back in the fold
 

After being MB-less for 18 months, a forum member threw in the towel when his '83 SD lost its tranny. It's ice blue silver over gray leather in great condition - the leather, the paint less so - with functioning R-12 AC(!) so it followed me home. Actually, it followed our Suburban home on a dolly, the 'burb 6.5 turning all of 1200 rpm the 12 miles home. Seeing as we pushed it onto the dolly with the tranny in P and the PO says it failed with a bang suggests the tranny is toast. Dang, I should have towed it at speed, then :) Time to go 722.303 shopping...

Sixto
83 300SD, Jr. 249K miles

Congratulations and welcome back! Come visit when you get it fixed—lunch is on me! Pictures?

Congratulations. Well it`s about time. :)

You are more in tune with to 60x engines, so this will be a new learning curve for you?


Charlie


sent from my pos computer

'83 300 SDs may be the best of the '81-'85 run.������

Why?

[QUOTE=sixto;3526091]After being MB-less for 18 months,

What you have is an addiction!! :rolleyes:

You said it! I have about an hour between getting home and sunset so dropping the tranny is going slowly. I did this on an '81 about 10 years ago and *nothing* is familiar. I stared at the front flex disk for a good long time and I still can't figure out how it comes off. Do you really have to support the tranny and drop the mount and crossmember to get to the nuts which are all on the forward side?

Did I mention the PO threw in a set of valve adjustment wrenches?

Sixto
83 300SD

The Sd REALLY buries the front disk don't it... That shaft balance disk don't help either...

I've done it a few times, but must be blocking the mental anguish, because I cannot recall the specifics right now...

How slow were you going in the 6.5? 1200RPM is SLOW!

I think we hit 30 mph downhill once. Otherwise I kept it under 25 mph.

Sixto
83 300SD

On my '81 nothing needs to be removed and the balancing disc slides back after you've removed the bolts. Do you have the rear wheels elevated with the transmission in Neutral? There's an opening on the passenger side, and it's just a matter of spinning the shaft until the bolt is easy to access with an Allen socket on one side of the disc and a wrench on the other side.

It's not an exercise in fun but if you just replace the flex disc and nothing else, it can be done as Otto Huber says. The output nut fell off my car and the drive shaft came out of the tranny. I decided to replace the drive shaft carrier bearing and both flex discs at the same time. The dust cover had to come off and drop the exhaust but not completely disconnect it.

By 83 all the kinks had likely been worked out from the all new 81 model units built.

I thought that '83 was the first year that the alternator belt was a real PITA to change. I can't think of any "kinks" in my '81 that aren't also in SDs up to 1984.

Looks like the power steering and AC belts have to come off first. Is there more to the PITA-ness?

Your words didn't make sense until I was under the car. Working around the crossmember with all manner of shadows was frustrating but I developed a system through the processes you described... as much of a process it takes to remove three bolts :)

It feels to me like the output shaft isn't connected to much inside the transmission. It's really easy to spin the flange though there's no radial or axial play. So the failure is downstream of the parking pawl or took it out. I wonder if the primary pump failed or there was a major loss of fluid at speed causing the secondary pump to engage with a bang which can't be a good thing.

Sixto
83 300SD <- was 300D... not that there's anything wrong with that

You need to change your signature Sixto. You no longer drive a 300D, you're in the S class now.