So I am the 6th owner of a grease car that was originally posted for sale here. This was posted by the 2nd owner on this forum and sold it to the 3rd owner: http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/mercedes-cars-sale/336099-1984-euro-240d-wvo-kit-wilmington-nc-$1-450-a.html

There 4th owner bought it for an engine swap and it sat for awhile, never did anything with it. I bought it from the 5th owner and he planned on using it as a daily driver, but got busy with school. Bough it for $1300 with 240k but the the odometer wasn't working so it could have 300k-400k. The previous owner didn't bit of work on it cleaned the injectors, ect. The frame is still rust free starts right up, blow by isn't too bad. No mayo on the dipstick or under the oil cap.

I was driving it home and as I pulled on to the highway it started to get up to 250F. I pulled over and called the seller. He said it should be fine as long as there is coolant present. I was skeptical if the reading was even accurate because the odometer, trip odometer, dash clock, and gas gauge all don't work. The speedometer works and the oil pressure gauge always is maxed out at 45 psi when the car is running. I topped off the the radiator with water. It didn't take much but I saw the water boil as I poured it in ,so I know there was at least some coolant in the system.

Went to Walmart and got some concentrated antifreeze because I assumed the the antifreeze was too diluted and that may have been causing the overheating.
I took off the radiator cap and reved the engine and when I released the pedal black liquid overflowed from the open radiator. It smelled like rust and looked like it too. I poured in 1/2 a gallon of conc antifreeze, topping it off, and hit the highway back home.

The temp gauge stayed maxed out for 40 mins on the highway. The radiator fan was working and I believed it the gauge was just bad. To test this I pulled in to a gas station and went to check the radiator temp. When I took off the cap coolant shot out like a geyser 10ft high. It got all over my car There were small pieces of metal and little small globs of black clay, which I suspect is some stop leak that was put in previously. I topped it of with 1/2 gallon conc antifreeze and 2 gallons of 50/50. The rest of the way home the temp didnt get above 225F.

Driven it a couple of times since with it never going above 175F. Still no signs of mayo under the oil cap or dip stick. No water in the oil pan or in the trans fluid. No signs of a blown head gasket, no white smoke.

Just curious if anyone on here has any insight on what happened, this whole situation just seems odd. I bought this for alternative fuel research. I plan to buy a running parts car so if I ruined the engine, I am not too worried about it since I am willing to sacrifice the engine for research anyways.

Just curious how likely it is that the engine is shot now assuming it was over heated. I plan on doing an intensive radiator flush and then investigating the thermostat.

Well, overheating the engine causes premature wear, all over. Sadly yes.

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1998 Ford Escort ZX2 5 speed - 279,000 miles My Daily

1992 Mercedes 300D 2.5 202,000 - Pure junk
2000 Mercedes E320 Black - 136,000 miles - Needs repair

Don't forget to grease the screw and threads on the spring compressor.

If you had to ball park the level of wear, what would you say? Did I take 10k of the engine's life? 50k? 100k? Did I probably warp/deform something. I know over heating isn't good, but I don't have any frame of reference of how bad it actually is. Is it on par with running the engine with no oil?

its hard to say, without any symptoms showing it may well have done nothing these are quite tough engines and sometimes you get lucky. that being said i might think of budgeting a head gasket sometime in your not too distant future, as the black crud you said you saw may have been block seal mixing with oil/combustion leak products. this combined with the rust build up in the cooling system not only limits heat transfer to the coolant but coolant flow as well. something else to think of is the 61X motors are slightly prone to cracking the head between the valves. its not as prevalent as the early 603 but definitely possible if overheated. all in all i would just keep an eye on it if it uses coolant or pressurizes it rapidly when cold or retains pressure over a day or more it may have a cracked head or blown HG. for now i would just keep driving it and keep a close eye on fluids temps and any new behavior. also look up the Mercedes citric acid flush procedure as that may help keep the temps down by removing the crud in your block.

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1985 300D om617: 8mm M pump 175cc 5200rpm, holset he221w @ 30psi, large A2W ic, compounds on the way.
KD9AFT
A&P

I cannot imagine driving 100 miles with the temp pegged.

OTOH it sounds like you might have gotten away with it.

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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.

Sounds like you could use a radiator cap, it should have vented and let you know there was a problem as soon as it overheated. The most likely bolt to snap on a 61x motor, is I think, the lower bolt on the thermostat flange. You'll please yourself if you work it out with heat, penetrant and patience instead of snapping it and adding to the list of problems.

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CC: NSA

All things are burning, know this and be released.

82 Benz 240 D, Kuan Yin
12 Ford Escape 4wd

You're four times

It's hard to

more likely to

concentrate on

have an accident

two things

when you're on

at the same time.

a cell phone.

www.kiva.org It's not like there's anything wrong with feeling good, is there?

I know how it feels to have no other choice other than jusr keep on driving the overheated car home. We all have lives that dont stop so sometimes it feels like we xant just park the car and get picked up by a family member until it cools down buuuuttt.... 100 miles... Pegged?? Um....u simply cant do that again.

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Bad assumption. Straight water cools better than any antifreeze. The more diluted the coolant is, the better it cools. Adding concentrated anti-freeze reduces its cooling ability.

The only purpose of the anti-freeze product is to prevent freezing of the liquid in the winter, and to inhibit corrosion inside the cooling system.

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1998 E300 turbodiesel

America's Rights and Freedoms Are Not The Enemy!

Bad analysis. Fails to consider the relationship between coolant concentration and boiling point.

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When cryptography is outlawed, bayl bhgynjf jvyy unir cevinpl.

Hard to say, I once overheated a VW 2.4 inline 6 turbo diesel, and only drove it to get off the freeway, it still caused damage. The engine continued to run, but it was for sure less powerful, and also had more blowby. So, overheating "damage" isn't an absolute, rather it's a variable.

The primary reason I went with waterless coolant in my project was due to that experience. What caused the overheating was a blown heater hose. As these engines get older, there are just too many weak links in the cooling system to possibly address them all, even though I did replace every hose on my car. And, it's always the one you didn't see or didn't get to that blows. The waterless coolant doesn't pressurize, so you don't have to worry as much about a weak spot in a hose.

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1983 W123 300TD US spec Turbo engine, with Euro bumpers and manual climate control, and manual transmission.

Nonsense. Not relevant in a pressurized automotive cooling system. At 15 psi, straight water won't boil until around 250 F. A 50/50 mix of coolant raises that by only a few degrees more. The cooling system pressure has a far greater effect on the boiling point, than does the coolant concentration.

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1998 E300 turbodiesel

America's Rights and Freedoms Are Not The Enemy!

Tangofox is right on this one. Although it goes against common internet understanding, less ethylene glycol is not better. This has been studied and published in SAE and other journals (a long time ago), and increasing EG reduces the likelihood to overheat.

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1968 220D, w115, /8, OM615, Automatic transmission.
My 1987 300TD wagon was sold and my 2003 W210 E320 wagon was totaled (sheds tear).

Straight water will accept / reject heat faster than an antifreeze mix.

Properly mixed antifreeze has a higher boiling point.

What is being missed here is you can get localized boiling that never makes it's way to the top of cooling system fill point.

Fill a pot with water, put it on a hot stove burner and wait. At first you will see small bubbles form at the bottom of the pan / near the heat source but they don't make their way to the surface.

This same kind of thing can occur around the combustion chamber / exhaust port on a liquid cooled engine. This is a type of cavitation that leads to cracked heads / erosion of cooled surfaces. When bubbles form, heat transfer drops off dramatically leading to hot spots. A higher boiling point fluid or pressure will stave off this localized boiling.

Next to address this:
You are lucky you didn't receive 3rd degree burns. Did you read the warning on most all rad caps " Do not remove when hot " ?

I'm thinking the system was never filled fully / or your cap removal under pressure allowed clogging material to exit the rad tubes.

In any event, you need to gain some automotive skills otherwise you are going to severely injure yourself at some point.

How I lost the first engine in my 87, Dog got hit by semi, was rushing her to the vet when engine pegged redline, kept going 40 miles it was the end of the engine, unfortunately it was for the dog too...

I always heard the best thing is 50/50 antifreeze to water.

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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.