Not exactly today, but --- When I bought my late 280SL, it had a 123 distributor, emission control inoperative, no vacuum line to dist., and 123 set to E. It ran quite nicely, but I had no previous experience re. the performance. As the emission stuff was inoperative, I removed it in it's entirety, including the wiring. That sure improved the under hood appearance ! After reading a lot of information on the Forum I decided to look for an earlier throttle body, and was fortunate enough to find a perfect one, installed it, hooked up the vacuum, set the 123 to curve #8 , and Wow !!
Timing advance is now correct, with 38 degrees at just below 3000 RPM. The two immediate improvements were much better starting, and a considerable improvement in mid range performance. The car now run up slopes/hills without having to shift down, as previously, although I can still occasionally botch a hot start. The idle runs consistently at 550, which is also a nice gain. Haven't checked fuel mileage (If I couldn't afford the fuel I couldn't afford the car) but as Dan (Benz Dr) said in a previous post the performance is a noticeable improvement, so mileage is a secondary, almost unimportant, consideration. Hope this may be of interest to owners of US spec cars running the 123.
