Hi,
The other day I took my 1984 300TD to one of those manual carwash places here in the Netherlands - one of those coin-in-the-slot places and you get a couple of minutes of soapy brush and high-pressure hose (held at a good distance of course).
Straight after the wash, the car started perfectly, but when I next started it a few days later, I got only faint dashboard lights, no glowplug light, and either a strange clicking or a whirring from the glowplug relay. When I remove the big plug on the relay, I get full dashboard lights when I turn on the ignition. The headlights etc seem to work okay.
I was lucky enough to find a great tutorial here, so I got out my tester and tested everything:
1. Main battery at 12.4V - is this enough?
2. All sockets in the main glowplug relay connector showing 0.6 Ohm resistance, which seems fine.
3. Voltage coming into the glowplug relay = 12.4V
4. Voltage on both sides of the strip fuse at top of relay = 12.4V
5. Voltage on each of the 5 terminals on the relay during glowplug activation = 12.2V
I can't quite work out the problem here. The voltage seems fine, the glowplugs are fine (as far as I can tell). I was expecting a dodgy relay, but that actually seems to be fine, providing 12.2V to the glowplugs when required. The only thing I would expect is that the starter would crank the engine (it doesn't), but if the starter's the issue, then why are the dashboard lights dim only until I remove the connector from the relay?
Any ideas? I guess the next step's to replace the relay, but whilst it's quick, it also costs a lot if that turns out not to be the cause of the problem.
Thanks in advance for any help you can give!
Sam
The other day I took my 1984 300TD to one of those manual carwash places here in the Netherlands - one of those coin-in-the-slot places and you get a couple of minutes of soapy brush and high-pressure hose (held at a good distance of course).
Straight after the wash, the car started perfectly, but when I next started it a few days later, I got only faint dashboard lights, no glowplug light, and either a strange clicking or a whirring from the glowplug relay. When I remove the big plug on the relay, I get full dashboard lights when I turn on the ignition. The headlights etc seem to work okay.
I was lucky enough to find a great tutorial here, so I got out my tester and tested everything:
1. Main battery at 12.4V - is this enough?
2. All sockets in the main glowplug relay connector showing 0.6 Ohm resistance, which seems fine.
3. Voltage coming into the glowplug relay = 12.4V
4. Voltage on both sides of the strip fuse at top of relay = 12.4V
5. Voltage on each of the 5 terminals on the relay during glowplug activation = 12.2V
I can't quite work out the problem here. The voltage seems fine, the glowplugs are fine (as far as I can tell). I was expecting a dodgy relay, but that actually seems to be fine, providing 12.2V to the glowplugs when required. The only thing I would expect is that the starter would crank the engine (it doesn't), but if the starter's the issue, then why are the dashboard lights dim only until I remove the connector from the relay?
Any ideas? I guess the next step's to replace the relay, but whilst it's quick, it also costs a lot if that turns out not to be the cause of the problem.
Thanks in advance for any help you can give!
Sam