W124 - Rhino is on a 3.2 M104 and not 2.8 as it was supposed to be

So on one of the Saturdays in January, I took the car to Puspakom to have the car inspected as the engine has been replaced. I needed to have that done to allow the new engine number to be endorsed on the registration card.

After making an appointment and going through the test, I was given a pass and can proceed to the JPJ for the endorsement to be done. It was then when the MCO was announced for Selangor and JPJ will not allow the endorsement to be carried out.

Now in all of this, I check almost all the information in the results except for the new engine capacity, I was just too confident that it was a 2.8 and did not think much about it.

Almost a month later, I made my way to JPJ to have the endorsement done and was told to pay an additional RM 115 for the road tax for an additional month. I was baffled and asked why, the papers say it is the same engine capacity, so what changed?

This was when the officer pointed out that the new engine number was M104995xxxxxx, this prefix refers to the 3.2-liter version of the M104 engine. This is something new I learned, the M104 2.8 engine has a prefix of M104942xxxxx.

The road tax for a 3.2 is just under RM 3200 a year while for 2.8 is a hair below RM 1700, that 400cc increase almost doubled the road tax and this is not going to be economical.

I informed the workshop on the issue and they have accepted and being accountable in fixing the issue. They will now source for a replacement M104 2.8-liter engine to be installed.

Now there are some issues with this setup:

  1. The ECU is for a 2.8
  2. The fuel injectors are for 2.8
  3. The fuel regulator has been replaced to 2.8 (unsure if it is different for the 3.2)
And all this causes an idling issue where the car will not idle still.

I wanted to replace the electronic throttle actuator and if I did, it would have been for the wrong model, which may not result in the improvement I am looking for.

So now, the plan is to have the workshop scout for a replacement engine, have the installation completed, do a test on the new engine and I believe it should idle a lot better and stable. And once all that is done, look for a replacement throttle actuator.

Hot tip:
To really be sure, always check the engine number to confirm the capacity of the engine. The M104 2.8 and 3.2 liters look just the same from the outside.

The progress of this issue is documented here: W124 - Found a replacement motor for Rhino, a M104 942.

Pictures:

M104 2.8 (M104942xxxxxx)


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