardly any mileage on the car in the last year. I smelled the fuel at the tank, and it doesn't really smell like diesel. I put some power service conditioner in it, but that may be part of the poor power. I also have to change out the main and in line fuel filter.

I plan to replace only the #1 element washer and oring, but I have an extra. I'm wondering if you think I should change them all.

I found a place that will check all of the injectors for $25 total (Diesel injection service in St. Louis on South Broadway) I think I'm going to do that if I still have the poor power after the valves and the element seals are changed.

I can't wait to get some time at Thanksgiving to wrench on her. I appreciate any additional advice. I would do a compression test but don't I need special tools for that?

thanks

Joe