'86 124

is it true that you have to wait for the red SRS light to go out before starting your car? my cars starting is very unpredictable.. sometimes it will fire up with no hesitation at all and other times it wil crank but nothing with happen.. if you feed it gas it starts to turn over and makes that same noise for a while and will die if i let go of the key.. whats the deal?

thanks,
James

Kestas

I don't know about the SRS light, but on fuel injected vehicles I typically pause a moment at the ON position to allow the fuel pump to pressure up before going to START. Does your owners manual mention anything about waiting for the SRS light to go off?

bamberger_1

The SRS sighn has thing to do with the starting of the engine. It's just a check whether or not the SRS lights are working, and when they were on and then went off you know that the SRS system components are ok. If the SRS light dont come on, turning the key, than the bulb is dead. If the light stays on after starting the engine, then one (or more) of the SRS components are faulty.

STE22

Howdy,
My 1989 300e has the same problem ( the difference is there are no SRS light indicator in my car's dash ) and it's quite irritating...sometimes it starts very well, but sometime it only crank and nothing happen, eventhough i already pause with the key on ON position . Usually it happens when my engine is hot, but after wait for a while until it cools down, then everything back to normal. When I check at the dealer, they can't tell what's wrong with my car.

spannu

Me too... I was thinking of maybe getting a newer starter from Bosch because they say the new ones have more cranking power and use less amps to do so...

dream7

Hey!! Mine too . . . 1986 300e - When it's cold takes 2 times to start, at warm starts the first.

bamberger_1

Starting problems can have various reasons and hard to diagnose from remote:
*fuel pumps backflow valve defect
causes bad starting if the car is parked for a while and not really cold
*leaking coldstart valve
bad starting when engine warm/hot
*leaking injectors
bad starting when engine warm/hot
*cracks in the intake assembly, drawing extra air
bad cold starting
*broken injector seals
uneven idle, bad cold starts
*demaged valve stem seals, allowing oil to enter the combustion chamber, fouling the plugs
general bad starting performance, irregular idle, sometimes no starting possible, unless sparks are cleaned
*damaged ignition cable insulation
bad starting performance, rough idle
*loose spark plug connectors
same as above
*worn out distributor (rotor)
rough idle, bad starting
*damagaged/grounded temperature switches
bad cold starts, or bad hot starts depending whether the temp. switch is grounded or a wire is broken

and probably a few more too