Has anyone left their diesel running all night/day?
 

Let's say if it's really cold out and you do not have access to a block heater? I don't need to, I'm more curious.

No, but I once got up in the middle of the night to take a drive at a hotel when it was sub-zero and I didn't have a place to plug in.

yup.

http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/diesel-discussion/240198-powering-my-house-mb.html

When I was a kid, the local real estate agent had a 300TD that he basically ran from November to March. No real crime to speak of in rural Maine at that time, so no worries. Now, I wouldn't.

a friend from alaska told me the semi trucks over there they leave running 24-7

Lol. I've done basically the same thing. Drove my 300td from sunny so cal to my friend's cabin up by Lake Arrowhead one winter and ended up getting snowed in without power on the second day. Ran an extension cord from my car's inverter to the house and plugged in the tv, DVD player,and some lights. We watched movies while huddled around the fireplace for warmth. Car idled for 11 hours to no ill effect (though the oil stain in the driveway wasn't too pretty, lol). I think it drank 6gallons of fuel during that time.

Yes you can leave it running all night.

The risks are:

- things going wrong that if attended would not be a disaster, but unattended... broken belt or hose, low on any of the vital fluids.

- in really cold weather, idle speed is not enough to keep the engine up to temp so you get more fuel by the rings into the crankcase, figure out a way to increase the idle speed and then change your oil at 1/2 your normal interval

- never do this on WVO for the reason stated above

My friend and mechanical guru Steve tells this story concerning my 81 240d when the PO still owned it.
Seems the PO called Steve one evening to say that the car wouldn't shut off and could he come over and take a look at it to see if he can fix it.
He gets over there a bit later and sure enough he finds the car idling in the drive. He asked the PO when this happened and the PO replied...
a week ago! LOL
Steve can't remember how he stopped it, being unaware of MB vacuum systems ; but he managed it somehow.
This was many years ago and the car is none the worse for it.

We regularly run diesel pumps for weeks 24/7. No probs. We have driven from one side of the country to the other in the old 300D, didnt turn it off, it had a bad starter. It is no big deal to run a motor continuous.

I recieved the benzproducts.com dvd on rebuilding injectors for christmas, and in it he mentions that though normal pop pressure for injectors is around 135 bar, he said that mercedes used the same diesel engines in forklifts and other equipment which was expected to see long periods of idling, and that the same injectors were set to 170 bar to compensate for the coking effects of long idle periods.

(btw, the dvd is very amatureish. I'd recommend against it in favor of spending a few hours reading the forums.)

A wee little bit O'Carbon
 

EXTRA, in the pre-chambers.
Diesel Purge and a Hard run of about 8 Hours straight (Above 3500 RPM) will
help clean it out.

ACTUALLY, These engines are not designed to be left @ Idle for LONG periods
for all the reasons mentioned in the above posts.
[The 616/617 series will probably suffer the least damage.A lot of 616 s were
put into service as "Reefer" engines and on GenSets...BUT those were "Loaded"
running situations,Not @ Idle.]

I wouldn't try it as a regular "Trick" with anything Newer.
(601/602/603/ or 604/605/606)

Answer
 

How long is it safe to Run a diesel without turning it off ?
http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/diesel-discussion/242773-how-long-safe-run-diesel-without-turning-off.html





Have a great day.

I'd invest in a block heater. Its a waste of fuel and engine-life to run it so long for no reason. I haven't used my block heater yet this year....and it has been 5-10F several times. This morning it was about 16F....fired right up no problem. :D Just crossed 287k today! :D

it got down to -17 thursday morning so I left my engine running all night long since i don't have a blockheater. no reason it won't work, just give er a good italian tuneup the next day to burn out the carbon!

Carry a propane torch and heat that big metal fuel can a little
 

and see will that get you started the next time. Just make sure you don't burn any rubber parts.

BenzDiesel