No sooner than I had renewed the brake master cylinder on this 1991 Mercedes-Benz 420 SEL, it broke down on me the very first time I drove it to work and had to be towed back home. This was the first time this car left me stranded and in need of assistance.

This video documents the troubleshooting process I went through by attempting to replicate the conditions under which the failure occurred using a heat soak to apply thermal stress to the failing component(s). Sure enough at 10:05 in the video, the vehicle officially breaks down and creates an opportunity to methodically troubleshoot the issue.

While I troubleshoot and repair the root cause, I also take the opportunity to replace what appear to be the original 186,000 mile, 23 year old ignition wires, distributor cap, and rotor so that the entire ignition system is reliable once again. Now that the root cause has been identified and addressed, I feel confident that I can take this vehicle on a long road trip without issue. (8/16/2014)