C220 CDI - Fumes in Cabin

[Oxfordian]

Hi all,
I have a strange problem with my C220 CDI Sports Coupe which I bought 12 years ago and has just covered 200,000 miles.

Diesel fumes enter the cabin when in slow moving traffic or at a halt (with engine on) and fuel consumption is now quite poor (50+ to the gallon is a distant memory) unless on a very long run. Interestingly, the fumes do not enter the cabin when Air Recirculation is on. The external air temperature reading also shoots up when in slow moving traffic or at a halt.

Despite some shocking experiences with both Merc main dealers and an indy garage, the vehicle is in really good physical and mechanical condition (the 2 problems excepted) and I want to keep it. There are no oil leaks and the exhaust is still solid.

Can anyone help me understand what the problem may be and recommend a reliable indy garage in the South East or West London?
I live in South Oxfordshire.
Many thanks!

 

[Stratman]

I'd have a sneaky 50p on leaking fuel pipes at the fuel pump on the front of the engine. It's pretty common and a search of the forum will turn up plenty of advice and pictures.

 

[bob6600]

You could have a leaking injector seal

Take the engine cover off and look for black deposits around the injectors

 

[Oxfordian]

I'd have a sneaky 50p on leaking fuel pipes at the fuel pump on the front of the engine. It's pretty common and a search of the forum will turn up plenty of advice and pictures.

Wow such quick responses! I'll search the forum for advice.

... and mention of the front of the engine reminds me that the condenser was replaced last summer and I recall a faint smell of fumes in the cabin shortly afterwards. It wasn't there all the time and only got worse last autumn.

Is it possible that something could have disturbed?
Thanks

 

[Oxfordian]

You could have a leaking injector seal

Take the engine cover off and look for black deposits around the injectors

Bob, thank you too for a quick response.
I'll take the engine cover off tomorrow and have a look.

 

[BlackC55]

Blocked cat, leaking exhaust seal, diesel leak or a chuffing injector.

 

[Oxfordian]

Ok, I finally got to getting the engine cover off, and even to my eyes, things do not look good.

The 1st image shows the black deposits and the 2nd provides a close up. It is not actually sticky to the touch but appears baked on. Doesn't smell much either.

Obviously, there is a problem here!
As I'm IT technical not car engine technical, can someone interpret this for me, with some advice as to what's required?

Much obliged!

 

[E270 Owner]

Ok, I finally got to getting the engine cover off, and even to my eyes, things do not look good.

The 1st image shows the black deposits and the 2nd provides a close up. It is not actually sticky to the touch but appears baked on. Doesn't smell much either.

Obviously, there is a problem here!
As I'm IT technical not car engine technical, can someone interpret this for me, with some advice as to what's required?

Much obliged!

https://www.google.co.uk/#q=mercedes+black+death

 

[Lewis82]

I have the same problem. Leaky injector has been diagnosed by my mechanic. An hrs labour he reckons if it comes out easily enough otherwise head neess to come off. Yours looks a hell of a lot worse than mine tho. Good luck with that. Hop you find a decent mechanic

 

[ItalianTuneUp]

I'm not expert on this, but the pics remind me of a problem that was pointed out on my car too. Something to do with leaky fuel injectors. I was told that this needed to be seen to promptly, as it can lead to to the premature demise of the engine. I believe the trade term for this is 'black death', as pointed out above.

Before I saw your pics, I was going to suggest that perhaps your cabin filter needed changing: the one that filters external smells like fumes from entering the car's cabin.

I would get to a good garage soon.

 

[Troon]

Oxfordian: as said, this is black death, which isn't as terminal as it sounds or may look.

Your injectors are held in place via clamps, bolted in with the Torx bolts you can see in front of injector #1 in your picture. At the bottom of the injector hole is a copper washer that seals the injector to the block.

This seal has failed on your #2 injector, and combustion gases are leaking past and condensing all over the engine. It needs cleaning, then the offending injector(s) need pulling out, the seat in the head needs recutting, and the seal and clamp bolt need replacing. By the look of how it's spread, I'd say yours is a quite recent but fairly serious leak.

Parts are not expensive: I bought two washer, two bolts and a small pot of the special grease needed (which is enough to do about 100 injectors!) for £17. The hard / expensive bit is the labour to clean it all up and pull out the injector.

Get it done immediately before it gets any worse; then check your engine for recurrence at least monthly. It's a fairly easy DIY job for a competent mechanic if caught immediately, but I wouldn't attempt fixing yours myself.

 

[Oxfordian]

Specialist to sort my C220 CDi 'Black Death'

Oxfordian: as said, this is black death, which isn't as terminal as it sounds or may look.

Your injectors are held in place via clamps, bolted in with the Torx bolts you can see in front of injector #1 in your picture. At the bottom of the injector hole is a copper washer that seals the injector to the block.

This seal has failed on your #2 injector, and combustion gases are leaking past and condensing all over the engine. It needs cleaning, then the offending injector(s) need pulling out, the seat in the head needs recutting, and the seal and clamp bolt need replacing. By the look of how it's spread, I'd say yours is a quite recent but fairly serious leak.

Parts are not expensive: I bought two washer, two bolts and a small pot of the special grease needed (which is enough to do about 100 injectors!) for £17. The hard / expensive bit is the labour to clean it all up and pull out the injector.

Get it done immediately before it gets any worse; then check your engine for recurrence at least monthly. It's a fairly easy DIY job for a competent mechanic if caught immediately, but I wouldn't attempt fixing yours myself.

First of all, thanks everyone for the response. Troon, your interpretation was really to the point and I too wouldn't attempt fixing this myself (those days are long past).

The link provided by 'E270 Owner' was helpful (and scary) but also showed details of this specialist MERCEDES CDI BLACK DEATH. INJECTOR SEALS. SEIZED INJECTORS. STRIPED THREADS. VITO SPRINTER ML C E S | Milton Keynes | Gumtree.

Has anyone used this person or have any knowledge of him, or of a reliable Indy who could undertake this kind of job?

Hoping for some feedback on the specialist.
Again thanks

 

[Oxfordian]

I'm trying this specialist

So, after a good look around for a specialist, I spoke with Steward at MERCEDES CDI BLACK DEATH. INJECTOR SEALS. SEIZED INJECTORS. STRIPED THREADS. VITO SPRINTER ML C E S | Milton Keynes | Gumtree. I don't have much to go on but he very clearly knew his job and I liked what I heard.

He's travelling to me at South Oxfordshire next Tuesday from his base in Yorkshire and it will take about 5 hours to complete the work. I will post details of the immediate outcome and follow up a month after that with another post.

I'm told that fortune favours the brave - hope so!
Cheers for now.

 

[Oxfordian]

No cabin fumes, black death gone & injector seals replaced

Hi All,

At a cost of £460, I've had all 4 injectors serviced by Stewart Danes of 'Modern Diesels' who drove to me at South Oxfordshire from Yorkshire. The understated description of work on the invoice reads 'For replacing all 4 injector sealing washers on your Mercedes C220 CDI'. This simple statement doesn't begin to describe what was done over 4 hours. The core of what he did was:

Clean all the carbon build up around the injectors.
Remove the diesel return pipe and test all injectors for diesel leak off.
Remove the injector bolts & injectors.
Clean the remainder of the carbon from the cylinder head & the injectors.
Re-cut the injector seats in the cylinder head.
Coat the injectors with ceramic grease
Fit new copper sealing washers and refit with new stretch bolts.
Connect diesel pipes & electrical connections.
Start engine and test injector sealing washers.
​

There are some before and after images below.

I've only done a short road test of 4 miles so far, but there are no fumes in the cabin and per gallon fuel consumption has improved from 38 to 53 (the 38 was what I observed over the same 'course' last week). It also appears that the reading on the outside air temperature sensor is no longer shooting up a few degrees when the car is at a stop and idling. I'm puzzled as to why this issue has rectified itself so will carry out some more checks on this - do please respond with any thoughts you may have about it. I'm also seeking views on a couple of other issues in a new thread.

Stewart is a really nice guy who I would term a specialist in this area. He absolutely knows his stuff, was also clean and efficient and I would recommend him without reservation. He's here: MERCEDES CDI BLACK DEATH. INJECTOR SEALS. SEIZED INJECTORS. STRIPED THREADS. VITO SPRINTER ML C E S | Milton Keynes | Gumtree

Finally, I'm driving to Switzerland in 10 days and on my return, I'll have a look at the injectors and follow-up with a final posting.

Thanks to all.

 

[Twistedmind]

Eat your dinner off that.

Looks great

Sent from my iPhone using MBClub UK

 

[Stratman]

It looks great now, glad you got it sorted. How did yer man remove the black gunge?

My sneaky 50p is going in the poor box

 

[Oxfordian]

It looks great now, glad you got it sorted. How did yer man remove the black gunge?

My sneaky 50p is going in the poor box

Hi Stratman,
He used a combination of a wire brush on a drill and a scraping tool of some sort. I did mention to him some of the domestic cleaning fluids people on this site had used and he was very critical of those due to their possible corrosive effects, both chemical and/or electrochemical - I wish I'd taken some notes.

I'm just so relieved that it wasn't the fuel pump or pipes to it.

Cheers

 

[E270 Owner]

Never use domestic cleaning products for Black Death, especially oven cleaner it eats the aluminium.

A mix of Carb cleaner and diesel is more than enough to clean it up.

 

[Stratman]

The chemical to avoid on aluminium is caustic soda (sodium hydroxide), the active ingredient in most oven cleaners

Here's why

 

[Oxfordian]

Injector image after 2000 miles - but lumpy?

Hi,
It's been a few weeks since I had the injectors done and I've driven approximately 2000 miles - many of these for hours at a time and at varying high speeds. I've survived the Swiss slopes, the unrestricted speeds of German motorways and (just about) the horrible polution in the German/Dutch industrial area. So, as promised, here's an image of the injectors after 2000 ish miles and it's still clean.

I noticed that the inside of the engine cover was still yucky with the original carbon 'build up'. This is significant only as I presume that at high engine temperatures this may become sticky and drip down. Certainly there's no leakage from the injectors.

However; there was a lot of anxiety at about 11:45pm in the middle of nowhere and after a long day's motoring when the engine was noticibly lumpy and became labouring when climbing and with the revs at about 2,500. There were 2 of us in the fully loaded car, outside air temperature varied from +8 (in tunnels) to -2 and height was about 1100 metres. Surprisingly, accelaration was and is good and so is fuel consumption which has averaged 55mpg over the trip.

I've driven this particular route before in Switzerland and never experienced this issue and believe it may be related to the injector work I had done. I'm awaiting a response from the technician, but has anyone any ideas.

Thanks for any thoughts