I recently acquired an '84 300D; I am new to Benz diesels and this kill lever with the stop sign on it. I have had a couple VW diesels, which only required high gear pop to kill the engine. My question is, how fast should the engine die using the underhood kill lever? Mine only really bogs and requires the air intake to be simultaneously covered to completely stop the engine. Are there adjustments that can be made?

Sounds to me like the linkage rods are not properly adjusted. Sorry that I can’t be more helpful on making the adjustments – buying one of the service CDs is well worth the money if you plan to do anything other than simply changing fluids on the car.

Have fun with your new car!

If the vacuum shutoff module (behine the FI pump) is badly broken (bad vacuum leak or the vacuum hose is disconnected) you may have a hard time to stop the engine by using the stop lever.

David

Interesting. I am still learning about the diesels. I was under the assumption that the ‘stop’ lever acted mechanically on the pump, much in the same way that the vacuum shutoff valve acts mechanically on the pump, only the shutoff valve does it via a diaphragm that moves internal linkages in the IP. Please let me know if I am wrong.

RTH:

I do NOT think you are wrong. I was just trying to say that the "stop" lever does not work well under certain conditons which include a bad vacuum leak and/or bad adjustment of the rods as you stated.

David