1965 fintail 200D during the winter

[rds]

Hi , I own 1965 200D for almost 2 years now . was fixing her the first year so this is my first winter driving my heckflosse. so to make long story short I've managed to locate another rusty hecklosse with 53 K miles on the clock , installed that engine into my first car. MB drives pretty good, 30 mpg , she does her 83mph .. so my question to the members of this forum regarding OM621 cold start during the winter . seems like my MB doesn't want to start up without plugging into the power outlet for 2-4 hours. Is it normal for these vintage diesels or it is my specific issue . for instance if the ambiguous temperature is about 25-30F after 3-4 hours plugging engine starts very reluctantly... maybe 30 seconds of cranking. Once the engine is warm it starts right up , no troubles...
Maybe somebody who has driven these diesels for a long time could address my question.
Thanks for all the feedbacks.

[Don350SDL]

Also search on hard starting in the forum.

Sounds like low compression to me.

Don

[rds]

Don ,
thanks for the reply . I've checked the compression recently :
295 psi <- 1st cylinder
300psi
310 psi
295 psi
according to MB manual the compression on the good engine should be in range
284-340 psi ...
plus I've changed the timing chain , installed fast glow plugs , replaced the camshaft with another used one with better lobes. checked all fuel lines for air leaks. installed rebuild injectors , checked the valves .. MB now starts much better but with the winter temperature drop I am back to the original problem.

I've noticed one thing: I put some motor oil into IP around 11K miles ago
so recently I was playing with lift pump trying to check the valves ..air leaks . so I've detached lift pump from the IP and noticed that diesel oil or maybe mixture of engine oil with diesel was coming out of the opening in the IP where lift pump connects... is it normal or I have an internal leak in my IP ?
Ruslan

[JPMose]

What weight oil are you using? When I owned my 1981 300SD, it would be hard to start in the winter if I didn't switch to 10W-40 (the car was always in CA, GA and TX during it's life and I used 20W-50 the majority of the year). Once I made the switch, it was like night and day.

[emcalhany]

I also have a '65 200D - my mechanic suggested one of those Optima batteries made for diesel tractors & tow trucks. Kind of expensive, but worth it, so far. I had also replaced glow plugs with no luck.

How much work did you have to do, overall? I've never met anyone else with a '65 - I would love to see pictures....

[atypicalguy]

I have a 1963 190d and have had the same problem at temps in the 10-25degree range.

I have a great battery and a rebuilt starter but sometimes she would not start in the cold without a bit of starting fluid. I have a friend with an old Volvo wagon that had the same problem, and this is how he fixed it:

Go and buy some SYNTHETIC Mobil Diesel/SUV motor oil and put it in your car. The weight is something like 5W40 but this is the same stuff they used to sell as Delvac1 and it is good for about 10k miles in over the road semi trucks. The viscosity of this oil is so much less at low temps that it reduces the work of the starter in cranking the engine over, thereby giving you a bit more compression (or something like that) when starting cold, because the engine is spinning faster. All I know is that this works wonders for cold weather starting.

Otherwise, use some starter fluid. Please note that you should NOT glow the plugs if you use any starting fluid. Just a short squirt of ether in the grill near the snorkel - maybe a second, then get in and just crank without glowing until the car starts. If you glow the chambers, the ether will detonate prematurely and can damage your engine/starter.

Good Luck.