so i was poking around the internet and i guess pretty much all 90's mb diesels have head cracking and gasket issues except for the 98 and 99s. these are of course the turbocharged versions. so any ways to mod these things without breaking the bank

 

Hello? Where are the mercedes diesel people?!

 

This is not true. Only the original 1987 300D 6-cyl heads had cracking issues. Replacing the head with a later casting cures the problem. The 1990-93 5-cyl engines had issues with the head gasket. Replacing the gasket with the improved type cures the problem. The 3.5L engines had rod issues, but the factory rebuilt engines were good, and if you replace the stock rods with the updated type before any damage occurs to the block, that also takes care of the problem. The 96-99 OM606 engines have issues with plugged intakes due to EGR soot, and glow plug issues (nightmare to replace if they get stuck, which seems to be very common).

Anyway, for a 98-99 E300, you can get a chip which basically maxes out the injection pump fuel delivery... should be good for roughly a 20hp gain, from ~172hp to ~210hp. You can't get any more power without modifying the pump by installing larger elements, which would then require a custom EPROM chip ($$$$). Changing the turbo, IC, etc will at best just reduce temps, or shift the power curve around, but that won't increase peak power output unless there is more fuel to go with it.

 

Get rid of the micro sized stock turbo.