1980 Mercedes-Benz W116 300SD review from North America

I recently purchased a 1980 300SD with low miles, just over 100,000 with a bad engine. The car was being run on cooking oil or something of that nature. I'm not sure if that's what caused the problem, but one of the injector cups appeared to have the end melted off. It looked like someone took a cutting torch to it. I'm going stick with regular diesel fuel.

I put an used engine out of a 1985 in the car, the head and block were the same, but I had to change all the attaching parts, oil pan, valve cover, motor mount brackets, etc.

To the guy with with the flashing glow plug light, that light flashes when there's a problem with the system. Chances are you one or more glow plugs that is burned out. You can check them with an ohm meter or a test light.

Disconnect the wires from all the glow plugs, and with an ohm meter check continuity at each plug. If you don't have a ohm meter, you can use a test light. Hook the wire from the test light to the + terminal of you battery and touch the probe to the end of the glow plug where the wire would attach. If the test light comes, chances are the glow plug is good, do this with all 5. The best way to test them is to carefully remove them from the engine. DO NOT force them they can break off, if you have one that doesn't want to come out, screw it in out a few times and spray carburetor cleaner around the threads.

Once you have them out, hook them to a 12V battery with small jumper wires, - to the body of the glow plug and + to end where the wire would go. Disconnect as soon as they start to turn red, you can burn it out if you leave it hooked up too long.