Mercedes MBE Diesel Engine Pusher School Bus

The cold start on this bus was perfect without any hold ups. It was plugged in and the batteries are obviously in good shape. Of course with most diesel engines the white smoke is normal with incomplete combustion going on. Heat from compression is low in this case so it takes a while for normal combustion temperatures to occur. The rule of thumb with diesel engines in my book is to put the engine to work as soon as you get normal oil pressure or at least make sure the high idle mode is on. Idling a diesel in cold weather is not a good practice because of the build up of carbon and related combustion byproducts that happen with cold starts.

These MBE 900 diesels are good solid engines except for the emissions which was adapted to the original block in 2007. The blocks can not be swapped from non emissions to these 2007 models because of added modules that were engineered to meet emission standards. I know this from experience we have a 2008 MBE that has a cracked block and no one can find me a bare block for it. There are plenty of non emission blocks around but nothing newer. The long block is available from the dealer but at a huge cost and a core charge that we would not get back due to the crack in the block.

When the warranty was up with these engines we were in for a lot of challenges. The engine codes were running away on us with daily occurrences with the EGR valves, DPF diesel particulate filter, EOS electrostatic oil separator along with boost and charge air codes that did not let up. Two of these pushers were sports run buses and almost every trip they would radio back and tell me the engine was coding. One saving grace was the ignition key could be cycled on and off which would reset the code until it came back again. But this would stress me out regardless being helpless with the bus so far away. One bus was 4 hours out of town and I spent hours trying to line up a service call to do a parked regen or else the bus was dead in the water.

Eventually these 2 bad boys were taken off of the sports run and we started using newer Cummins ISC diesel engines. The pressure was off and if you have read any of my other posts Cummins is my choice for a diesel engine medium duty ISB and ISC models. Yes they don't last forever there are quirks and failures but an extremely smaller percentage compared to other diesels on the road. Preventive maintenance had proven to extend down time and the extra cost is money well spent.

Mercedes 900 Diesel Engine Runs poorly after fuel filter change

The Mercedes MBE 900 Diesel Engine. What I have experienced since we acquired these engines in 2005 is they are built well and stand up to the rigorous start and stop routines involved in a school bus fleet. The pre 2007 engines are not emission controlled like they are today and have given us very little grief. However I would like to share a tip on a troublesome problem we had with a 2005 freightliner conventional school bus.




The Video I made above explains how to properly bleed these engines. Strangely enough we were told to crank over the engine continuously after a fuel filter service until the engine fuel pressure built up. At first we were scratching our heads thinking we're living in the new millenium and this diesel engine has no priming pump and only one starter...that was destined for failure eventually from the constant load it would have to endure turning the engine over and over just to prime the fuel filters.

We tried to innovate and pressurize the fuel tank and crack a line at the secondary fuel filter to help the system prime up faster. Unfortunately some of our new buses had fuel guage sender problems and there were buses running out of fuel out on the road. There was no choice but to load the hell out of the starter to get it going again.

By the way if you loosen the fuel line from the unit pump to the head the line must be replaced. Recommended by the dealer / engineers. We were forced to crack the lines only once and re-tightened them after start up and did not have any leaks. So I imagine the odd time the fuel line will not seal properly after it has been disturbed?  

Engine Runs Poorly After Changing Fuel Filters

We recently experienced a problem with one of our MBE 900 diesel engines after a fuel filter change. It ran poorly and was not picking up fuel. It eventually kicked in and ran fine for a few days. However it died on it's bus run and had to be towed. It ran like it was starving for fuel like air in the system. The engine would idle fine but crap out under a load.

One thing noticeable was when priming the fuel system with the pump kit the pump just kept filling the lines and filter without the typical solid feeling at the pump handle indicating the system was primed and ready to go. Eventually the Mercedes diagnostics instructed us to check the return fuel volume from the head and the unit pumps.

There should only be 1.7 Liters of fuel returning to the tank every minute at an idle. We had double that...so it ended up being the overflow valve (similar to a check valve) which is in the return fuel plumbing to maintain around 60 psi. It was not doing this and caused a loss of back pressure in the return system which caused the hard starting, rough running condition. Now our shop will recognize the problem after these symptoms pop up again.