Oz newbie with manifold leak Q

Hi everyone. Recently purchased a 1987 Mondial 3.2, Australian delivery with just over 100k km in Adelaide Australia. I'm very pleased and excited about the purchase and just love everything about it. I have a '68 Alfa 1750 GTV and '82 Ducati MHR and you can certainly feel that same Italian breeding, but the looks, view from the drivers seat and mid mounted screaming V8 etc. make it all extra special. In my explorations of the new toy over the past week I picked up the sound of a bit of an exhaust leak, which certainly wasn't there on purchase - you develop an ear for these things when you have been playing with old cars as long as i have. I will try and describe the location of leak in the hope that someone will say its the "xxx", because it will be very hard to photograph! Its on the rear exhaust manifold not far from the head. The manifold has this shroud around it and it appears there is a tube that sticks up on each branch of the manifold through a hole in that shroud on the upper side. They appear to have weld on them and one of these "tubes" is where the leak comes from and it appeared to have some muffler putty around it. The car has a local service history with ferrari specialist so I can go and see him but like to arm myself with as much info as possible. I can't help wondering if this was part of some emmision arrangement that has since been removed and the tube blanked off with weld but now leaking. I hope it is not an engine out job to repair! Thanks in advance for any help and i did do a search on manifold leaks first so hopefully not wasting your valuable time!

 

Thanks Steve - really appreciate the response. I have a number of old benzes and moderator on a benz forum and know how important people like yourself are to people like myself that are new to a marque and models. I got a bit from a search but googled and got a ricambi site that has exploded diagrams
EXHAUST SYSTEM (NOT FOR US AND SA VERSION) - Ricambi America, Inc.
They don't show those tubes but do on the US diagram - but regardless mine definitely has them. But i don't have the tubes leading to the manifold like on the US diagram. I'm only trying to work out that if it did have the gas analysing with the full tube set up and his was removed for whatever reason, what would be the impact? It certainly seems to work well. Just using mercedes as an example from around this time, Euro models had more power than australian delivered, but often due to lower grades of fuel here at that time and 10:1 euro vs about 8.5 i think for us, and the US generally had higher levels of emmision control, less flowing manifolds etc.
And i had a closer look with mirrors and torches and it does look like these tubes have just been welded up and i can see the hole in the last one. Just wondering if i should just disconnect the battery, try and protect with temporary steel sheilds etc and just MIG it up?
will try and search a few other words too and see if i can't find some personal experience dealing with this.

 

Great info - sometimes things get lost in written messages but you are bang on with what i need! From what i can see of the US ricambi diagram i am convinced what you are saying is correct, that the Aus delivered car is the same as US emmission set up - these tubes, shroud around exhaust etc. I have taken a general pic of the engine and then with mirror in one had and camera in the other, i think i have a pretty good shot of my tubes and you can see the exhaust putty on the dodgy one. But as you can see there are no tubes and sounds like with Dirk as an example of someone eliminating his, that the car runs fine without them. What do you expect the impact of eliminating them is?

That makes total sense what you are saying about welding, so i think for starters i have a range of 2pack type fillers and will choose one that will resist the heat perhaps - nothing to lose. If it holds no doubt at some stage something else will need fixing and engine may have to come out. We have a local company that does ceramic coating on manifolds and had a noticeable impact on an early AMG mercedes i have where i did the tri y manifolds. I see a number of people mention it. Do you think it is a worthwhile exercise? If it keeps leaking that may be a worthwhile project to fix the problem and get coated.

And having trouble seeing the block at no.1 with all the stuff in the way, will have another look later.

Thanks again for the help and hope photos work!
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I live in South Australia where there are no vehicle checks unless a copper pulls you over, finds a fault and defects the vehicle. Then you have to go to a workshop at a place Regency Park where i think they must be so bored they go through a car to such an extent and have to pay hundreds of dollars each time they send you away to try again that i think most people give up and throw the car away! Strange system but the key is to look after your car so you never end up there....... same outcome i guess! But there are no emission checks unless you are blowing so much smoke that the copper pulls you over and then see above for the result!

I can look this up of course, but are there any other differences euro to US spec eg. camshaft grind, compression ratio etc? Do you know the power difference. I know on my 560 mercedes oz spec is about 180kw and with increased compression ratio, different cams and tri-y manifolds it increases it to 220kw for the euro spec. And of course that K-jet looks very familiar to me. I'm going to a Benz club get together today and will be seeing a guy there that has a business that produces performance gear for k-jet Mercedes and interested for him to look at the Mondial to see if any of his gear is relevant - this is the link anyway: Bosch CIS and CIS-E (K-jet and KE-Jetronic) | Product Categories | dkubus Pty Ltd


I have a lot of experience with getting bolts undone - other products i find successful are Inox and 'Freeze release' - imagine you have those or something similar...... and patience of course is very important.

Yep and absolutely agree with the dodginess of welding, especially when plugs are available - i was thinking how hard to find something or turn something up. I think some drilling and tapping is the way to go and i can turn something up if need be.

I'm just still not clear on how these tubes integrated into the system - was it just for checking if you chose to check, or did it feedback to the injection or recirculate some of the exhaust gas? By the sound of things if you just remove everything, the system will operate as normal?

 

Excellent - thankyou! Although it makes it even more upsetting that simple capping plugs were ignored and reverted to using a welder to solve their problems - should be a punishable crime! To drive it today i pushed a little muffler putty in and then put a self tapping screw of a size that just wound in and that managed to hold against a motorway blast and some twisty adelaide hills roads on the way home - and i have to add i really love this car. If it gives way i will soon know but ultimately sounds like a manifold off job and at that time I can assess the options to cap, weld etc. - but you have put me on the right track.

I had some other issues with the alarm etc and was looking in the handbook and saw the location of engine type. I can just work out some numbers but I can't see how to get there without removing the injection system part that is above it - great place to put a number! No doubt in the same place as earlier versions that maybe didn't have that injection. Once engine is cool might try some solvent or degreaser that might make it easier to read.

 

Thanks for that and i absolutely get what you mean Bell Bloke. I have a collection of cars and motorbikes well into double figures and amongst them are total rebuild project cars that you wonder will ever see the road in my lifetime! I have the ability to panel beat, weld, spray, mechanical rebuild, machine etc and therefore i often make the mistake of buying a car cheap because i 'can' fix it. But can and actually doing it are different things with competing demands on time. I have a 1924 Amilcar CS that i bought as a chassis and running gear and made panels, bonnets, dash, firewall, seats, cast steering wheel, pedals etc etc and did all of this in 18 months, but i was my only project at that time and i didn't have kids and at a time in my life when i worked hard in an office and once home would eat dinner and spend time with the wife and 10pm or so i would head out to the shed and work through the wee hours...... rather than lay in bed sleepless worrying about the office... it worked well for me! And like you say, once you start stripping.... just a bit more..... while i am at that just do this etc, it is so easy to shed bound a car for periods way beyond what you ever thought. That was one of the keys to this purchase. So i am quite happy while that screw in that tube holds and leave the proper fix until it or something else needs to be fixed or when i might want to sell the car and get those things perfect........ but if you ask the kids that's never gonna happen and i have to admit it is hard to imagine the novelty of this car wearing off!

And thanks for the welcome PAP - i couldn't see an 'intro' type thread so here seems as good as any place to put some pics. I think it is a really nice original car right down to the tools and books. Not sure if the photos show it but it could do with a cut and polish and has the odd mark here and there, but i like it that way and shows it is not fresh out of a crash shop and maybe hiding some secrets. I also know the seller quite well who has had it for about 10 years. It has the 328 I believe wheels that look the same but not metric, but have the metrics tucked away in the garage too.
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Thanks for your comments - to be honest it is the only one of these i have seen up close so i don't have much to compare to! I am sure they are about, but i haven't even seen one on the road in little old Adelaide - and maybe i don't get out much. And it was a poorly researched impulse buy, but i do trust and respect the seller, and apart from those welds I couldn't be happier and it is always good when a vehicle is so much more than you thought it would be. And everyone who gets in it seems to feel the same - a very special car.

And thanks also for those links Bell Bloke - very interesting and useful material.