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1996 E300D Bleeding fuel lines?

11K views 10 replies 6 participants last post by  djohnson7645  
#1 ·
Im new to this type of issue. Im actually a high school sthdent with not a lot of experience with working on cars.

I drove my car to school and I believe I may have run the tank dry, which I know is really bad for diesels.

My car will not start currently. It cranks but I cracked the injectors and cranked to check if they are getting fuel, nothing. I started with replacing the fuel filter but then I did some research to find out it may have just needed to be blead first. I did some research but I haven't found any demontrations on how to bleed my specific system. I did a lot of cranking with the screw on top of the filter open but no fuel has come out.
Can anybody here help?
 

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#2 ·
Your car does not have any special bleeding procedure. They expect that you will just crank the engine and it will self bleed, HOWEVER, it will take a lot of cranking and if you do it continuously you will likely fry your starter. Earlier cars had a finger pump but it was eliminated on the 210. Assuming you are sure you added enough fuel given the way the car is sitting to get to where the fuel line connects to the tank, you can just crank it until it starts. Crank about 15 to 20 seconds and stop. Let the starter cool for 10 or 15 minutes, and repeat. Make sure all connections like the bolt on the filter are tight so air does not get in when you are not cranking. Filling the secondary fuel filter with diesel or Diesel Purge will speed things up a bit. If you have a Mighty Vac or similar sucking device, air can be sucked out by removing the return line from the back of the filter housing and sucking on the hole in the housing. Once most air is sucked out reinstall the return connector and quickly crank the engine. Once you get it going, you will never let it run out again!
 
#4 ·
Jack up the back of the car so the nose is pointing downward, and just crank.

Alternatively, you can pressurize the gas tank to 5psi with compressed air, I have a special gas cap with a hole to do this, and then crank.

Kajtek solution is better though.
 
#5 ·
These suggestions are all good but overkill.

Fill your tank as full as you possibly can. Fill the fuel filter with diesel and put it back on the engine.

Make sure your battery is fully charged. Crank for no more than 20-30 seconds and let the starter rest for maybe 3-5 minutes.

With the secondary filter full of fuel you should probably get it to hit on the second round of cranking if not before.

Dan