timing

.... so let me understand, you did not tell him what to be careful of, then you screamed at him for doing something he wasn't aware of.... hmmm

No, I told him, as I stated before, I did not stress HOW important it was.

And I didn't scream at him, like I said I screamed, more in horror than anger.

I don't think turning the wrong way will cause something like that to happen... since you are turning by hand... there shouldn't be a jump as if you were to use starter motor.

Speaking of which... when is the last time you changed the timing chain?

White smoke means either Hydraulic/brake fluid or more likely water coolant.

When I adjusted the valves of my engine (m130 a W108 280SEL 1968 car) and I did turn my engine backwards (by hand). Nothing bad happened. (I did the same on a few other cars (non Mercedes).

I d> I adjusted my valves on my 1983 300SD about a month ago. I had my little

Never, how can I tell when it is time? Also, must I remove the engine to do so?

Does that mean that I have a bad head gasket? How can I tell if thats the problem, with a compression test?

Compression test won't do much good for fault finding.

1. Unscrew the screw you use for filling up oil. check the cap for a white/light brown sludge, (cream like stuff) on the inside of the cap. If you there is water in you oil. this can still be normal if you run only short trips and don't let the engine heat up enough (mostly shorten then

To check for water leakage into you oil. run the engine till it's warm (don't do that if you have huge amount of white smoke) take the dipstick out. and check for continues water vapour coming out of it.

if really bad and definitely in need of fixing you could see the coolant level drop considerably as well. given that you don't have another source of leaks.

anahataray via CarKB.com wrote:

A coolant system pressure check will reveal if you have headgasket leak... either dropping pressure when engine is off or ever rising pressure when engine is running.

You can tell by how much slack you have in the chain. Timing chain can be measured to see if it is within tolerance or not.

Another test is by setting #1 pistin to top dead center... and moving the crank pulley to see how much timing degree you moved without moving your camshaft. You can actually physically see it... go back and forth to see how much changed without camshaft moving.