A few easy ones, I hope. ('79 300TD fuel filters and hatch)

It's messy, wear latex / vinyl gloves!

The fuel system is under a bit of pressure but that makes more of a mess than anything else. I'd try to do this work with a near empty fuel tank so the fuel doesn't flow out while the small filter is being changed.

The issue when opening the fuel system is to get the air out of it afterward. That's why there's a hand primer pump. It's that 6" high pipe like device with a black plastic top which unscrews so you can pump it. There's a rubber sealing ring under the plastic cap that eventually breaks and the hand primer pump then needs to be replaced ($20) or there will be seepage and air leaks into the system.

The air needs to be expelled or the motor will crank and crank while it expels the air. Air compresses so the 2,000 psi injection pressure gets to compress a lot of air before it's gone. Watch for the bubbles to disappear from the clear plastic fuel lines while you hand prime, remember, both filters must be filled with fuel.

Some shops fill the spin on filter with injector cleaner before installing it. Saves work and priming. Clean fuel is fine too.

Happy Thanksgiving.

A friend of mine put one tank of filterred Chinese restaurant oil from his neighbor whose been using this stuff for a couple of years in his 300D.

My friends cat clogged a fuel filter in about a day. He changed it and got

5 more miles down the road. Then it clogged again. 20 filters later... ... it finally ran 5 miles without clogging a filter.

Good way to clean all that crus in your fuel system I suppose.

Monark are the cheap Chinese filters. I've never used them just the German filters, but I use Monark glow plugs. They don't last as long as the BOSCH or Beru parts but they burn hotter.

Here's a related question. The "spin on" fuel filter is really more of a bolt on, at least in my 80 300SD. The bolt that goes through the top of the filter holder has a washer on it under the head. Where do you get these washers? They don't come with the filters I've bought. I've managed to reuse them, but new ones would be best to avoid leaks around the washer at the top.

TIA

Yeah, that's the end-goal. ;)

Yep.

Now, though, since changing out the filters, I get bubbles coming into the fuel prefilter. Not just air in it, but bubbles entering it from the supply line. Any tips on what I should look at for this?

As for the hatch- the struts weren't too hard to replace once I figured out how to get at them. Dropping the trim panel over the back speakers, there're a couple of holes in the headliner that /almost/ line up with the bolts holding the struts to the body, and one of them was set with permanent loctite which was no fun to get out but I did eventually triumph. It was sort of tedious to get the pin back in through the hatch itself, but with enough perseverence and a thin coat of antiseize and it eventually slid through. The hairiest part was doing the first one, since the struts wouldn't hold the hatch up and I was constantly afraid that my prop was going to fall out, crushing my fingers. ...once I got the first one replaced, though, the hatch did stay up by itself. With both of them replaced, it actually takes some effort to shut the hatch, a nice turn although not having the key to the lock means if I don't slam it hard enough I gotta crawl back into the car, unlock it, and try again...

Pics of the operation were taken, and I'll get those up on my website before long along with the story of bypassing the ACC servo.

-tom!