From: owner-diesel-benz-digest-at-digest.net (diesel-benz-digest) To: diesel-benz-digest-at-digest.net Subject: diesel-benz-digest V1 #348 Reply-To: diesel-benz-at-digest.net Sender: owner-diesel-benz-digest-at-digest.net Errors-To: owner-diesel-benz-digest-at-digest.net Precedence: bulk diesel-benz-digest Wednesday, July 12 2000 Volume 01 : Number 348 Forum for Discussion of Diesel Mercedes Benz Automobiles John Meister Digest Coordinator Contents: diesel imports RE: Where's the stuff? (long) Introductions revisited - WAS: Where's the stuff? RE: Where's the stuff? Re: Where's the stuff? Re:Where's the stuff? RE: Where's the stuff? (long) Introduction, and a couple of current projects 450SL RE: Where's the stuff? Re: Where's the stuff? my diesel stats Re: used motor oil Diesel Benz Digest Home Page: http://www.digest.net/diesel-benz/ Send submissions to diesel-benz-digest-at-digest.net Send administrative requests to diesel-benz-digest-request-at-digest.net To unsubscribe, include the word unsubscribe by itself in the body of the message, unless you are sending the request from a different address than the one that appears on the list. Include the word help in a message to stag-digest-request to get a list of other majordomo commands. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 12:36:06 -0500 (EST) From: John Fieber Subject: diesel imports Regarding acquisition of a diesel [grand] Cherokee, where would you import from? Where are they made? Since they are vehicles designed for the US market, I doubt there would be any major hassle except for the engine. Then, if you live outside California, things might be easier. VW has diesel versions of the Golf, Jetta and Bug available except in California. My impression about Mercedes (not) selling diesel cars in the US is that if they can't sell them in California, it isn't worth it at all. I've heard that Orange County alone accounts for a staggering 10% of world wide sales. The dealer in Newport Beach has no less than 100 service bays in their shop...a bit scary. The area is a good place to buy a used Benz though. They don't rust, mold or have moss growing under the seats. (Ah, my western Oregon heritage exposed!) - -john ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 16:52:46 -0400 From: "Chris Straut" Subject: RE: Where's the stuff? Sure thing! My name is Chris Straut and I'm from Bridgeport, West Virginia. I work in the computer field (UNIX, please!) and am somewhat obsessed with cars. I've also started to like diesels, especially for their reliability and efficiency. I currently own and drive a US-model '85 300D with 82k miles on it. The car is white with dark blue leather interior and is in immaculate condition. I haven't had any problems with it except for a mysterious turbo-outage (turbocharter stopped giving boost for a few days, but then started working perfectly a few days later), a worn sunroof motor gear, and a worn ball joint. If I had a decent scanner or digital camera, I would post some pictures for everyone to see. The sound system has been upgraded to a very large extent and sounds quite well-balanced. At some point I plan on buying european lights and "new style" mercedes wheels for the car (i.e. the wheels I see on late-80's 450SELs). Anyone have pictures of W123 Mercedes cars with late model or aftermarket wheels on them? I haven't seen any, and want to get some ideas. Chris - -----Original Message----- From: owner-diesel-benz-at-digest.net [mailto:owner-diesel-benz-at-digest.net]On Behalf Of john Sent: Tuesday, July 11, 2000 1:14 PM To: Neil Wigley Cc: diesel-benz-at-digest.net Subject: Re: Where's the stuff? this be a quiet bunch... especially since I sold my 300D. :) I try to stir things up every now and then... why not post to the list what kind of Diesel Benz you have, introduce yourself even... and ask others to come out from behind their keyboards and share. :) I've had 3 Diesel Benz's. 68 220d, 75 240d and my last one, an 81 300d. :) john At 10:04 AM 7/11/00 -0700, Neil Wigley wrote: >Hi > >I signed on successfully yesterday. But nothing's coming my way. Have >all the dieselheads become taciturn during my absence? > >Neil Wigley >wigley-at-san.rr.com >-- > > >San Diego > - ------------------------------------------------------ http://www.WAGONEERS.com/ http://www.wagoneers.com/think-about-this.html Snohomish, WA - where Jeeps don't rust, they mold... - ------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 16:16:50 -0500 From: Alec Cordova Subject: (long) Introductions revisited - WAS: Where's the stuff? I'm still posting like I know what I'm talking about, so I guess I should post a refresher about me as well. I've owned four Benzes, two diesels. Just before we got married in 1984, my wife bought a 1963 190c fintail sedan. She called it the Batmobile. It was under $2,000, and it was cool. Even her father, a devoted Jaguar fanatic, marveled at the engineering and quality in that basic model. He remembered seeing lots of them (mostly diesels) as taxis when he was stationed in the Philippines in the 60's. Her mother was a diehard Cadillac owner, and I remember how much of a difference there was in the ride and comfort between the little Benz and her mom's new caddy. (Obviously the Benz was better!) We drove that car until the clutch finally gave out, and as poor, starving college students, we couldn't get it fixed. I ended up following a matching fintail to its home after work one night. Turned out the owner and his father restored that model. I don't remember how much they paid us for ours, but they brought it by a month or two later with almost everything fixed. Several years later, we found Cream Puff. She was a light beige 1980 W123 240D in great shape. I think she cost us somewhere around $6K. Amazing car. You just had to plan ahead a little on the road. Had her work done by Tony Temple in Austin. Since he's retired, there's nobody in the area that gives the same quality friendly service. You can get quality, but not as friendly and helpful as Tony. We kept Cream puff for several years, then traded her on a Jeep Wrangler Sahara when they were fairly new. Around the very end of 1991 or 1992 (I think), we found Old Smokey. A dark red ("English Red"?) 1985 W123 300DT with 80 or 90 thousand miles. Previous owner worked for an oil company, as best we could tell, and they had the company mechanics do lots of the regular maintenance/oil changes stuff. Found her at Apple Dodge in south Austin on consignment for a friend of the manager, or some such baloney. They didn't even really know what they had. The salesman didn't believe me when I mentioned that the motor had only five cylinders. We talked them down from almost $14K to around $10.5K, and had to put some tires on it that night. For those of you that want a W123 diesel with a little pep (Can you say, "John the ListMom?" I thought you could.), a 1985 300DT is absolutely the way to go. From my couple of years on the mailing lists, I have come to know that there were several tweaks on the 1985 to improve the use of the engine's power. (This was NOT a California car with the infamous Trap Oxidizer, just a regular US model.) As soon as we testdrove this car, we knew it was what we were looking for. Although I haven't done too much work on the car myself, and I haven't needed too much done on it by professionals, I picked up quite a bit of knowledge about this one. It inspires you to learn as much as you can so you can admire it even more. For reference, in 92, we bought a brand new VW Golf, having had a German-built 1984 seriously-boxy Jetta that held up quite well. The Golf cost us about $11K, and it was the worst assembled vehicle I have ever encountered. Wonderful design, and a BLAST to toss around when things were working, but several people were not paying attention when they built it, and it may even have been dropped on its head as an infant. Served as a vivid reminder of how much car you can get for your money with a used Benz. Time has been catching up with the 300DT, and most of her suspension rubber needs replacing. The air conditioner worked for maybe two or three years of the seven or eight years that I drove her. Six months here, $600 in repairs, nine or ten months working, several hundred more in repairs, a few more months working, then I never got around to fixing it again. Drive to work early, stay late, and ride with others if you go out to lunch in the Texas heat. And the clearcoat is rotting away. So I could have spent 2 or 3 K to fix the suspension, A/C, and maybe a cheap paint job, and had probably 4 or 5 more years of devoted service. But in the meantime, we had picked up a used BMW Z3 convertible for my wife. Just the 4-cylinder, but enough to remind me that I would really like something that could be driven just a little more aggressively. Started looking for 87-88 300E, and right away I found an 89 300CE in pampered condition in the very low teens. One prepurchase inspection later, I now have pep, working air conditioning, a truly stylin' coupe (no pillar between the front and back side windows), less interior space, a bigger oil leak, and a thirst for premium unleaded now that the price is reasonable (NOT!). Still a heavy, solid, German feel to this one, but definitely not Old Smokey (who doesn't really smoke, by the way). Still, I'm very happy with this one. So that's four Benzes, plus two water-cooled VWs, a Porsche 944, a Z3, a neato Jeep that we took offroad maybe twice in the year that we owned it, an early 80's Chevy diesel pickup, an early 90's basic Ford F150, and a small house. Long story, but it's not like we're eating up time reading all the zillions of posts on this list lately. Regards, Alec Cordova 89 300CE, 108K 85 300DT, <200K 97 Z3 1.9, 103K ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 16:27:25 -0500 From: Alec Cordova Subject: RE: Where's the stuff? Unless you want the Euro lights for the way they make your car look, save yourself a lot of money, and just buy "E-code" motorcycle headlamps. Cibie and Hella make them, as do others. They mount just like regular 7 inch round sealed beams, but they use replaceable H4 bulbs, and they use the true Euro-style lighting pattern. Rusty sells them for about 45 bucks per side. I put them on my 85 300DT and was truly amazed. No fuss, no muss, and LOADS of useful light. Alec -----Original Message----- At some point I plan on buying european lights and "new style" mercedes wheels for the car (i.e. the wheels I see on late-80's 450SELs). Anyone have pictures of W123 Mercedes cars with late model or aftermarket wheels on them? I haven't seen any, and want to get some ideas. Chris ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 14:37:59 -0700 (PDT) From: Jerome Kaidor Subject: Re: Where's the stuff? > I try to stir things up every now and then... why not post > to the list what kind of Diesel Benz you have, introduce yourself > even... and ask others to come out from behind their keyboards > and share. :) *** Hi, my name is Jerry and I drive a 300D.... "HI JERRY!" ...The car is a dark blue '85 model with 137,000 on the odo. I've had this car for about two months. In that time, I've * Discovered that somebody had installed engine & transmission from an '81 300TD wagon. * Fixed the power door locks by connecting them to the correct vacuum source. * Fixed the hard transmission shifting by properly connecting it to the Vacuum Control Valve on the injector pump per '82-'84 spec. * Changed the oil and filters * Replaced leaking hose to the oil cooler, resealed the turbo oil return line & cyclonic air separator line, and replaced the pan gasket, thus achieving a oil-leak-free car. * Replaced the condenser, refrigerant compressor, receiver/drier, one high-side hose, and charged the AC with R134a refrigerant. * Resoldered the Automatic Climate Control pushbotton box. * Rewired the compressor control circuitry to do without the non-functional '85 brain box. * Replaced the non-functional Becker radio with a new Pioneer CD player * Removed all the wiring cruft from a previous installation of an aftermarket alarm system. * Waxed the car with "TR3 Resin Glaze" * Treated the upholstery with "Vinylex" * Washed the car about five times. ...Things remaining to be done for complete automotive Nirvana include * Obtain and install a proper turbo injection pump with an ALDA * New shocks. * Subwoofer and tweeters * Replace vacuum servos as necessary to make the climate control properly control all the vents. * Get the tachometer working. - Jerry Kaidor ( jerry-at-tr2.com ) ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 18:00:35 -0400 From: Frank Subject: Re:Where's the stuff? Ok I'll bite. I'm Frank Leonard and live in Tampa, FL. Also a computer geek, however I don't care what OS I'm a mercenary. I have 2 deisel benzs - 1980 300CD odometer stopped working 3 years ago at 157,000mi. I suspect well over 200K on there now. This is my "beater benz" I've more or less given it to my 16 year old. Its been through hurricane josephine and several feet of water. Itys barely survived a curb jumping at Checkers as my 16yo tried to turn it into an ATV - broke both transmission cooling lines and the oil pan, not sure if there's frame damage or not? She's convalecsing at tne moment. 1985 300SD 132,000 and a dream car, garage kept(before me) I'm the second owner. Complete records, I think the PO traded it in because the maintenance book only went up to 125,000mi. Love the purr of a diesel, and the other day diesel prices finally came down below gas in TPA. 151.9 for diesel, 154.9 for regular unleaded. And at 25 MPG in a close to 4000 lb car I'm lovin it. The remainder of the fleet consists of a 2000 toyoto sienna (the wifes), a 1982 buik skylark (the daughter's smokes more than either diesel. And a 1993 Chyrsler Le Baron(my old car now taken over by the young girl. Just joined the biodeisel list.......is it really possible? Regards Frank ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 22:03:45 -0500 (EST) From: John Fieber Subject: RE: Where's the stuff? On Tue, 11 Jul 2000, Chris Straut wrote: > My name is Chris Straut and I'm from Bridgeport, West Virginia. Is this a 12-step program? ;-) > haven't had any problems with it except for a mysterious turbo-outage > (turbocharter stopped giving boost for a few days, but then started working > perfectly a few days later), Did you note any sound changes during the outage? 84 California and I believe 85 Federal models have an electronic controlled EGR system which includes an "air recirculation valve", effectively a turbo bypass (but distinct from the waste gate). I presume it is to lower the intake pressure to enable more exhaust gasses to flow from the exhaust manifold to the intake via the EGR valve. [Actually, it is still all vacuum operated in fine W123 tradition, but the vacuum is electronically controlled via a switchover valve and a funky pressure converter gizmo.] I bring this up because there are a couple (potentially transient) failure modes of components in the EGR system which can cause this valve to always be bypassing rather than just when the EGR control electronics thinks it should be bypassing. The bypass isn't complete; it supposedly only cuts turbo boost by about 30%, but that is VERY noticable if the bypass is stuck on. It is also accompanied by abnormally loud turbo whistling. And if your EGR valve is non-functional (either accidentally or otherwise), the bypass serves absolutely no purpose. > The sound system has been upgraded to a very large extent and > sounds quite well-balanced. Any tips on sound improvements while maintaining the stock look? I cramed some Boston Acoustic CX4 speakers in the front which was a night and day difference from cereal-box-with-a-voice-coil type speakers that were there. No bass though. I'm pondering what to do about the back since anything in the stock holes will be similarly thin in the low end. Mind you I don't need a bottom end that will crack the pavement, but SOMETHING below 180Hz would be nice. > Anyone have pictures of W123 Mercedes cars with late model or > aftermarket wheels on them? I haven't seen any, and want to > get some ideas. I think they look really sharp. As always, start at http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/MODELS.HTM. Now there must be a law in Indonesia that W123s cannot use stock wheels because every W123 on that page has either newer MB wheels or third party wheels: http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/20084.HTM http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/200841.htm http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/230771.htm http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/280801.HTM http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/280811.htm http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/280e861.HTM - -john ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 23:29:52 -0500 From: mmason Subject: (long) Introduction, and a couple of current projects Hello all! Well, by way of introduction=85 I=92ve been on the diesel Benz list for almost 2 years (I think). I drive an =9280 240D, although it=92s got parts from such a variety of sources that it=92s kinda hard to tell sometimes! I=92m the 4th owner, and it was reasonably well maintained (interior was excellent, body was good, engine had 164k and was getting tired) when I bought it in =9296. Great car for a college kid=85 I graduated in May from the University of Iowa. My father and I have made a project of the car=85 two years ago we did extensive bodywork and a repaint in the original Mercedes light ivory, and last August we bought a crate engine from Mercedes and put it in ourselves. The new engine=92s got about 13,500 on it, while the odometer (from an =9282 240D parts car, so it=92s not accurate for this car's body anyway) reads 210.4k miles. The funny part =96 neither of us are mechanics. For a future English teacher (me) and a dentist (Dad), it=92s been a learning experience from the get-go. A testament to the relative simplicity (and fun factor) of working on these cars. Put Bilstein heavy-duty shocks in last year, to get rid of the "old school bus" feel... I've been running Shell Rotella T 15w40 on the new engine, exclusively... I haven't been TOO meticulous lately in keeping track of mpg, but I think it's getting 29 or 30 highway, and about 25 locally... Current projects: =96 Troubleshooting the cruise control, which has never worked since I=92ve had the car. I=92ve been isolating components one by one, and we=92ve narrowed it down to the brake light switch at the pedal. It functions, but I=92ve got to think there=92s a short in one of the wires coming off of that switch. Another thought is that the pulse counter on the back of the speedometer is flaky. We=92ve got the right cruise amp in there, and the switch on the column tests out OK=85 so I=92m kinda scratching my head. - - Mounting a right-side rear view mirror. I found a mirror in great shape, found the joystick switch through www.performanceproducts.com, and am in the process of adapting my own harness to the mirror and the switch. (The dealer wanted 22. for the switch, and 74. for the harness, and so far we=92ve spent 14. on the switch and about three bucks on the wire!) If anyone wants further info on this job, email me offlist. Welcome to all new listers, and thanks to everyone who has helped me with this car in the past=85 this is truly a helpful and fun diesel Benz resource. - -- Matt ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 07:38:07 -0400 From: "Chris Straut" Subject: 450SL I found a 450SL in the area with 130,000 miles on the odometer (not a diesel, unfortunately!). It looks to be in good shape, and the dealer is asking $8,900 for the car. I'm thinking about taking it for a test drive. Is there anything i should know about this model year, before I get serious about it? Thanks Chris Straut ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 07:52:47 -0400 From: "Chris Straut" Subject: RE: Where's the stuff? John, I think the turbo outage was caused by something getting wet under the hood. Fortunately I don't have an EGR valve, so that couldn't be the cause. The car's been running fine for about 2.5 months now, so I'm not worried about it :-) As far as stock sound goes, I can tell you what I've got and you can go from there :) First I'm going to quote the email that I just sent to Jerry. "Jerry, just a note on that subwoofer. I added one to my 300D and got some very severe rattle coming from the trunk area. It turned out to be the gas (well, diesel :) tank vibrating against the metal plating behind the back seat. This wasn't just your typical outside of car trunk rattle, either. The vibration was actually so loud that you could hear it in the car over the bass. If you pull the back seat and then remove the small circular plastic port covers, you will notice that the gas tank is only a millimeter or two apart from the metal plating in some areas. I ended up pulling the gas tank about 2 centimeters back and installing some spacers on the brackets where the gas tank was bolted down. That fixed everything! No more rattle, and then system really sounds great." So you will probably encounter that rattling issue. It wasn't all that difficult - you'll figure it out easily once you go to do it. I have a Polk DX sitting in a small carpeted box (as a bonus, it's the same color as the carpet in the trunk!) being driven by a Rockford Frostgate Punch 250a. These amps are pretty good, with a high dollar/watt ratio. I mounted the amp on the vertical panel in the back of the trunk, and placed the sub against the back in the middle. This gets me good extension down to about 28Hz, yet isn't so loud that it will rattle your vacuum system to pieces or turn your benz into a "ghetto box", as a friend of mine would call it. MB Quart makes some excellent speakers for the rear, but they will run you about $100+/pr. Right now i'm not running them with any external amplification, but I may do that at some point - these drivers eat wattage like popcorn. Up front I have some cheapie pioneers that are about to get replaced.. maybe even with the Bose units you suggested below! All of this is driven with a Kenwood KDC-7011. It's one of the nice units with the flat-black rotating face. While it's not the best head unit you can buy in the pricerange as far as features/output is concerned, the rotating face makes the tradeoff worth it. When the unit isn't in use, the face rotates around so you just have a small flat-black square in your dash. This way you don't have some funky space-age stereo sitting in the dash of your classic mercedes all of the time - it's only there when you want to use it. Also, Blaupunkt (sp?) makes some nice "normal" looking units that look good in older Merecedes dashes. The guy at the local audio shop was trying to sell me some unit with a "phat blue light, man" - not in my Mercedes, thank you :) Thanks for the wheel links! Chris Straut - -----Original Message----- From: owner-diesel-benz-at-digest.net [mailto:owner-diesel-benz-at-digest.net]On Behalf Of John Fieber Sent: Tuesday, July 11, 2000 11:04 PM To: Chris Straut Cc: diesel-benz-at-digest.net Subject: RE: Where's the stuff? On Tue, 11 Jul 2000, Chris Straut wrote: > My name is Chris Straut and I'm from Bridgeport, West Virginia. Is this a 12-step program? ;-) > haven't had any problems with it except for a mysterious turbo-outage > (turbocharter stopped giving boost for a few days, but then started working > perfectly a few days later), Did you note any sound changes during the outage? 84 California and I believe 85 Federal models have an electronic controlled EGR system which includes an "air recirculation valve", effectively a turbo bypass (but distinct from the waste gate). I presume it is to lower the intake pressure to enable more exhaust gasses to flow from the exhaust manifold to the intake via the EGR valve. [Actually, it is still all vacuum operated in fine W123 tradition, but the vacuum is electronically controlled via a switchover valve and a funky pressure converter gizmo.] I bring this up because there are a couple (potentially transient) failure modes of components in the EGR system which can cause this valve to always be bypassing rather than just when the EGR control electronics thinks it should be bypassing. The bypass isn't complete; it supposedly only cuts turbo boost by about 30%, but that is VERY noticable if the bypass is stuck on. It is also accompanied by abnormally loud turbo whistling. And if your EGR valve is non-functional (either accidentally or otherwise), the bypass serves absolutely no purpose. > The sound system has been upgraded to a very large extent and > sounds quite well-balanced. Any tips on sound improvements while maintaining the stock look? I cramed some Boston Acoustic CX4 speakers in the front which was a night and day difference from cereal-box-with-a-voice-coil type speakers that were there. No bass though. I'm pondering what to do about the back since anything in the stock holes will be similarly thin in the low end. Mind you I don't need a bottom end that will crack the pavement, but SOMETHING below 180Hz would be nice. > Anyone have pictures of W123 Mercedes cars with late model or > aftermarket wheels on them? I haven't seen any, and want to > get some ideas. I think they look really sharp. As always, start at http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/MODELS.HTM. Now there must be a law in Indonesia that W123s cannot use stock wheels because every W123 on that page has either newer MB wheels or third party wheels: http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/20084.HTM http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/200841.htm http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/230771.htm http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/280801.HTM http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/280811.htm http://www.dhc.net/~pmhack/mercedes/280e861.HTM - -john ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 10:04:42 -0400 From: "S.D.Byers" Subject: Re: Where's the stuff? Census time: One 1982 300TD, gold, 180k, near mint condition, Texas car. Name: Goldilocks. One 1975 300D ENGINE installed in a rebuilt 1964 Land Rover 109 inch SW. (This engine came from a crashed 300D, 169k miles). Name: Liza. One 1977 300SD ENGINE installed in a rebuilt 1969 Land Rover 109 inch SW. (This engine came from a 300SD with 450k on the clock and lots of salt belt rust). Name: Swiss Miss, name of 300SD was Brown Pig. Other non-benz vehicle float about the yard. SDB ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 10:30:09 -0500 From: "Italiano, Joseph J" Subject: my diesel stats Diesel Dogs, I'm down to only one MB, an 80 240D with 214xxx miles. It is my only automobile now. I've owned it since 1995...bought it for $3200. It had 156xxx miles on it and needed 4 injectors that were leaking and causing a strange "ping" upon deceleration. I owned an 1987 300 SDL from 1989 to 1999. Bought it for $28000 put 100,000 miles on her, and sold her for about $8500. The 80 240D quality seems a lot better than the 87 300 sdl. I personally believe that MB started to cheapen their cars somewhere in the mid 80's, and you started to see failures in the 150,000 mile range that you didn't see in the earlier cars until 250,000 miles. As far as cost per mile, if the 240 burns to the ground today, cost is about 5.3 cents/mile. My 87 300 sdl cost me close to 20 cents per mile. (only cost of the car divided by mileage, no fuel, insurance,etc) and I bought it for half the sticker price when it was 2 years old. I still say that the best car values are still the early 80's MB diesels but they are getting harder to harder to find in good shape. Joe ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 09:46:34 -0700 From: john Subject: Re: used motor oil At 07:12 AM 7/12/00 EDT, IanWade-at-aol.com wrote: >John >My name is Jonathan >I work for power co in the UK. >I found an email list in which you said that you have run your diesel on used >motor oil. >If we bought a diesel engine could we run it on rerefined motor oil. >What are the problems we would get or what modifications would we need to >make. >Jonathan There are several problems in using used motor oil for fuel. The foremost is the contamination of the old oil. It'll have acids and heavy metals, and abrasive particles, mainly silicon. The problem I ran into with used motor oil and used vegetable oil was the clogging of my fuel filter. :) If the used oil can be centrifuged and then filtered through a filter say around 2 microns, and then treated or blended with something to balance it's PH content, it would be fine. Perhaps a blend with kerosene or Diesel would make certain that the injection pump would have the lubricity needed. If you're talking about reformulated motor oil, then there would be less problems as it theoretically has less contaminants and would have been tested for proper balance. The only remaining issue is the lubrication of the Injection pump. The viscosity of the motor oil will be thicker than that of normal Diesel fuel, so there is the possibility that the pump wouldn't receive sufficient lubrication and cooling. Again, using additive or mixing with kerosene or Diesel would minimize those issues... if indeed they are an issue. I've heard of farmers using biodiesel for years without problems. So, the issues are basically: - pump lubrication - contamination and abrasive elments - viscosity of the fuel - pH balance of the fuel Hope this helps... Diesels are the most efficient form of internal combustion engine. later, john meister snohomish, washington usa - ----------------------------------------------------- http://www.wagoneers.com/AMSOIL/ To order 1-800-956-5695 customer# 283461 Snohomish, WA, where Jeeps don't rust, they mold... - ----------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ End of diesel-benz-digest V1 #348 *********************************