Quote:
Originally Posted by cth350
The PO either got old or got tired of replacing parts without seeing progress. That is how I got a 600. One 4 digit bill too many for the guy. The car now sits waiting for me to pay a 5 digit repair bill, so at least it's not costing me money to maintain it. 
Replacement injectors are pricey. I'd be wary of replacing just because they look shabby. The wire harness, that's different. It will be brittle and frayed. Addressing that never hurts (well, except the wallet).
Once it runs nicely the next step is rides nicely. A 300sel has a rather unique air suspension system that should give you endless hours of comfort and joy. Not to mention more work, once something needs repair. When it works, even moderately well, it is in a class of its own.
-CTH |
Injectors etc, already ordered, so - in they go.
I made a modification today that has not gone well. I made a degree wheel for the the distributor and found my trigger points were in a range of 150 - 158 degrees. I was able to adjust that range down to 113 - 116, and I read that 110 is the goal....car HATED it. Ran horribly, had to get the idle up just to keep it from stalling and sounded like it was running on 6 cylinders. I am 98% sure my degree calculations were correct - its not really that hard, so I was surprised at the result.
****UPDATE - I fixed this. I doubled checked timing (bang on) and removed the distributor again to see how I messed up the trigger points. Somehow, one set of points (out of the four) was closing for only 60 degrees, and was not opening at the same point every time. I have absolutely no idea how it got this way, but I adjusted them back to around 116, double checked the rest (range of 115 - 122 degrees) and the car ran better than ever - I'd say 85% of optimal. ****
I suspect however that since the only change has been to the trigger points and its gone from running at about 80% of "normal" to 40% of "normal" that I messed something up and will need to readjust (
**Update - yes, I did***). I'm not even sure trigger points have a significant impact on rich versus lean. I've ordered a wide-band 02 sensor and related AFR handheld - been meaning to get one for a while anyway, so we'll see.
I also found I may have been using the wrong timing mark on the harmonic balancer.... In the picture, I was using the line nearest the pointer, which I took to be Zero TDC (since it has a Zero next to it) I didn't realize that was the Zero part of 10, and only after cleaning did I realize there is actually another Zero and line to the right - and that's what I need to be using for timing.
Curiously, everything seemed to line up (cam marks, etc) even when I was using the wrong timing mark....sigh...more investigating tomorrow, too dark now to continue, but I am sure that is not helping.
Always good to come away from a days work with more questions than answers.
As to the air suspension - on most days, and if I've driven it some, the car will maintain its ride height for about two weeks, after which its noticeably low in the front. Other times though I can see a reduction in the front after only 72 hours, its somewhat variable. When I first got the car I measured the drop at about 1/4 - 3/16 inch per day, but that seemed to improve with use.