I posted the following in the "Cars for Sale" section of the Forum a few days ago, and he did find it. But since a lot of guys will miss it in that section, I thought I would repost it. It was a long bolt in the wrong place that locked up against the vibration damper.

Well it all depends on how badly you want to keep the car. It looks like a pretty nice 300D, though the paint is not to good. Now about seizing the engine, unless you seized it while running, I don't think it is "seized up". But it could be locked up. And if you want to keep the car you will have to put more effort in finding the cause of the problem. It can't be in the water pump because that is only indirectly pulled by the engine. But go over your work carefully. More then one owner operator has bungled a job by leaving a scraper or a screwdriver or a socket, really any little tool that can get behind the front vibration damper. Really look good! Look over, under, around and behind any moving part in the area that you worked on. Get your fingers in there and feel around. If that doesn't yield anything, well just keep on looking. Pull the glow plugs so you are not working against compression. Then get a good fitting deep 17mm, (I think) socket on that front crank bolt and shake it up a bit and you don't have to put tremendous torque on the wrench to do that. A breaker bar so that you can change direction fast should work well. Shake it up and watch out that something doesn't fall out and hit you in the face. If that doesn't yield results, take the bottom pan off and get a good light and see what you can see. Remember, nothing is going to unstick your engine but you. You have the front of the engine clear of obstruction, so if all else fails, get the instructions for pulling chain rails and guides. I hope you can find the problem before you have to go that far. Now if you ran the engine hot or without oil, then you seized it - that is you darn near melted the pistons into the block. Only you know if that is the problem. If you didn't do that, then keep on looking for that lost screwderiver or socket or whatever.

Hey we are always happy when someone gets a nasty problem resolved. Yes we are! That is why most of us are here.

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Junqueyardjim
Christianity, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The only thing it cannot be is moderately important. C.S. Lewis



1983 Mercedes W123 240D 4 Speed 285,000 on the road with a 617 turbo, beautiful butter yellow, license plate # 83 240D INDIANA

2003 Jaguar Type X, AWD. beautiful, good mileage,
Mom's car, but I won't let her drive it!