IT'S ALIVE!!!!!!

[Benz Dr.]

So, after a whole year in storage the Red Rocket lives again. Started it today and it was making a strange noise coming from the distributor drive area. It seems to be going away but I'll keep an eye on it.

 I had to have the head milled about .010'' then I found out the block was warped too. I had the block decked .030'' which put the compression up around 180PSI so it's premium fuel from now on. When you hit the throttle the engine jumps sideways. New flywheel seems to make the clucth work better.

Just have to check the head bolts and put the hood on.

  '' String backed gloves in my auto-mo-love. ''

 Queen: from the PL, Night at the Opera.
 From the somg, ''I'm in love with my car.'' ca. 1976

Daniel G Caron

[hauser]

Dan I know you have been working on this for a while.  I am glad to hear that you have once again given it life!   Keep us up on any new developments.

1969 280sl 5 spd        1999 ML320          Gainesville,Fl.

[Benz Dr.]

Well, I put the hood on with the help of my wife, Shelley. Went to a nearby town to wash the car and put 20 bucks of Sunoco 94.
 
  '' Nothin' but the best for my dog. Not a speck of cerial.''

 Frank Zappa '' Dirty Love ''
  from the LP Over Night Sensation.

Daniel G Caron

[hauser]

Doc did you wash a hot car?  You of all people should know not to do that!  I hope you didn't get those hot rotors wet!  I learned that the hard way.  I couldn't understand why my relatively new brake job was pulsating.

1969 280sl 5 spd        1999 ML320          Gainesville,Fl.

[Mark in KS]

Be sure to always drive with the cap on the expansion tank!  Great to hear that she's alive.

"Working for peanuts is all very fine, but I can show you a better time.
Baby you can drive my car."

The Beatles (1965)

[Ricardo]

Dan
Strange noises in the dist. drive area and then you drove it anyway...I seem to remember some advice about NOT driving your baby when she's making funny noises...unless the kids aren't home[:0]

"I'm not the man they think I am at home, oh no,no,no
I'm the rocket man"
Elton John

Ricardo

Hauser
My rotors get wet everytime I drive in the rain, they shouldn't warp from a car wash...

[Benz Dr.]

Nah, I let it run for a few hours to see what would happen. We took the cover off the front of the engine and the shaft was moving out every full revolution and making this noise. After it ran for a while the noise went away so I decided to test drive it.
Not like I just took it to red line and hoped for the best....

When I had the block decked I had to remove almost everything from the block. I left the oil pan and the motor mounts on but all the drive pulleys had to come off. This meant taking the cover off for the distributor drive and removing the shaft. I had a little problem putting it back together and may have tweaked something in there. I figured if it didn't get better after some running I'd have to pull the IP and see what was going on. This noise was not constant ( a very bad sign ) and was much slower than the engine speed - maybe 25%.  At first I thought the timing chain was rubbing on something but that's not the case. Everything else is VERY smooth. I have to let the clutch out carefully or it will spin the tires on the gravel driveway. It may live up to the name.

 All fluids topped up and rad cap on tight.

 '' I can't drive.......... 55 !!!! ''

  Samy ( The Red Rocker ) Hagar

  It's where I got the name for my car.

Daniel G Caron

[mdsalemi]

mds

quote:Originally posted by Benz Dr.

Well, I put the hood on with the help of my wife, Shelley. Went to a nearby town to wash the car and put 20 bucks of Sunoco 94.


  '' Nothin' but the best for my dog. Not a speck of cerial.''

 Frank Zappa '' Dirty Love ''
  from the LP Over Night Sensation.

Daniel G Caron

Well, for those of you not familar with "petrol" prices in Canada, that's just enough fuel to stir up the dirt in your tank!!  Dan, it wouldn't even take me to the point where I have troubles!  And you know what that's about!



Michael Salemi
1969 280SL
Signal Red w/Black Leather
Restored

[German Dude]

well, for those of you not familiar with "Benzin" prices in Germany:
20 bucks worth will get you a little under 5 gallons - just enough to come splashing out of the gas cap to mess up the chrome...

"It was a beautiful day, me and Dell were singing - a little runaway - I was flyin'".
(Tom Petty "Running Down A Dream" from Full Moon Fever)

Juergen
64 230SL #2933, 4sp, signal red, white hard top
93 Citroen XM station wagon

[Benz Dr.]

Car is doing something strange. It pulls hard in all gears but when I back off the throttle at lower RPM's it 's as if the ignition shuts off. At first I thought I had a loose ignition rotor but it's OK. Really hard to drive the car around town because it bucks and jerks all the time.
It's as if something goes loose and then catches back up and then turns on again. It did this before I rebuilt the engine but maybe not as badly. If I just throttle the engine up whith it out of gear it starts to pulsate like it's shutting off and on. Seems to be good under load though......

This one even has me wondering.

Daniel G Caron

[graphic66]

Sounds like you got a problem makin dynamo hum, maybee apply some rotation on her sugar plum. But really, Ignition or injection that the real question, Was it a Sears rebuild kit or a real one

[Benz Dr.]

Hey, nothin' but the best for my dog. I don't use cheap parts, I don't sell cheap parts - all OEM pieces. Injection Pump was rebuilt by a Bosch dealer.

 Could be in the distributor. I've had it apart several times but could never find anything wrong with it. It's from a 300SE and has dual points - could be a vacuum advance problem. These distributors use vacuum advance and I had to change the throttle body from the original unit.

One other possiblity is a vacuum leak at the manifold. I know it's still leaking a bit and when I lift off it may be making the mixture go too lean for a split second. As I said earlier, it's been doing this for a long time.

Daniel G Caron

[hands_aus]

This was discussed on the Yahoo site ages ago

here is what I saved

Message:
Lumpy at Low RPM
Any idea what might cause a slight but rapid bucking or lumpiness when driving slowly in first or second gear? The problem is most noticeable when attempting to maintain a low speed in traffic or on side streets at about 2000 RPM (or less) in second gear. It feels like the car wants to pull forward several times a second.

The lumpiness deteriorates into bucking as the RPMs drop from 2000 and approaches say 1200. Idle is a bit lumpy as well. It runs fine at higher RPMs and when accelerating. This condition existed prior to, and after installation of a rebuilt engine.

Reply:
I had the same problem with my 280SL with ZF 5 speed transmission. The car was perfect in everyway, but would buck as you described.
I have not seen this with automatic transmission 113's. I think it is a function of the injection pump rack transitioning from idle position to partial running position.

Automatic transmission cars have the fluid coupling or torqueconverter to absorb or hold energy during this transition stage. Manual transmission cars do not have this. At least that is my best guess of the problem. I do not know of a solution.

Will

Another Reply:
I also had this condition on my 250 and got rid of some of it with mid range FI adjustments. However, it was completely cleaned up when I replaced the linkage cross arm bushings and all ball joint connectors.  This was also done at the same time I converted to Crane point conversion.  So I am not sure which one or combo rectified it, but it did.

I hope this is of some help

Bob (Brisbane,Australia)
RHD,1967 early 250 SL, auto

[Cees Klumper]

I had some hesitation in acceleration at lower RPM's after I put in my rebuilt engine. It turned out I had not properly tighthened one of the brackets that hold the transverse linkage rod (the one going over the valve cover). It was the bracket on the intake manifold. As soon as I fixed that, the hesitation was gone. So sloppiness in the linkage definitely does influence the smoothness of the engine.

Cees Klumper in Amsterdam
'69 white 280 SL automatic

[Benz Dr.]

I may have found the problem. It's raining right now so I may wait to test drive the car.
I think the linkage adjustment moved somehow and the two were a long ways away from where they should be. Linkage adjustments ARE critical. Even a small amount will affect low RPM response.
 
I also fixed the cold start problem I was having. I put a new thermo time switch in there but it stil wouldn't work so I removed the relay and took it apart. I held the relay while cranking the engine and now it works every time. Odd why it wouldn't work until it made contact a few times...

Also did a few other small adjustments but over all it's running pretty well. Drained out the dirty water and put some fresh stuff in - I'll probably run a cleaner through it before adding anti freeze. Seems to be running just a little bit warmer than before but then it's putting out A LOT more HP. The strange noise is completely gone now - I never thought it was going to be a problem.

Still need to do a lot of work on the car. Paint touch up, chrome plating, new windshield, new soft top, carpets, interior and wood needs to be redone. Mechanically, it's very sound now.

Daniel G Caron

[Ben]

I have the exact same problem and I always assumed it was to do with timing or vacuum. I never thought of the linkages. Mine are adjusted correctly but they are definitely sloppy !

I think I'd better start replacing some ...........its the only thing I havent done from a tuning perspective !

Regards,
Ben in Ireland.
'64 230SL 4sp.
'03 CLK Kompressor

[Benz Dr.]

So it wasn't the linkages. I've seen them be really poorly adjusted and the engine would still run OK. The closer you have then the better though.

 In this case the engine would actually shut off for a few seconds while decelerating but never stall or shut off completely. Once it was at idle it would run OK.
 I took the plugs out to do a compression test - everything about 175 PSI. Did notice the plugs were not gapped very well so now it idles smoothly.
I decided to plull the distributor and found the problem. This is a dual point distributor and it's vacuum advance. I guess someone before me had messed with it and adjusted the pull rod for the advance all the way out. This gave it about 20 degrees of advance and a lot of movement inside of the distributor.
This is where it gets strange. From higher RPM, if I lifted off the throttle the engine would slow down causing high manifold vacuum and this would pull the advance so far forward that a part inside the distrbutor would touch and short out the ignition. If I went right to idle ( clutch in ) it never did this as the throttle plate went by the vacuum port in the throttle housing. Once I adjusted the pull rod to about 10 dgrees of advance it can't touch anymore. Car runs much better now.

How's that for a head scratcher?

Daniel G Caron