They Said it Can't be Fixed - A Journey to the Inside of a Mercedes Bluetec

iammclovin804 said:

wae said:

iammclovin804 said:

wae said:

I pulled all the wiring diagram and such out of WIS, but I haven't started troubleshooting yet.

I did, however, score a Ford trailer brake controller pigtail and a Valley Industries Odyssey brake controller for $20.  I've got it all installed in der Scheißwagen and when I go to pick up the trailer tonight, I'll see if I did it right.  Theoretically, I should be able to use DAS to change the rear SAM to recognize that the trailer has LEDs so I don't get the light warnings on the dash.

Vediamo would probably be easier to use than DAS. I had issues with DAS selecting incorrect cbf files when I was coding my manual swap. It's also possible that the coding will be in the central gateway, not the SAM. 

I can definitely say that there's nothing in DAS that seems to have anything to do with the trailer lights.  I found routines to turn the lights on and off on command, but the control unit adaptations didn't have anything about trailer lights listed.  I guess I just need to put on my big boy pants and learn how to use Vediamo.

Feel free to shoot me an email if you need help with it. It's a little difficult piecing all the info together from various forum posts. 

I very well may take you up on that offer!  I'm going to play around a little bit first and see if I can at least get connected and answer the easy stuff on my own.  I've been watching a couple videos, but they're in Russian and I'm a little rusty on my Russian.  All I know is something that sounds vaugely like "du par ruskie?" which, according to The Hunt for Red October, means "you speak Russian?".  And I can be sure that the Historical Documents are correct on that....

Okay, I'm trying to dig through WIS to get some detail on how this is supposed to work....  I've got the Electrical Schematic which looks something like this:

So it looks like it goes from the trailer hitch through the rear SAM, over the bus and hits the front SAM, the ISM and the ESP modules.  Also, I didn't realize that the seat heater controls and the parking sensor controls and all that are on the "upper control panel".  I thought that term referred to the thing on the ceiling.  But that's the Overhead Control Panel, apparently.  So I've learned something today! 

Really weird that you're not getting a signal on the brake controller plug, though.  Maybe double-check everything on the trailer that there isn't any kind of weird grounding issue?  I know that when my housings had LEDs in them, the blind spot detection system would just constantly cycle through orange and reg triangles on the mirrors and beeping intermittently.

Up to now, the only thing the Benz has towed is the camper. Hooked it to the car trailer with all LED lights, with predictable results: Without the load resistor adapter harness, there were no trailer lights. Added the resistor harness, and trailer lights all worked immediately. Brake controller does not work (no brake light signal), but trailer is light and the brakes on trailer are surprisingly rusty & E36 M3ty looking.

While I feel this should be fixable in software, I will try to do it the old fashioned way: find a wire at the brake light switch or on the actual taillight fixture that gets 12V+ when brakes are on. Get that wire to the appropriate pin in the X58/28 socket.

But first, hafta work on blau schiessewagen. Then can try to track down electrical issue on weiss sheiss wagen.     

Wow what an epic thread. I can't believe I read through all that.

I stumbled on this little corner of the intrawebs because I am the proud owner of a 540k mile Dodge Sprinter with the brilliant om642 under the hood. Runs great, burns one quart of oil every 100 miles. Honestly the oil burn rate doesn't really bother me. It's the going into limp home mode every 5 minutes because the DPF is perpetually clogged. I drive it with the scan tool plugged in at all times. I can clear codes without ever taking my eyes off the road. 

One fine day scanning through row52 a 200k mile 08 R320 CDI popped up at the local PnP. Three hours and $400 later and the prize was mine. 

The plan is to tear down and rebuild this engine before swapping it into the sprinter. Pretty much everything that bolts onto the long block is different on the sprinter including the 13 quart oil pan, intakes, EGR, harness etc. So at some point I'll need to move everything over. But at least the long block is the same... I hope.

 Here's some of the highlights of what I found inside. Surprisingly clean inside, no sludge no varnish. 

Cyl walls look good with evidence of oil getting past the rings. 

On 4 of 6 pistons, the oil control rings were stuck in the groove.

Yeah that's disgusting.

Dat airflow 

Yummy 

In reply to FJ40Jim :

Our friends in Stuttgart are just too clever by half sometimes.  Maybe that wire has a break in it somewhere.  I didn't see anything in Xentry that appeared to force the signal to the brake controller, but I wasn't specifically looking for it either.  Maybe it is there somewhere?

In reply to Glutton4pain :

Welcome!  It is so weird that this motor seems to have that side of the coin.  In the cars, it's not unusual to have them starve for oil before 150k, but in the Sprinters they seem to want to run forever.  One guy told me that there was some difference in the oilng on the Sprinter engines, but I've not personally seen any evidence of that. 

What kind of maintenance schedule did you follow on the Sprinter?  Was it BlueTEC or just CDI?  I'm assuming that it's a CDI, otherwise the DPF would have been covered by the AEM and its extended warranty.   How does the engine come out of the Sprinter?  What type of oil have you been using?

That R engine doesn't look bad at all for 200k.  The rings definitely need to be replaced and the pistons cleaned up a bit, but those bores look amazing!  And the amount of crud in the intake doesn't look that bad if we're grading these on a curve.

Your comment about the giant oil pan just sort of sunk in, here.  I wonder how much that has to do with it.  Sorry for the twenty questions, I'm just really curious about these motors seem to be fine in some situations and time bombs in others!

In reply to wae :

The maintainance schedule on the sprinter is very straight forward. I keep driving it until the "add 1qt oil" message pops up on the dash. That's when I add 2qt (insert smart guy meme here) and then I drive it some more. I've only had it for a year so I really haven't done much to it. Most of my work has been converting the ambulance interior into a camper. I tried an oil change with m1 15w50 in the desperate hope of reducing oil consumption. That was a waste of time and money. Now it's on a steady diet of cheap Kirkland brand 15w40. Nothing short of a rebuild is going to fix the oil control rings. 

The 08 Dodge Sprinter is just a CDI or CRD in Chrysler speak. No DEF tank and a DPF bolted onto the exhaust easily unbolted for occasional pressure wash. I think the 2010 MB Sprinter was the first year to use DEF with "bluetec" branding. The Merc Sprinter AEM doesn't cover the 07-09 Dodge Sprinters 3.0L. Most Mercedes Sprinter dealers refuse to work on the Dodge vans. They'll tell you to go to the dodge dealer for service and parts. Most of the parts I ordered online were for a 2010 Mercedes sprinter. 

From what I've read the front bumper and radiator support comes off in order to pull the engine. Don't even need to jack up the front end because the van already has a lot of croubd clearance to get underneath. Unbolting the engine from the transmission in the van is an problem so most people pull the two together then separate. Some say that's not necessarily true. I'll know in a month or two.

Yes I think I really lucked out with the R320 engine. So far I'm encouraged by what I've seen. So far I've cleaned the pistons, installed new rings and rod bearings, heads cleaned, exhaust valves lapped and new valve stem seals installed. The crank never left the block. Next step will be reinstalling the heads followed by the new timing chain. I'm still trying to wrap my head around timing the cams. 

In reply to Glutton4pain :

Ah, so that's really interesting:  It looks like they only sold those as Dodges and Freightliners until 2010 when they went to BlueTEC.  I just assumed that they also sold them as M-B vehicles at the same time.  Interestingly, if I go find a VIN from a 2008 Dodge Sprinter 2500 and plug it in to WIS, it decodes properly and brings up the service information.  No idea if Xentry would recognize it, but it wouldn't surprise me.

Looks like straight out the front with the transmission attached is the "official" way to do it.  They do at least call for the A/C system to be set to the side and not opened up, so that'll save some time and money.  Only because I'm curious: Why not new main bearings and thrust washers?

Setting the timing isn't all that difficult, it's just a bit fiddly.  You're installing a new timing chain, so that's going to eliminate a large source of frustration - I found that while mine was "in spec", it was stretched just enough to make it incredibly difficult to get everything to line up.  I put my harmonic dampener on so that I could copy the timing mark from that pulley to the crank itself and then from there to the block.   Take out the chain guide that the tensioner pushes against as well as the tensioner, of course.  Make sure your engine is sitting level and then clock your balance shaft such that the little nick is straight up:

(that's the little nick - the picture and the engine were both a little off-level, but that's straight up and down relative to the engine itself)

Run your chain through and drop the cams in.  I think I took the sprocket off the right side, got it around the chain, and then attached it to the cam.  What's a little weird is that the chain drives the right intake cam and the left exhaust cam.  The good news is that all the valves on the left side are closed at #1TDC so there's nothing pushing that side.  On the right side, though, you do have a bit of a challenge to get the cams in place.  That's where the "special tool" comes in to play:

I made my own out of composite decking of all things, but basically you're looking for something that has half-circles cut out that are approximately the same diameter as the camshaft journals and spaced to be able to land on both of them.  Whatever you make it out of needs to be soft enough that it won't score or scratch the cam, which is why I went with plastic.  You can do it without that - I believe FJ40Jim just used the little hold down straps - but I found it almost impossible to get the cam in place without them.

There are little dots cut in to the sprockets on each side.  For the right side, the dot on the bottom of the tooth valley for the exhaust cam should be level with the surface of the head while the dot on the tip of the tooth should match up with the dot in the tooth valley on the intake cam:

I don't have a good picture of the other side, unfortunately, but this is the almost-helpful image from WIS:

The official install instruction is "Do not mix up camshafts.  Markings (2) on camshafts must be aligned with each other and markings (3) on camshafts, seen in the direction of travel, must be aligned on the left side to the cylinder head upper edge".

The cams on the right side are going to want to move.  I used some small c-clamps to put a bit of aluminum angle between the exhaust cam sprocket teeth and the head to prevent the right side from moving on me while I threaded the chain around.  I also used a vice-grips on the cam to get it into place and to hold it steady.  Once the chain is all the way around, you can slide the tensioning guide in and pop the tensioner in.  Just make sure any slack in the chain is to the left of the cam sprocket as you're facing the front of the engine.  Once the tensioner is in, you can put the cam straps on, torque them down, and pull off the special tool and whatver you used to keep the right side from turning.

In reply to wae :

No main bearings because it's one less thing for me to potentially screw up. Don't fix it if it ain't broke. I just don't see the need. This van is not a daily, I'll likely own it for another 20-30k miles. It's just camping fun toy. 

Thanks for the info on timing. I'll probably be asking you some more questions when the time comes. 

The Jeep WK rebuild manual I'm following says to torque the head bolts to 60nm followed by 90deg x 2. The sheet that came with the Elring head gaskets says 10nm, 60nm and then 90 deg x 3. Which is right? Every other Mercedes cylinder head I've done with stretch bolts has been 90 deg x 2. 

That's the part of the video series (that I really need to get back to finishing, now that I think about it) where I put the head bolts in.  Assuming that you've got the same Elring head gasket that I have, everything on that sheet matched what was in WIS, except that the diagram showing the tightening sequence was basically upside-down.

Let me go run and check what they said in 2008 for that version of the OM642 real fast though....

Here's the spec out of WIS.  I chose a 906.633 VIN that has a 642.993:

I'll chalk it up to Chrysler's legendary attention to detail and go with Wis. Thanks!

On the head bolts....

The Mopar book and WIS are often slightly different, but it always appeared the the Mopar service engineers read the pointlessly complicated MB service info, rolled their eyes and said 'tork to 23ft-lbs', period.

On one of the VW diesel forums, a member who had access to good equipment did some experimentation with the TTY headbolts. After the first 90* pull, they were at max clamp load. after the second pull, still the same. third pull, still the same... It was only after the bolt had actually started to neck, that clamp load fell off. Also useful data: the headbolts could be torked per the book, then loosened & reused several times while still achieving max clamp load. I reused mine with no qualms.

The R320 pistons look like mine, except not nearly as bad. They will clean up fine, and the bores also look good. Do replace the rings, because all the carbon grit does wear the rings. If the rod & main bearings look good, then reusing them is fine. On mine, the timing chain kit needed replaced, due to stretch & subsequent tensioner hyperextension. The TTY rod bolts are much shorter than the head bolts, so it is unknown how many times they can be re-used, perhaps zero. I replaced mine.

FJ40Jim said:

editing...

 

 

Very suspenseful!

wae said:

FJ40Jim said:

editing...

 

 

Very suspenseful!

 

The forum ate my post the first 2 times I typed it, so decided to post something to see if it would take.

It did.

In reply to Glutton4pain :

You wrote: <<Most Mercedes Sprinter dealers refuse to work on the Dodge vans. They'll tell you to go to the dodge dealer for service and parts.>>

What I'm hearing is that the van needs a Ram grill, a Freightliner grill and a M-B grill. Snap on whichever is appropriate for the closest dealership.

In reply to wae :

Did a little more investigating of the trailer brake problem today. Results: though the trucklet is equipped with factory LED taillamps, the input to the brakelamp is conventional 12V on the violet w/black wire at the 5-pin light connector. I was thinking that possibly the SAM would only provide 5V to light the LED, but fortunately voltage reduction is handled by the board in the taillight housing.

The hypothesis for the brake light control logic and subsequently the trailer brake controller is as follows: Brake pedal is applied and brake position switch in the power brake booster A7/7 is closed, sending brake signal to ABS/ESP module N47-5, then to CGW N93. CGW sends brake light request to rear SAM N10/8, which sends 12V+ to LED brake lights. If SAM senses there is a trailer plugged in, then 2 things should happen:1. send brake light power to trailer socket X58/11, 2. send 12V trigger to brake controller plug X58/28. 

For whatever logic module reason, the truck does seem to know there is a trailer plugged in, because it activates trailer light power at the X58/11, and it turns off the rear collision warning, But it still won't send the +12V trigger from rear SAM to X58/28 brake controller.

But it just needs to pass the +12V signal that going to brake lights to the wire going to brake controller. I just need to find out which wires on SAM are going the brake light, and to the X58/28 plug. Then unpin the X58 wire and jumper it to the brake light wire, giving it the desired +12V to trigger brake controller. Unfortunately my virtual machine WIS clone has crashed & burned on this machine so I can't see the incredibly complex rear SAM wiring diagram.

That's where I'm at now.

FJ40Jim said:

In reply to wae :

Did a little more investigating of the trailer brake problem today. Results: though the trucklet is equipped with factory LED taillamps, the input to the brakelamp is conventional 12V on the violet w/black wire at the 5-pin light connector. I was thinking that possibly the SAM would only provide 5V to light the LED, but fortunately voltage reduction is handled by the board in the taillight housing.

The hypothesis for the brake light control logic and subsequently the trailer brake controller is as follows: Brake pedal is applied and brake position switch in the power brake booster A7/7 is closed, sending brake signal to ABS/ESP module N47-5, then to CGW N93. CGW sends brake light request to rear SAM N10/8, which sends 12V+ to LED brake lights. If SAM senses there is a trailer plugged in, then 2 things should happen:1. send brake light power to trailer socket X58/11, 2. send 12V trigger to brake controller plug X58/28. 

For whatever logic module reason, the truck does seem to know there is a trailer plugged in, because it activates trailer light power at the X58/11, and it turns off the rear collision warning, But it still won't send the +12V trigger from rear SAM to X58/28 brake controller.

But it just needs to pass the +12V signal that going to brake lights to the wire going to brake controller. I just need to find out which wires on SAM are going the brake light, and to the X58/28 plug. Then unpin the X58 wire and jumper it to the brake light wire, giving it the desired +12V to trigger brake controller. Unfortunately my virtual machine WIS clone has crashed & burned on this machine so I can't see the incredibly complex rear SAM wiring diagram.

That's where I'm at now.

I'm going to guess that yours is a W164.124 but I don't really know my chassis codes and sub-groups and all that real well...  I'm happy to extract these as PDFs and email them to you if I've got the right chassis code.

But...  Let's see:  It looks like there's only one wire from the SAM to each of the left and right tail lamps, but according to the diagram that's for the taillight AND the brake light.  I guess it uses a different voltage for each?

E4/5 e4 is "Left brake light and taillight" and E3/5e4 is the "left brake light and taillight".  According to the functional diagram, though, it looks like E21 is the CHMSL which might be the money:

Also, I would like to take a moment to express my desire for one of those exterior rear spare tire carriers.  Damn that looks good on that trucklet.  Anyway...

It looks like pe54.21-p-2103-97maa is where it's at:

W8 is a ground of course, so that leaves us with the Blue/Black wire coming from the rear SAM to the "rear SAM connecting point" as pin 4.  Not sure how that translates to a pin on the SAM itself, but maybe that gets you closer.  What's infuriating to me is that in the functional diagram, there are a number of systems that feed into the "central control unit" that could send a "brake lights request".  So unless you're reading the CAN bus, there's no real way to know if the brakes have been actuated other than checking voltage on the inputs to the brake lights themselves.

Also...  The clutch has been going out on the wife's Mazda 5 for a while now.  Now that der Scheißwagen is operational, it's slipping even worse than before and the car should be parked until it's replaced.  And, of course, she doesn't like to drive the truck, so she's driving the Mercedes and I'm back in the Excursion.  Her lack of mechanical empathy concerns me a bit, but I guess this is the real test.  I just hope I don't have to spend too much time detailing it when I get it back from her.  If I get it back....

Thanks Wae! That is good info. The googles found that full diagram of the rear SAM. Plus I already had the trailer wiring diagram including the SAM.

It appears that the brake controller trigger wire out of SAM is A15, Bk/Red.

Any of the following are brake light outputs from SAM: D2 Pink LH brake lamp, D7 Vt/Bk RH brake, F3 Blu/Bk CHMSL.

Next step: connect trailer, verify all trailer lights working, indicating SAM sees trailer. Test for 12V output on pin A15.

If good, then find unplugged connector/broken wire from SAM to X58/28.

If bad, then unpin A15 and jumper it to any of the brake light outputs. Test brake controller. Huzzah!

Wait, DW is driving the Merc? Is it all fixed? No flashing MIL or random limp mode?

In reply to FJ40Jim :

I feel like with this vehicle "fixed" is kind of a spectrum...  The CEL is on, but it isn't in limp mode.  I still need to track down the issue with the M55 and O2 sensor circuits and I need to replace the turbo cartridge, but it's driving well and not making any funny sounds or smells!

Quick timing question. Have I got this right? A second pair of eyes is appreciated. 

Passenger side head

Exhaust cam on passenger side

Front side of passenger side 

Drivers side.

Front of driver's side

Crank and balance shaft

I did not end up making or buying the whole down tool. The metal holddowns that come with the head seem to work just fine. My locking tool is an oversized nut and washer combo. I turned the crank through two full revolutions and everything seems to be turning and ending up at the same timing marks. 

Thank you

Timing looks good. Bear in mind the crank & balance gear have only... 18? teeth, so if it's off by one tooth there, it's off by 20degrees, which is quite noticeable. The pics all look real close.

Yep, that looks about right to me!