Warm idle too slow - occasionally stalls 300E

[Brabus 300E 3.6]

I am now the very happy owner of the BRABUS 3.6-24

It´s a realy good car i must say. but who would have thought different

http://www.bilgalleri.dk/html/gal_visbil.asp?ID=69175

http://videos.streetfire.net/search/...550131c912.htm

My car as i described had it´s head gasket replaced at 110.000 Km.
and then glas blowned the valves and valve guides as well and the gasket was replaced with a simular one from the 3.6 AMG version, i belive they are 100% the same. and it is not as expensive as the BRABUS gasket.

i am just wondering why the car tops at 240 Km/h ? as the org. 300E-24
I have the 5 speed automatic gearbox but the car seem to run out of power at 235-240Km/h like the org. 220 HP does.

I was very surpriced as i have read somewhere that this BRABUS 3.6-24 with 285HP and 385 Nm is surposed to reach the 272 Km/t at least in the smallere 190E with the same engine.

maybe i got a BRABUS with a normal 3.0 220HP engine? ( i hope not ) thats my big Worry. but how can i check if the engine is the real deal?

[Ian B Walker]

You could try writing to Brabus quoting your engine number and ask them if they have any record of it and what has been done to it. Just a thought.

[KLP 92]

When you say it tops out at that speed, is it beacuse its out of power or because its at 6000 revs?

I've had a Brabus 3.6 in a W124 CE before, i've topped 160 mph before with ease.

[Brabus 300E 3.6]

Hi.

I alreasy tried that.
and BRABUS did not keep eny form of system of the engine numbers or the sin numbers before after 1994 i think.
im also worried about it because the red engine top seems to be painted in res with a spray can hold by a person who has the pakinson syndrome so the paint is also on some of the wires and other stuff around the top. but maybe someone just repainted it with no sense of quality.

The engine does not top out at 240 Km/h it can take up to 7000 Rpms but at 240 Km/h it´s "only" going by 5500 rpms i think.
It just wount go further because it sems like it dont have the power to do so.


the engine also smokes alot blue when i start after a slow down with the engine brake. but there is no smoke when i just drive normal.
it uses up to 4 Liter/1000 Km.
the oil rings and lifters has already been changed i think so it´s not that. but with a camera you can se the oil leak is coming from the valves inside the cylinder as it drops oil down on the pistons, that should be a good sign i think as the pistons rings are not that easy to change.
So it is posible taht the valve guides are worn out so the valves are "rocking" and that way leading oil pased the oil seals
i must say it feels realy quick from 0-150 Km/h but after that it seems like the engine is not performing like it should do. maybe the wheels are to big and heavy i don´t know but i realy need some proof help i think.

Originally Posted by Ian B Walker

You could try writing to Brabus quoting your engine number and ask them if they have any record of it and what has been done to it. Just a thought.

[KLP 92]

4 litres for 1000km = serious bottom end problems.

If you say the rings have been changed and its coming from the top i would redo the top end, new valves, vlave guides and seals. But 4 litres is alot for a top end!!

I would suspect this is the prob for your lack of performace sue to the fact the engines burning this much oil will definately affect the performance.

[KLP 92]

Are all 6 plugs wet with oil?

Your symptoms point to bottom end though, ie when your accelerating against the engine brakes it smokes.

[Dieselman]

He said the engine smokes after engine braking using over-run. This is a classic sign of valve seal problems.

You need to perform a compression test then a leak down test with compressed air. This will tell you where the problem is either valves or rings.
I go for valves although 4 litres of oil is a lot to go through in 1000 km. That's 1 litre per 250 km or 1 litre per 125 miles.

Generally smoke under acceleration is rings, smoke after decelleration is valves.

Is there much blow by when you take off the filler cap or breather pipe?

[KLP 92]

Originally Posted by Dieselman

He said the engine smokes after engine braking using over-run. This is a classic sign of valve seal problems.

Sorry i misread the post, totally agree with you.

[SL300-24]

I am no expert .........but have you changed the idle switch? It cured a similar problem on my old 260E W124.......

[Dieselman]

Originally Posted by KLP 92

Your symptoms point to bottom end though, ie when your accelerating against the engine brakes it smokes.

For a moment I wondered what you were saying here. I never knew MB or Brabus fitted Jake brakes to their engines.
Anyone whose heard a Jake brake in anger would know that would be a good sound

The kiddies with their dump valves would s**t themselves..

[fredfloggle]

Originally Posted by Brabus3.6

An update. Over the last couple of days the car has worsened, it will definitely cut out if I don't right foot accellerate and left foot brake. I decided to buy a cylinder compression tester. The procedure I followed was remove all spark plugs, coil lead and fuel plug relay, then screw in and test cylinder compressions.
The results surprised me as I expected low cylinder compressions. The specced cylinder compression for my engine is 10.1:1 up from the 300's 9.2:1. The actual compressions I read from cylinders 1-6 were: 12.5, 13, 12, 11.5, 12, 10.75. So hopefully Ian was correct when he mentioned the valve clearances as excessive clearences will give higher compression. After the valve's were re-seated the all the clearances became too small so I had to loosen all of them, perhaps all too much. I'll re-check them tomorrow. I would have thought if the valve clearances were out the engine would be noisy though as remember this happening on the M110 engines, my 103 runs fairly quietly. Does anybody know of a site that explains clearly how to get valve clearances 100%?!
I have attached a picture of a spark plug that just came out. Unfortunately the picture isn't great but the plug tips look fine however the base of the plug, bottom of the thread is blackened, its smell I cannot make out. Could be carbon or oil fouling. The valves have just been re-seated etc. so I guess it's either incorrect valve clearences or an overly rich mixture?
Thanks & enjoy yourselves tomorrow night!

i think you may mean either BarG or kg/CM2 , the gauge won't read ratio directly - and it is a bum to calculate - you need to know the top ring to piston head volume for a start - it is not just chamber capacity/(sweptVol+Chamber capacity )

Excessive valve clearances won't give high compression ! because of overlap etc and scavenging , peak BMEP is seen higher up the rev range . Try it if you like , screw down a tappet - watch the gauge , and as you start to hold the valve open , the you will loose compression - wind it back the other way , and you will get quite a big valve clearance before you loose compression - all to do with the cam geometry , and air dynamics . Valve clearances would have to be wide open to give the situation you mention , not to mention the God awful noise .

Alternator load - an alternator charging flat out at maximum turbo would draw a couple of HP , but this wouldn't be at idle . The engine is seriously lacking grunt not to be able to turn over the alterator .

Re-Reading this - I am going to take a flyer that when it cooked - you broke at least one ring - yes , it might give a reasonable compression test , but as soon as the ring has combustion gas pressure on it , it can go all over the place . Symptons would be about right - oil passes the control ring and sits in the ring grooves - on the over run it passes into the bores and chamber . On a six pot , one or two pots waffling wouldn't necessarily cause it to shake all over the place - it would tend to pick up when worked as well , but loose loads of power at low revs .

If it is this , get the bores scoped right away - for the cost , send in an oil sample - they can tell you what it had for breakfast . What you don't want is to have a heavy rebore (assuming not linered) because a ring goes to town on the bore .

[fredfloggle]

Originally Posted by Brabus3.6

I have the M103 engined 12V variant which I do believe shares the same bottom end. I can only say ensure all Brabus specific items are working. It may have the Brabus Tempamatik system allowing oil or outside temperature to be viewed. If this is innoperative I know first hand that just the oil temperatue sensing bolt is over £130!
The biggie to watch out for is the head gasket. At 155,000km it may have already been done but if not it's only a matter of time. While the heads off you'd be mad not to do stem seals and valve guides. If you do your own work be prepared to be set back around £1,000 as just the head gasket is £440, valve guide work is expensive too as it's best left to the engineers. If you don't I wouldn't like to estimate the cost involved in doing this.
My experience with the car, having clocked up over 30,000 miles on it doing a water pump and a couple of head gaskets plus much more along the way is that provided you don't abuse it, it's little more trouble than a standard Merc. There is a dude on this forum and others with a Brabus 190E who has I believe, your engine. He would be better informed about your particular M104.

With regards to my problem last year of the dash lights not coming on it was because I had the wrong alternator. I had one from a 2003 car which used a new style voltage regulator incompatable with these cars. I swapped it for another 150A one from a C43 which has the single bolt VR and all is fine. I also managed to cut back down to one battery. The massive 975CCA optima can be doused (just!) in the original battery position of the 124 with slight modification (read - smashing) of the battery tray.

A water pump and two head gasket ? I can see the first one going if you had a water pump failure , but the second one ? something isn't right .
How much has this thing cost in 30,000 miles ? sounds like a fortune . yes , it has a few horses , but it hardly wild . For the life of me , I can't work out why you would buy a Brabus and not abuse it ? isn't that what it is for ? you should kill yourself before you blow it up surely !!

[Brabus 300E 3.6]

fredfloggle vbmenu_register("postmenu_308813", true);

Im not the same Brabus3.6 who posted this threat, im the Brabus 300E 3.6

I never change the water pump. i have been told that the head gasket has been changed before but i think who ever did the job didn´t do it right.

i had my car checked at a mercedes shop and they told me the compresion was 13.5 on all 6 cyl wich is a litle rare, normal they will differ i litle so i think thats a good sign.

But the engine only gives a big cloud of smoke when i comes from speeds at 80Km/t and higher and letting the gas off and just letting the car doing the braking without using the brakes and when im at stop and starting to accelerate away the car lets out a huge cloud of blue smoke but only the 2 first seconds after that it stops smoking even if im still on accelerating.

That tells me that the valve guides and/or the stem seals is to blame.

But what surprices me is when the repair place did a bore scop look inside the cylinder with a cammera they could see fresh oil comming from ALL the 6 cylinders valves so the oil is deffently comming from the valves but then, why from all the cylinders? i would have thought that it was only from one bad or something like that.

They also told me that cylinder number 6 had a lot of black slack on the piston top and on the valves after burning a lot oil i think.
He told me it could be because the engine type M104 has a weekness at cylinder 6 for cooling more than the others so acturely not all cylinders get the same amount of cooling and he see that on almost every M103 and M104 engines.
He wouldn´t worry about that, he would worry a lot more for the oil he could see comming from the valves.

HAW can i check it it´s my stem seals or its the valve guides that need to be changed?
Can enyone tell me the bore and stroke for the brabus engine and the org. 300E-24?

[Brabus 300E 3.6]

Hi again.

A litle update.

My car is still using a lot of oil, but know im suing the sales man for saling me a car with a serious error that couldn´t be found for the regular man.

I will post here as soon as i get tha case closed.
But for now it seems like he is going to pay all the cost for a rebuilt of the top or what ever that needs to be done.