“American planes will always be superior as long as there are wonderful men like you in the cockpit. And German parts.” — Lt. Commander Block

The KE Jetronic and I go back quite some time. My first Merc (w201) had this injection system as well as the same engine (M102 but with less displacement) as the pornstyler. May it rest in peace…

It didn’t run too bad but I never REALLY figured it out why it wasn’t running perfect. Then I had to part with the car quite unexpected. It still fired up and ran fine but I think it probably wouldn’t have passed the German road safety inspection anymore, they are not too keen about cabriolet conversions…

Concerning the Injection System, it’s payback time… After some consideration I bought “A quality product made in America”.

“Quality Exceeds Expectations / Made in USA” says another label. Well my expectations are moderate, converting the signal of a oxygen sensor to human readable numbers is no witchcraft at all. Let’s see them exceeded…

Inside is some circuitry probably made in china and a Bosch LSU Wideband Oxygen Sensor (made in Germany). I just want a ready-made circuit before I build my own so I can ensure that mine is working fine… And I want the pornstyler to run fine before I start building my own circuit.

Disclaimer: I didn’t mean to offend anybody from or fond of the US. I just enjoy to tease you guys 🙂 If I had thought the device would be crap I wouldn’t have bought it.

After installing it I would say my expectations are met. You wire up it just like the manual says (Plus, Minus and Emulator output for narrowband sensor), plug it in and it runs just fine. By coincidence Olli wired up an “Innovate” (same thing, different producer) at the same time and the experience was more unpleasant. The colour of the cables do not match the colours mentioned in the manual and you have to do some “free to air” (?) calibration to get it working which need an extra switch and a LED which are (i think) not in the box… Well done Zeitronix! How about Linux Software for the thing? That really would exceed my expectations…

Disclaimer: It’s not as bad as it looks, the springs are not under tension.

Still: Don’t do such stuff. Even if it’s save you will look stupid. People will make fun of you and/or tell you not to to it. This is especially fun in a shared workshop. Back to the point: Putting spanners only on one side of the spring (which is under tension) is guaranteed to make funny bouncy spring make funny bouncy stuff in the workshop an maybe hurt/kill somebody. Not funny.

The save way to go is to use proper spanners, compress the spring, remove it and then decompress it. And we also have decent spanners in the shop you don’t have to use the cheapos… If you have to support something which is under pressure please do it right. Use something which has a proper stand (three or more legs) so it won’t jump away easily if somebody kicks it unintentionally. Also use a layer of wood to distribute the load.

In this case I would have used the workshop pushcart (you can see the wheels in the back of the photo) and put it under the differential or some proper three legged stands…

I managed to get next week off. That means a solid ten days without work! But much hobby “work” todo, most of the parts for the pornstyler arrived…

Saturday I’ll have a look at a travel vehicle which (of course) would also need some love… But I won’t start before Monday, first it’s time to visit a good friend to relax and enjoy ourselves…

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A picture of a car which I will look at next weekend (mailed by the owner). We see a Stromdieb (even the dictionary don’t know the translation. Some kind of cutting connector, the blue thing with the cables). Some advise:

• Do not use these things. They either don’t cut the insulation propably or the cut most of the copper inside. In either way that makes them a very reliable source for connection problems which (especially with 12V) have a tendency to produce fire. Especially especially if they are used very close to the alternator (on top of it to be precise) which maybe means there is no fuse…
• Engines tend to get hot. Do use components which are heat resistant. (These things aren’t)
• Do not connect red and blue wires. Red is commonly used for + and blue for -. First of all it looks stupid and it secondly it will confuse and annoy anyone who will ever work on the car.

I returned to the workshop to charge the battery  of the station wagon because it had startup problems. The battery was full, the (refurbished) generator works perfectly and the startup & idling problems remain. Fuck. After cleaning and a quick checkup (see other post) I decided to drive home. Then it came to me: The battery was dead a couple of days ago and the Merc has PMS. Not premenstrual syndrome but some kind of pressure motor control. And this computer has no hard drive so it looses it’s memory every time the battery is disconnected. After that you have to teach in the accelerator pedal. Turn on ignition, slowly push down the pedal for two (?) times and then start the engine. Problem solved. I should remember this stuff…