So, what is the best way to add a nice bright idiot light so that I will quickly see it if the oil pressure drops off while I am driving?
On a Ford or Chevy, I would put a T fitting into the block and add a generic idiot light sender to trigger the bulb on the dash. There must be some more elaborate and fancy way to do this on an MB Diesel, right? Randy B -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Loren Faeth Sent: Monday, April 24, 2006 6:17 PM To: Mercedes Discussion List Subject: Re: [MBZ] Idiot Needle I put oil temp and oil pressure gauges on my 200D because i wanted to find out what is really going on. With a factory short block, the 200D will generate over 100 PSI cold. I have never tried to see how high it will go. I drive it in a manner so as to not go over 100PSI. After it warms up it runs at 86 PSI. So you can see, that a warm engine running at less that 3 bar (~45 PSI) is a very tired, worn engine. With the combination temp and pressure, I could tell when the car was a quart low on oil, and that is pretty much time to change the oil anyway. The pressure would drop about 1 lb and the temp goes up a bit. In combination, they are as telling as an exhaust gas pyrometer. Under extreme load, the temp and pressure change too. I just never put in an EGT pyrometer to find the correlation. Yes, Brian, it is an idiot needle, but it works and prevents a lot of crap from uninformed MB owners at the stealerships. After you understand it, it will tell you a lot about the condition of the bearings. My 200D will never come off the peg, even hot and idling. But it was a very tight engine out of the factory. Loren Loren At 12:09 AM 4/23/2006, you wrote: >I've wondered for some time now, and it came up again tonight as I told the >wife what to look for when she drives the 240D: > >Why does the oil pressure gauge simply peg at 3 almost all the time? In >doing so, it is less a gauge, and more an idiot light. Why didn't Mercedes >redesign the gauge so that it provided precise feedback as to the pressure? > >OR > >On the other hand, is it the case that the gauge does provide precise feed >back, but that's just how the oil pressure acts in a diesel? > >It stays pegged except when the engine is completely warm, and it's hot >outside, and I have come down to idle. > >Brian >83 240D >_______________________________________
