I have an '88 240 wagon, B230. Recently, it has had some issues with hesitation. I looked at the fuel pump relay, and it was full of water. This has happened in the past, due to a leak that I have yet to entirely vanquish, and I just replaced the relay with no problems. This time, though, the new relay makes a crackly zap sound sometimes, and the fuel pumps won't run. I tested the pumps by jumping the fuses 4 and 6 together, as I have read about in other threads, and the car started normally. It's not just a random bad relay, since I tried another new relay with the same results. Unless of course they're both bad. My guess is that because the relay was on all the time while it had water in it, it caused something to melt and now there's a short; the problem is that I don't know where to look. Has anyone else had any problems similar to this?

 

I can't imagine that water in the relay is good for they system by any means lol....If you can't trace/fix the leak, I would recommend placing the relay in a different location out of the way of the leak and seeing what that does for you.