From: owner-diesel-benz-digest-at-digest.net (diesel-benz-digest) To: diesel-benz-digest-at-digest.net Subject: diesel-benz-digest V1 #1015 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 Tuesday, May 13 2003 Volume 01 : Number 1015 Forum for Discussion of Diesel Mercedes Benz Automobiles Derick Amburgey Digest Coordinator Contents: Re: Air filter recommendation? RE: Air filter recommendation? Re: FW: XJ Diesel question Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? Re: Air filter recommendation? Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? Re: Air filter recommendation? Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? Re: Thoughts from under a car . . . Topsiders/Airfilters/Diesel Aircraft Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? Books4cars.com Re: Topsiders/Airfilters/Diesel Aircraft RE: Books4cars.com 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: Mon, 12 May 2003 14:29:19 -0700 From: Kevin Pekarek Subject: Re: Air filter recommendation? On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 04:19:10PM +0000, acordova-at-texas.net wrote: > So I gave in to the urge and bought a Topsider. I'll bite. What's a topsider? For a minute I thought you said toploader, but that's a ford tranny, so it's probably not that :) K ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 14:29:51 -0700 From: REisenhardt-at-AlienTechnology.com Subject: RE: Air filter recommendation? Alec What's a Topsider? Randy '87 300 SDL 296k miles - -----Original Message----- From: acordova-at-texas.net [mailto:acordova-at-texas.net] Sent: Monday, May 12, 2003 9:19 AM To: diesel-benz-at-digest.net Subject: Re: Air filter recommendation? > heheeh... K-mart and Walmart are two places to find decent oil cheap. Catch > being they have decent oil and junk, not the good stuff :-/ > > -- > Kevin Pekarek > Redwood City, CA (near San Francisco) and > Los Osos, CA (near San Luis Obispo) > Isn't that the truth. The quicky oil change places have all started refusing to touch a Benz, even the local one I've been patronizing for several years (while supplying my own OEM filter). So I gave in to the urge and bought a Topsider. Went to WalMart armed with a printout from some web site (http://www.whnet.com/4x4/oil.html) of the "official" Mercedes-approved 229.1 and 229.3 motor oils, planning to buy some tasty Synthetic. The only Synthetic I could find at WalMart that was on the MB-approved list was Castrol Syntec 10W- 40, and it was just 229.1 approved, not 229.3 extended-drain-interval approved. Half a dozen other synthetics in WalMart, more if you consider the different viscosities, which the 229.x lists do, and only one match. My car seems pretty happy, though, with a sump full of Castrol Syntec 10W-40 229.1-approved synthetic, from single quart bottles. And that Topsider is a wonderful thing. Alec Cordova Taylor, Texas 89 300CE, 157K ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 14:42:56 -0700 From: john Subject: Re: FW: XJ Diesel question At 02:29 PM 5/12/2003 -0700, Starc, Dan wrote: > > -----Original Message----- > > From: Starc, Dan > > Sent: Monday, May 12, 2003 2:28 PM > > To: 'Meister, John' > > Subject: Diesel question > > Importance: High > > > > I have a friend in South America with an XJ 97 or 98, with a disesl, > > and he believes the key has an ECM/security code which needs to be > > bypassed (it's a repo or stolen recovery sale, no ignition key > > available), so they can get it started without the key but it shuts > > down shortly thereafter...any ideas? Is there really a code ON the key > > itself? HELP! > :-) > > TIA, > > Dan yep, got the same problem with my '99 WJ... only one key works... the '97 is probably the VM motor... will post to the XJ list too... someone in Europe may have info on the computers used on those models... there are several computers that have to be replaced to make it work... but since it's a Diesel it may be easier to bypass all the computers... he should ship it to me, I'll trade my '87 xj that works just fine for it... :) here's some of the computers on my '99: SKIM, PCM, BCM, PCI, EMIC SKIM - Smart Key Immobilizer Module PCM - Powertrain Control Module BCM - Body Control Module EMIC - Electro-Mechanical Instrument Cluster. PCI - Programable Communications Interface VFD - Vacuum Fluorescent Display (odometer) RKE - Remote Keyless Entry VTSS - Vehicle Theft Security System DDM - Driver Door Module EVIC - Electronic Vehicle Information Center PDM - Passenger Door Module john - ------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.WAGONEERS.com/ Snohomish, WA - where Jeeps don't rust, they mold... jesus, don't leave life without him, please! - ------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 16:46:45 US/Central From: acordova-at-texas.net Subject: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? > Isn't that the truth. The quicky oil change places have all started refusing > to touch a Benz, even the local one I've been patronizing for several years > (while supplying my own OEM filter). So I gave in to the urge and bought a > Topsider. > > And that Topsider is a wonderful thing. > > Alec Cordova > Taylor, Texas > 89 300CE, 157K > Shame on you, folks, for not knowing what a Topsider is. And I'm not talking about Sperry Topsider boat shoes, which are particularly nice and very long- lasting (like our sweet old Benzes). I'm talking about the Topsider MVP Oil Changer. See http://www.skilimited.com/product.asp?wc=true&base_no=AA-OC for an example, although I bought mine at West Marine. It allows you to change the oil through the dipstick tube. Primary application is for inboard boat motors, but it works wonderfully on automobiles. In fact, they work particularly nicely on MB automobiles, which for the last 20 or 30 years have had dipstick tubes that go all the way down to the bottom of the oil pan. There is a very expensive factory tool in use by most MB dealers that sucks the oil out of the dipstick tube just by sealing around the top of the tube and using it like a drinking straw. A Topsider includes tubing to push down through your dipstick tube, but it still does a very tidy job of extracting just about all of the oil. Some have claimed that, at least on an MB, a Topsider actually removes more oil than is usually removed through the old drain plug. On my 89 300CE, which has one of those sound/splash/drip pans under the motor, it's much easier to do the oil and filter job completely from the Top Side of the motor. Alec ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 14:50:23 -0700 From: Kevin Pekarek Subject: Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 04:46:45PM +0000, acordova-at-texas.net wrote: > Shame on you, folks, for not knowing what a Topsider is. And I'm not talking > about Sperry Topsider boat shoes, which are particularly nice and very long- > lasting (like our sweet old Benzes). I'm talking about the Topsider MVP Oil > Changer. See http://www.skilimited.com/product.asp?wc=true&base_no=AA-OC for > an example, although I bought mine at West Marine. It allows you to change > the oil through the dipstick tube. Very cool. Might have to get me one of those. Only problem is west marine is next door to the ham radio store. That could turn out to be a rather expensive trip. Better leave the wallet at home and bring just enough cash for the oilsucker. :) Kevin / KG6MMT - -- Kevin Pekarek Redwood City, CA (near San Francisco) and Los Osos, CA (near San Luis Obispo) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 14:57:45 -0700 From: "Paul Schwartz" Subject: Re: Air filter recommendation? > I also have a soft spot for steakhouses, and good ones of those are very hard > to come by in the bay area. Having a house in a rural county with lots of cows > around comes in handy :) Yeah, I've often wonder what enables vegans to get up in the morning. Paul ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 17:58:04 -0400 (EDT) From: Richard Welty Subject: Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? On Mon, 12 May 2003 16:46:45 US/Central acordova-at-texas.net wrote: > Shame on you, folks, for not knowing what a Topsider is. And I'm not > talking > about Sperry Topsider boat shoes, which are particularly nice and very > long- > lasting (like our sweet old Benzes). on a note which is automotive but not benz related, there are actually some race drivers i see who wear topsiders instead of proper racing shoes. i try to talk them out of it (i'm a tech inspector) but i can't stop them, because the topsider meets the technical requirements for SCCA club racing driver gear. richard - -- Richard Welty rwelty-at-suespammers.org Averill Park Networking rwelty-at-averillpark.net Unix, Linux, IP Network Engineering, Security rwelty-at-krusty-motorsports.com 518-573-7592 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 14:57:50 -0700 (PDT) From: Jerome Kaidor Subject: Re: Air filter recommendation? Paul Schwartz wrote: > > > Yeah, I've often wonder what enables vegans to get up in the morning. > *** Well, isn't beer vegetarian? - Jerry Kaidor ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 16:26:33 -0700 (PDT) From: Jerome Kaidor Subject: Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? acordova-at-texas.net wrote: > > > Isn't that the truth. The quicky oil change places have all started refusing > > to touch a Benz, even the local one I've been patronizing for several years > > (while supplying my own OEM filter). So I gave in to the urge and bought a > > Topsider. > > *** OK, You guys talked me into it. I just ordered a Topsider from Skilimited. It's not so much for the Benz - it's no big deal to reach underneath and undo the drain plug - but more for my airplane. Getting at the drain plug for that sucker is a bigger deal, because you have to remove the lower cowl. And my Tr2 & MGA both need an oil change - and those things are so low to the ground that your arm almost doesn't fit.... Of course, the big deal with those is that -at-#$#$# cannister oil filter. Especially the TR, whose oil filter fouls on the road tube, so you have to unbolt the adapter from the engine block.... But that's getting off the topic of diesel benzes. Who'd like to talk about how they are ideal Ham Radio cars, because they make no ignition noise? - Jerry Kaidor ( jerry-at-tr2.com ) ------------------------------ Date: 12 May 2003 19:51:35 -0400 From: gary Subject: Re: Thoughts from under a car . . . Don't forget, Re-babbeting the bearings on the roadside as well! - -Gary in Orlando On Mon, 2003-05-12 at 15:33, Michael Frank wrote: > LOL This has me thinking of that chapter in Grapes of Wrath....the old > Hudson breaks down by the road side. Tom figures they holed a piston. Then > and there, he drops the oil pan and worries the offending piston out from > the bottom. He treks to the nearest junk yard, buys a new piston. No ring > compressor, so they just do it up with copper wire, which wears out as they > chug along and releases the rings......I always wondered if that would ever > work in real life. You might want to check out the next chapter too, where > they bury Grandma Joad by the roadside... ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 20:03:13 -0400 From: Robert Chase Subject: Topsiders/Airfilters/Diesel Aircraft Heh heh, I have seen the topsiders on some of the Ferrari sites as its a horrific pain to change the oil on one of those puppies. What kinda plane do you have Jerome? I notice some of the rental Cessna's that I fly from time to time have the cowlings screwed in with sheet metal screws (of course with a couple of screws missing here and there). Looks rather flimsy and it would definatly be something I would not want to mess with :). I would check the FAR's and make sure the FAA does not have some funky regulation on the way your oil must be changed. Perhaps your A/P could answer the question for you. Speaking of planes and diesel engines here is an interesting article on avweb about the first diesel powered general aviation aircraft engine. http://www.avweb.com/newswire/9_19b/complete/184939-1.html#3b Quite honestly Im suprised that no one has done this before. The idea of having no magnetos or ignition system to fail in flight is wonderful. The Diesel engine's RPM range is almost perfect for aircraft use as well. Another side benifit would be the elimination of the carburator and providing a little extra margin of saftey against carb icing. Oh and of course there is no RF interference to any of your Nav/Com equipment. Personally I cant wait until they get their certifications and start sticking them into existing/new aircraft designs :) Now if someone would only make a car with the Audi CVT transmission and a diesel engine all of my transportation needs would be met forever :) Robert... Jerome Kaidor wrote: >acordova-at-texas.net wrote: > > >>>Isn't that the truth. The quicky oil change places have all started refusing >>>to touch a Benz, even the local one I've been patronizing for several years >>>(while supplying my own OEM filter). So I gave in to the urge and bought a >>>Topsider. >>> >>> >>> >*** OK, > > You guys talked me into it. I just ordered a Topsider from Skilimited. >It's not so much for the Benz - it's no big deal to reach underneath and >undo the drain plug - but more for my airplane. Getting at the drain plug >for that sucker is a bigger deal, because you have to remove the lower >cowl. And my Tr2 & MGA both need an oil change - and those things are >so low to the ground that your arm almost doesn't fit.... Of course, the >big deal with those is that -at-#$#$# cannister oil filter. Especially the TR, >whose oil filter fouls on the road tube, so you have to unbolt the adapter >from the engine block.... > > But that's getting off the topic of diesel benzes. Who'd like to talk >about how they are ideal Ham Radio cars, because they make no ignition >noise? > > > - Jerry Kaidor ( jerry-at-tr2.com ) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 17:12:16 -0700 From: Kevin Pekarek Subject: Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 04:26:33PM -0700, Jerome Kaidor wrote: > But that's getting off the topic of diesel benzes. Who'd like to talk > about how they are ideal Ham Radio cars, because they make no ignition > noise? hehehe. sounds like you've been in my crown victoria. You can hear the ignition through the scanner and through the VHF radio. I'm pretty sure the alternator is part of the problem as well, but I digress. I don't know how the diesel benz would work for a mobile setup. The only mobile setups in diesels I've played with were in friends' VWs. The one in the TDI jetta (current body style) was absolulely silent. The earlier rabbit (around an 82) had problems, and my pacer (has a perkins 4.154) had the AM antenna moved because of noise. With the rabbit and the pacer, the going theory was that the belts acted somewhat as a van de graaf (sp?) generator, and this was responsible for the noise. Never poked my head under the old rabbit's hood, so I don't know if it was a v-belt or serpentine, but the pacer is a v-belt setup. I haven't heard the pacer's problem (then again, I have never run it). I'm acquiring a 190D in the very VERY near future, still haven't decided if I am going to put a radio in it, or just use HTs. I hate punching holes in cars. At least with the diesel, I don't have to worry about going fast enough to cause problems with a mag mount :) K - -- Kevin Pekarek Redwood City, CA (near San Francisco) and Los Osos, CA (near San Luis Obispo) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 17:28:48 -0700 (PDT) From: Jerome Kaidor Subject: Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? Kevin Pekarek wrote: > > hehehe. sounds like you've been in my crown victoria. You can hear the > ignition through the scanner and through the VHF radio. I'm pretty sure the > alternator is part of the problem as well, but I digress. > *** In my experience, the spark noise far overrides anything else. Well, maybe with modern cars it's not as bad - they all use resistor wires. I had a serious ham radio setup in my old Saab 96 - and that had the 3-cylinder 2-stroke motor, solid wires, wide-gap plugs, a serious CD ignition system to fire the wide-gap plugs. I bet you could have hooked up an antenna to that car though a code key and made contacts.... I notice that my IC-706 is the exact right size to slip into the radio slot in my 300D. Why don't they make ham rigs with built-in FM stereos? The technology can't be THAT hard - I bet the whole FM stereo function is available in a single chip nowadays. The pre-85 300D's would be ideal - those don't even have CPUs. - Jerry Kaidor ( jerry-at-tr2.com ) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 17:50:21 -0700 From: Kevin Pekarek Subject: Re: Topsider, WAS: Air filter recommendation? On Mon, May 12, 2003 at 05:28:48PM -0700, Jerome Kaidor wrote: > I notice that my IC-706 is the exact right size to slip into the radio > slot in my 300D. Why don't they make ham rigs with built-in FM stereos? > The technology can't be THAT hard - I bet the whole FM stereo function > is available in a single chip nowadays. well, they almost do. The FT-100D I bought for the motorhome can receive FM (though in monaural). It does decent filtering, but the memory control kinda sucks, so I'd definately look at the FT-857 a little closer if I was going to do that. K - -- Kevin Pekarek Redwood City, CA (near San Francisco) and Los Osos, CA (near San Luis Obispo) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 20:24:12 -0500 From: "Richard Arnold" Subject: Books4cars.com Hello fellow Diesel Heads, I am in need of a set of shop manuals for my '87 300SDL. I came across the web site, books4cars.com and wondered if any of you have any experience with them. I'm okay with CD books but since I have upgraded to XP, my Alfa manual needed an upgrade. What are your thoughts? Regards, Richard Arnold '87 300SDL '73 Alfa Spider ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 18:51:09 -0700 From: Rick Orr Subject: Re: Topsiders/Airfilters/Diesel Aircraft http://home.earthlink.net/~ralphcooper/pimagf30.htm hee, hee. nothing new, I think there is an earliar attempt [these old guys were well too heavy engine-wise]. rick ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 20:57:09 -0500 From: "Alec Cordova" Subject: RE: Books4cars.com > Hello fellow Diesel Heads, > I am in need of a set of shop manuals for my '87 300SDL. I came across > the web site, books4cars.com and wondered if any of you have any > experience with them. I'm okay with CD books but since I have upgraded > to XP, my Alfa manual needed an upgrade. What are your thoughts? > > Regards, > Richard Arnold > '87 300SDL > '73 Alfa Spider > Didn't we just hear this question today, or was that on another list? The MB factory manuals for your W126-series car are available on CD from many sources, including MB directly (1-800-FOR-MERC), our usual sources (Rusty at www.buymbparts.com), eBay (sometimes with less than perfectly legal histories), and possibly the site you mentioned. Price should be in the $100 to $125 range for genuine MB. The CD's are compilations of the older printed manuals (now out of print), scanned into Acrobat pdf files. Interface is not the greatest, and some of the images have to be printed to read the small print, but it's the Real Deal. The CD or CDs (2 discs for some MB models like my W124 89 300CE) include Climate, Electrical, Engine, Maintenance, and Chassis manuals, plus an owners manual from one model in the series (for me, I get the owner's manual for an early 90's 400E sedan, I think). The CDs use Flash and pdf files, nothing that XP should have any problems with. Third-party manuals for MB cars have not proven to be too great. In particular, your late-model W126 diesel may not even be mentioned in the Chilton's MB diesel book. Those only cover up to the five cylinder motor used through 85, not the sixer in yours. Alec Cordova Taylor, Texas 89 300CE, 157K, high-mileage badge has been ordered, plus a lapel pin for me ;-) ------------------------------ End of diesel-benz-digest V1 #1015 **********************************