i've been driving my new 1987 300sdl for a couple k now, and so far its been wonderful. there are a few outstanding items.

the passenger seat is... posessed. it moves by itself periodically (every 45 minutes?). moves isnt really the right word, it doesnt go anywhere, the motor just enguages for a nanosecond and the chair jitters. it does this when the car is off too? weird weird.

she is very finnicky about rising rpm. even while accelerating, rpms will remain relatively constant. to gain significant speed, i often end up just tossing the throttle down a bit and after a pause (2-3 seconds?) the rpms rise pretty sharply. when i'm on the highway, its a little scary watching the throttle move nowhere, then quicky go from 2900 to 4000. "not get hit by truck, cracked head" starts ominiously looping through my head. i havent driven a diesel before, i'm not sure what to expect here, but normally when i inch on the throttle, i expect rpm to rise. with her, if i inch on the throttle, the car may or may not go faster, but the rpm will invariably stay about the same. its problematic because i have basically no pull at all until the turbo starts kicking in ~2300 or so, and it takes a while to get there. its definately not undrivable by any measure, but well, i'd much rather ask, especially given how "wrong" it feels.

cold start is pretty course. rollover is very noticable, i expect the diesel clunking, but i can hear the engine struggling at a point. the engine sounds a little unbalanced? the exhaust is mostly standard gray, but as she turns over there are little puffs of white smoke. ps, its often pretty cold out: just above freezing.

the above two make me think perhaps an injector is misfiring somehow. the diesel repair manuals i've read state you just take the injector out of the socket and spray it against a big sheet of paper, however i cant help but wonder if they're oversimplifying the process.

i dont know how to winterize her!! ack! a couple times i've had to resort to holding the starter on for 3-4 seconds and waiting for the engine to catch up.

cruise control sometimes cuts out. sometimes i'll get 300 miles before she cuts out, sometimes i wont make it 2 miles. after cut out, she may or may not immediately re-enguage cruise, and may or may not re-engauge cruise 80 miles down the road.

the seats, uh, suck. (passanger seat mysteriously aside) the leather is all good but there's not really any support or cushion left in the seats (was there ever?). what can i do for replacement? these seats have forward/back shift, seat-tilt, back-tilt and headreast electronic adjust and are pretty huge, for reference. when i think of aftermarket seats i think racing seats, but maybe someone makes large comfy seats? not particular about the power adjustments at all, so long as the seat is comfy and minimally adjustable. pulling seats out of a junker has to be... uh.. shady. do i have any options?

i know its a laundry list, i've found some information from searching and will keep searching on these topics, but i'm hoping this shotgun blast of questions might spawn a couple responses.

love and chicken grease (last part just seems fitting in here)
rektide

The no power at low RPM's seems like the same problem I had with mine when I bought it. It turned out that mine had a leaky ALDA, and I don't know if the ALDA not getting any pressure is what caused the lack of power, or if the constant bleed off of pressure caused something else to not work.
The seats will never be comfortable in these cars. You'd think that when they decided to put the same basic seat in all the MB's that they would have picked a more comfortable design. Maybe they were OK 20 years ago, but I am sore everytime I go on a long drive, because there is no lumbar support at all. You can at least firm the bottoms up with some foam stuffed in there.
The intermitant cruise control is a VERY common problem.

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87 300D - Running on Veggie oil; 260,000 plus miles; Original #14 head

Just think of this as a message feature .


As for the engine at start up there is a dial by the fuse box which supposedly adjusts the idol. When it starts to get cold here (California so cold isn't the right word) I play with the dial each day till it feels right.

Could the low power be a clogged vacuum line??? There are the two lines that go from the alda??? to somewhere else which sometimes gets clogged. Look for them at the rear driver side portion of the engine. One goes around by the firewall toward the fuse box and I don't remember where the other one goes. (I don't know if this paragraph was any help at all Oh Well).

Search the forum for the Above Alda info as well as for info on the Cruse Control; there is some sort of solder fix for the cruse control.

As for the seats; I agree they aren't that comfortable for driving but everybody who has ridden in the car has loved them so go figure.

Finally please check out this post. I found it very interesting. It talks about a whole bunch of tips for the 126 chassis. LINK
-Matt

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KI6CCA

Current Stable:
1987 300SDL
1980 450SEL

Out to Pasture:
1982 300D KIA (Rice Rocket vs. 123: He hit me at 80-100MPH I walked away he went to the hospital. Sounds fair to me!)
1985 300D EURO Scrapped (got more money from state than car was worth)
1979 & 1980 300SD Great Cars!

This is usually caused by the switch. My driver's switch in the SDL was similarly possessed. The change of switch will cure it.

Remove the ALDA, plug the boost line, and drive it. See how you like it.

Change starting sequence. Turn key to #2 position. Wait 20 seconds. Start engine. Do this at all temperatures.

Cruise amp going south. Either attempt to solder all the connections inside the unit (no guarantee) or send it in for a rebuild ($185).

www.gdl-online.com

The seat issues are twofold:

1) The seat spring may be broken in several places. To replace it, if broken is $300.

2) The rubber pad is usually shot. Replace it for $95.00.

I also added a piece of memory foam directly above the rubber pad and it gives a great feeling to the seat. Once properly rebuilt, these seats are excellent.

You can also go the cheaper route and use "pool noodles". Do a search on that term.

When it cuts out on a long flat road, it's annoying. When it cuts out charging up a hill and sends your face into the steering wheel, it's downright rude. Consider that this might happen when you have the cruise engaged.

It's quite easy to remove the leather cover from the front seat bottoms. You can do it with the seats in the car if your hands are small enough. Unless Matt changed things, there's a 1.5" or so layer of craft store foam between the horsehair pads and leather covers in his SDL. I thought it made a world of improvement. I tried 3" foam but the seats didn't look right. I was thinking of a lumbar pad but never got to it.

Sixto
93 300SD