This morning's Chicken Wagon update: I removed the failing odometer from the car. I looked at putting cyanoacrylate glue on the shaft, and even tried a bit, but it didn't want to wick into where it needed to be and tried to sieze the shaft where it goes through the frame. Things are just too tight there for the 'quick fix', I don't know how anybody does it without ruining the odometer. Time for Plan B. I removed the face of the speedometer, first lifting the needle over the zero stop and ensuring that it rested on the little mark on the edge of the dial that marks its zero tension position. I then used the two-spoons trick to pop off the needle. Next I removed the odometer drive shaft entirely, liberating all the plastic dials. The pot-metal drive gear (in the non-visible tenths position) was really quite loose, but sometimes would bind a bit. Looking inside the bore of this gear it appears that there might be a bit of spring wire coiled in there that is supposed to 'bite' on the shaft. Anyway, I knurled the shaft where the metal drive gear seats using a pair of pliers. One must be very careful not to mar the shaft where the plastic dial gears are as they must spin freely. While it was apart I used alcohol and a swab to clean all the dial faces, the trip odometer was particularly filthy. I then reassembled the shaft and dials, which was not easy. It took a few tries before I got everything aligned so that it would function and the dials lined up through the holes in the face. I added some miles to its reading to partially compensate for the time it was broken. I had to tap the shaft into its final position with a hammer as the knurling made for a tight fit. After it was all together it worked freely when driven by my thumb. I then reinstalled the speedometer face, put the needle on the shaft so that it pointed at the resting mark, then lifted it back over the zero stop. I then greased the drive gears and put some M1 5W20 on the sleeve bearing. With this all done I reassembled the instrument cluster and installed it back in the car. I also squirted a bunch of oil down the drive cable. We'll see how it goes!
> Perhaps the previous owner of the 230TE, that odo came from never used > the > reset button, no way of knowing really. Having just become intimately familiar with the guts of the offending unit, I can in no way see how resetting the trip odometer, moving or not, can place any significantly greater torque on the drive gear. If it does, the amount is nearly trivial and the drive gear is already about to fail. It takes _considerable_ torque to roll over a bunch of dials at once, that drive gear is supposed to be _tight_. -- Jim _______________________________________ http://www.okiebenz.com For new parts see official list sponsor: http://www.buymbparts.com/ For used parts email [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
