New W124 300 TD owner

[chilsta]

Hello all,

I've just bought a 1990 300TD off the 'bay with 200,000 on the clock. The PO lived on Jersey and the Isle of Wight with it for the last 5 ish years- going by the old MoT certs, it's done about 10k miles in that time.
Really happy with the car and everything about it. It's great to drive (maybe a bit floaty, but I'm getting used to that and still have easy things like the steering damper to check out). My first automatic car, but I'm getting used to that and in a car like this it makes more sense than manual anyway.

I previously owned a 1988 Mk 1. 190D 2.5 for 7 years which was converted to run on vegetable oil or Diesel using a single tank kit made by Elsbett of Germany.
I caused some slight collision damage a year ago - it was well mendable, but the amount of rust on the body and other problems that were outstanding meant that it wasn't worth spending the money and it was sold to someone who parted it out.

Compared to the W201 the W124 is just that bit more refined in most areas. I feel like I've made a welcome upgrade.

I plan to keep a running diary of the work I've done/doing to the 300TD on this forum in order to hopefully help others and to remind me what I've done to the car. I'll start a new thread for that in general discussion as I figure this isn't the right place.

Anyway, thanks to all for the forum- I've already found it helpful with resolving some problems and it's great to have a rich community of likeminded people sharing information and helping each other out.

Cheers
Marcus

 

[trapperjohn]

Welcome Marcus. A fellow 300TD owner here. 217K on the clock and just done a round trip to Scotland with the usual no fuss, no worries progress.
39.9 MPG. If you look up the GTG Scotland meet, mine is the only 124 Estate there. It is sitting on 16" alloys which I think give an improved ride.
An interesting game to play on a long run is "spot the 124" There are fewer and fewer about.
Are you going the veg route on your estate?

 

[s500colin]

Hi Marcus
Welcome to the forum

 

[d w124]

Hi Marcus and welcome to the forum .Just read your diary and looks like you`re a real enthusiast

 

[Sorry Pete]

Welcome Marcus,

Old MB diesels never die! I've been looking for a 124 estate diesel for a while now, in preparation for a house move and consequent renovations.

I'm extremely interested in the Elsbett conversion you had on the w201. I've said in other veggie-based posts that it would be my preferred kit were I to go 100% veg oil.

I look forward to reading your ongoing saga of W124 ownership!

All the best,
Mike

 

[chilsta]

Thanks all for your welcomes.

Welcome Marcus. A fellow 300TD owner here. 217K on the clock and just done a round trip to Scotland with the usual no fuss, no worries progress.
39.9 MPG. If you look up the GTG Scotland meet, mine is the only 124 Estate there. It is sitting on 16" alloys which I think give an improved ride.

Very nice looking ride- that's Almandine Red right? Same here Wasn't what I was looking for, but I'm quickly warming to it. Hoping mine looks like yours before too long. It's not far off if you ignore the rust patches on the wings. I'll get some photos up here of it soon. Have you replaced your wings?

Are you going the veg route on your estate?

Yes, I certainly plan to. Took my first trip in a year to fill up a supermarket trolley with oil the other day. Sadly the best deal I could find was Tesco selling 3x1 litre bottles for £2.50. That works out at 83p a litre which is great, but the hassle and waste of plastic means I won't be getting much of that.
I'm hoping to see my brother today who runs Vegburner and ask him what he recommends. He's already said that he thinks Elsbett is overkill for what I need. He sells parts through True Asset - True Asset Renewables Web Shop so I have a handy source of most parts I need and a wealth of knowledge to get something together that works for me.

I'm extremely interested in the Elsbett conversion you had on the w201. I've said in other veggie-based posts that it would be my preferred kit were I to go 100% veg oil.

I certainly couldn't fault it, other than the expense. Towards the end of the car's life the timer circuit seemed to fail- this keeps the glow plugs on longer than standard and powers an electric heater which is wrapped around the axillary fuel filter. I wired the circuit to a spare tell-tale bulb in the dash that wasn't being used so I could keep an eye on the circuit and that stopped lighting after a while. Didn't seem to make any difference though, even in the winter I never had any issues with starting on SVO.

I mostly ran new supermarket oil, a tank or 2 of filtered waste oil my brother got for me. I'd say less than 10% of the fuel I used in the years I ran the kit was Diesel. Visiting a petrol station began to feel very strange!
I only do around 6k miles a year and probably used 3 fuel filters in the 6 years I used the car with the kit and only once got any sign of fuel starvation which wasn't an issue as I stopped, switched over to the standard fuel filter (you can see the white plastic switch between the air filter and the power steering reservoir in the below photo) and changed the axillary soon after. The filter was a Mann 707 and I got one from GSF and one from Camberly's, so they're easy to get hold of.

Let me know if there's anything specific you'd like to know. I still have the laminated installation and usage instructions that came with the kit and my brother and another friend used to install these kits professionally for Blooming Futures - Welcome to The Award Winning Blooming Futures and the Bio-Fleet Project

Here's a photo of the installed setup:

Vegburner Engine by chilsta, on Flickr