I have a 93 300D, i recently installed an alarm system, a Viper with Remote Start. The Remote Start will not work on my car, it will crank the engine, however, without the key in the ignition, there is no fuel going into the engine. Is there anything out there that i can run to my alarm that will open this vaccuum...has anyone else ever tried to put a Remote Start on a 300D??

Thanks in advance...

 

I just got done with the install of a sidewinder in my '83 300D. I was faced with the same problem. At first I thought it stumped me on how I was going to get around this problem. The remote startrer was all installed and everything worked except it would not start or at least stay running for more than a secong. I thought I could put am electronic valve in place of the mechanical vacuum switch in the ignition but figured that wouldn't be very easy working out the electronics, it would require I build a special custom circuit which I could have done but required to much of my time. The problem is that when the ignition is at rest it allows the vacuum to reach the fuel shut off diaphram meaing the car won't run. I thought I could just use the valve and have it shut the vacum off when the remote start was activated but most electronic valves do not shut off when energized and I certainly did not want to have it energized all the time except for the time the remote starter was active, including all the time the car was parked not being driven. With a little more thought, I came up with the answer, a leak! Well, sort of a leak, what I mean is why not have the valve just open and let outside (outside the closed vacuum system but for under the dash) air into the line there by preventing the vacuum from activating the shutoff. I had some clippard electronic valve I had bought for a battle bot or something laying around and knew they would come in handy now! A quick trip to the auto parts store for the necessary parts:


short piece of vacuum line (rubberized type not plastic)
(1) plastic tee

before:

vac---> ING. sw.
==================¨ˆ¨ˆ¨ˆ
==================¨ˆ¨ˆ¨ˆ
<------fuel shtoff

after:

vac---> ING. sw.
===================¨ˆ¨ˆ¨ˆ
=============Tee===.¨ˆ¨ˆ¨ˆ
<------fuel shtoff ||
|| ¨ˆ¨ˆ electronic
|| ¨ˆ¨ˆ valve
L===¨ˆ¨ˆ=<----air in when energized

So here is how it goes, I pulled an fused wired from a hot while active (could get this hot from any hot while active line from rem. starter) and ran it straight to a relay then relay to the elec. valve and the ground to grnd. When I activate the remote starter the valve opens and prevents the vacuum from shutting off fuel by way of massive planned air leak in vacuum line. Wehn the romte starter is not active like when I am driving the valve is not energized and does not allow air into line.

I used a 24 volt valve rated at 25 psig max but the 12 volts was enough to trigger it, a 12 volt valve would be suggested though.
I used part of an old plastic TEE for the barbed nipple into the valve(couldn't find threaded barb the rights size for tee) and just melted the end and shoved it into the valve while it was hot and when it cooled I threaded it the rest of the way into the valve and sealed it with some epoxy.

Whalaaa! It works great and now I don't have to wait for the engine to warm up sitting in the car.

Note: I programmed the remote starter to not check tach signal or voltage level and to just crank it one time per cycle. Tach signals are not as easy to find on a deisel and I am unsure what the signal looks like at the tach module and didn't want to grind the starter trying it out. I would suggest you do the same. Ebay is a good place to find an electonic valve just make sure that it will allow enough air in to negate the vacuum present or else your engine will just stumble run stumble run on and on.

Don't pay attention to any spelling errors, i WAS IN A HURRY!
Have any questions, email me at flippurr AT earthlink.net and put MB Start somewhere near the begining of the subject or I might delete it, damm spammers got me deleting almost everything by accident.

Good Luck
flippurr

 

Viper, Sidewinder, and other snake names are all made by Directed Electronics and have almost identical guts. Your dealer has a vast service department waiting for his call to Directed. Your remote start should work perfectly as wired. If it doesn't, return to the shop who installed it and they will make it right. P.

 

That may be true for most cars but mecedes model that use a mechanical vacuum to shut off the engine is new to them. Many customers have asked to have remote installers put in these models and as of this post, several local qualified alarms outfits in my area remain unable to help me and didn't have any answers to boot. It is not the normal situation and I don't think any of the newer mercedes diesel's use this method to shut off the engine. They have dreamed up all kinds of ways to deal with the electronics side of remote starting but I guess there is just not enough requests from customers needing answers for this problem for them to come up with an answer. When I am left to fend for myself I usually do well and this worked and my solution worked great. Go and ask them if they have any answers for your problem and if they do post it because I would love to hear about it.

flippurr

 

I have a 1988 420SEL. I want to install a remote start on it but my installer said he would have issues installing it. Do u guys know if I will have the same problem even thoighmine is a gas not a diesel

 

For what it's worth, I've got a 1987 300E with a Clifford alarm and a DEI remote starter. I don't think DEI had yet bought Clifford at the time I had these done, but it's the same company now. It has worked flawlessly with the gas engine.

 

My 89' 300E had the Cliffard remote start/alarm system installed with no problems. =) Mine is gas also. Maybe the installer that can't install it just sucks imo take it to another place.