French Car Forum

The first one with the crusty metal MAY well have 'meat' left in the metal
collars' thickness but I'd be nervous about what cannot be seen especially
higher up where the rubber is bonded on too. The rubber you've peeled
down should really just be pulled off and the metal rust treated to give
it any chance of surviving = bottom line is it doesn't look very clever!!

If you look at the thickness of a 'normal' one it's not exactly chunky bearing
in mind the weight of the car is being supported on them!

Your second pictured may very well be fine - you cannot get too complacent
though as I found with my Activa that seemed OK from a casual inspection
but still did in my bonnet!

Still cannot find a black Xantia bonnet...

Andrew

Got a new one from the dealer today. In stock so must be a regular fix/problem as they dont normally hold things if they dont need many.

It did'nt come with a new gaitor though will the old one fit back on again?

Hope the weather will be kind over the weekend so I can start fitting this along with my gearbox end driveshaft boot that has a split in it.

I have given the offside a good poking with a sharp driver from the top and the bottom rubber is held on still very firm.

What sort of sealant rust proofing can be added to this new one to keep it clear for as long as poss?

Cheers gav425.

Hi Gav
Your plymouth Citroen dealer generally does hold a lot of spares as when I got my strut tops from the Exeter brach they had to bring a set up from there.

I had no problem fitting the old gaitor onto the new strut top so you should be fine there!

i have just had a realy close look at a pair of strit tops before binning them,

my conclusion is IMO if the rubber was peeled of then the bare metal painted, they could/would still go pop, as all the bonded rubber is important to its well beeing,

it is constructed in two parts that are bonded together by the vulcanised rubber, one part is the lower section which is the plate that sits under the wing turet with a domed section which sits up throgh the wing turet apature,

the second part is the section which is the sphere mount, this is the section the strut ram locates into,

so with the rubber stripped back as far as possible and the bare metal painted, this will leave the edge of the rubber exposed to the elements, which will allow wet to creap up between the rest of therubber and metal

hello strut top/s

regards malcolm

ps. regarding the gaitors, there is two diferant diamiters (strut top end) one will not fit the other, if you find your old gaitors fit the new S/T this is because your old S/T was of the larger diamiter

I totally agree Malcolm. The rubber is there in the first place to prevent
ingress of water or moisture - just it doesn't last very well, really does it!!

Andrew

Think I've read every page in this thread, and nobody has sectioned one each of Series I and II tops, to see if speculation about redesign can be put to bed.

Wouldn't it be a useful thing to do?

Regards, Adam.

Hmmm, I see 21 pages so didn't bother to read it, been bored tonight though so read it through and now I'm like this:



will be checking mine tomorrow!

Finally, and not well before time. I've made this topic a "Sticky"

Thanks for that citrojim.

This is a useful thread with a lot of information on the subject. 8)

It will help to inform owners, that are not aware of this problem, so they can check this, and attend to it.

So even though there are a wide range of engines fitted to Xanta's.

I.E. Early diesels, HDI diesels, petrol engines small size up to the 3.0 V6, and all the estate car variations, and the fact that the Xantia came in early, and late facelift versions.

So did they use the same part on all models?

Surely in Europe these cars were used by the authorities, one would suppose that the Police in France would have used the Xantia as a fast response car, certainly in the estate car version with a police spec uprated V6 in it!

When the Police in any country use a certain car the manufacturers whoever they might be tend to do a Police specification variant of their car that has been selected, after all it's good promotion for their product, but they certainly do uprate things, to ensure that they don't also get bad publicity due to a component failing.

So, is there a Police spec mounting made for the strut top?

Did it not get improvements made to it for the version sold and fitted to the car supplied to the general public I.E. it made stronger, and better with a different design?

Also is this a problem that affected cars when they were younger, so that Citroen had to attend to it, and do it under warranty?

Or is it something that has escaped the system, because it has only affected older vehicles, when the component has had more age and wear?

Therefore is this something that Citroen are unaware of as a problem, other than be able to guess at the fact that there might be a problem, from the amount that their main stealers are selling?

How long do the police hold on to their vehicles for though?
I can't see it being much more than 2 years and very unlikely to be long enough to have the strut tops go (do they use salt on the roads in France? )

Not sure, but in the case of the TSG support vehicles, I have seen at least 8 years of life, before they renewed their vehicles.

Yes I would be interested to know if they use salt or not.

Do they also speed bumps over there?

Here's a picture of another failed mounting!

[/img]

That’s a well-mashed rubber !
Looks like the metal plate stayed in place.
That ordinary sphere is the sort that goes flat in the heat under the bonnet.
It’s got recent marks of the strap wrench around it.
Think that most vintages originally have the dimpled spheres that don’t go flat.

Recently on Aussie Frogs, there was passing mention of a Series II that had possibly experienced strut top failure. It had the deformed bonnet and new upper strut mounts.

That is the only instance I've encountered, of Series II failure. All other documented cases read about, have been Series I.

Cheers, Adam.