Hi guys,
I've owned my 1984 190D 2.2 5spd for a few months now. I haven't taken it on a highway run until now. I have a lot of slop in the steering due to a worn center link. I also have a bit of a warp in the brake discs and unbalanced front tires.
That made for quite an interesting drive. At 2AM though, not too many cars are on the highway so I felt ok doing a run.
A few things occured to me. The car shakes pretty good due to the off-balance front tires. The rears were installed at a shop after I bought the car and they have weights. The fronts don't have weights for some reason. Odd. The brakes pulse. I knew that from driving fast in town. I'll do a brake job when I get more money. The brakes work fine and the pulse is only noticeable above 50mph.
The most striking things are that one, I took 30 seconds to get up to 60mph. The second is that my top speed in 5th gear floored to the mat was only 80 or 85mph. I can't imagine that the om601 and 5spd takes 30 seconds to get to 60 and then tops at 80. That's just not sitting well in my head.
A while ago I made a thread asking for suggestions on an intermitent shake and rough idle. I tried a few different things (filling up all the way, lubing my linkages etc.) that were easy to do, but it still does that too.
Is that a fuel starvation problem? I changed the primary and secondary fuel filters when I got the car in July. The secondary has a few flecks in it, but it isn't clogged at all. The fuel looks good coming through the secondary filter. I fill up at Shell and add 4oz of 2 stroke oil to the tank. The fuel input and return lines are new in the engine bay. The fuel thermostat has been bypassed and the input goes right to the lift pump.
I haven't touched the filter screen but I think my next thing is to fill the tank and swap the fuel lines to blow out anything on the screen.
I don't know where I could be sucking air or restricting fuel.
I just replaced the 4 glowplugs by pulling the manifold off. I put that baby in the bathtub and scrubbed it nice and clean followed by a dishwasher cycle on pots and pans.
The car is federal emissions, so the whole intake is clean now.
What do you guys think? I just find it really odd that a 4 month old filter could plug up and that the secondary could be pretty much clear. I also find it odd that the engine will rev up to redline in gear 1-3 fine, but the top speed is 80mph. It says fuel starvation, but not fuel starvation.