C5

[fastandfurryous]

It's mainly to do with how good the zinc electroplating is on a car. Peugeot are especially good at this: I have yet to see a 405 with any kind of corrosion, and I've had some fairly appaling 405's over the years.
Citroen are pretty good at it too (after all, they are PSA) and manufacturers like SAAB BMW Mercedes etc have been good at it for many years.
Quality of steel has a fair bit to do with the speed of corrosion too. Increased inclusions or contaminants in the steel ususally equals faster corrosion. One particular car this reminds me of is the Alfa Romeo Alfasud. Manufactured from recycled russian steel (aparently) and rusted faster than you could believe. Lancia beta's were pretty bad too.
The best fix for this is of course waxoyl, and lots of it, applied liberaly in box-sections, and most importantly from the inside of wheelarch panels. I have seen an enthusiast's Fiat X1/9 (another car supplied with salt solution in the sills from new) which has been religiously waxoyled every year from new, looking as fresh as the day it was made.
Do excuse me while I drift horribly off topic!

[PowerLee]

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by fastandfurryous</i>

It's mainly to do with how good the zinc electroplating is on a car. Peugeot are especially good at this: I have yet to see a 405 with any kind of corrosion, and I've had some fairly appaling 405's over the years.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
The only time ive ever seen a rusty 405 its always been down to poorly repaired accident damage.
Ive seen a few rusty sheds of 405s in my time!

[Kowalski]

My '94 Xantia has a few spots of rust on the rear wing, but the rear wing was replaced at some point and I suspect its a weld that is rusting, its rather difficult to paint the back side of a wing once you've welded it on isn't it. The same Xantia has a couple of large stone chips on the bonnet that have been there for 5 years and haven't rusted.

[ghostrider]

I'd go along with the comments about the effects of modern safety measures on peoples' driving style. I can't remember who said it but when asked what the best safety measure would be on a car the guy replied that a sharp six inch spike sticking out of the centre of the steering wheel would focus your mind nicely on driving in a careful and considerate fashion.
I remember when Audi quattros first appeared, everybody raved about how all that extra grip & control would result in less accidents, the only trouble is of course that yes the car will corner faster but when it finally lets go you have even less time to recover it as you are already going round the corner much more quickly and you are into the scenery that much sooner. Most modern cars capabilities are way beyond the skill levels of the people behind the wheel, the only thing that will reduce road deaths significantly now is a sea change in attitude by the only thing that has not had extensive development over the last 40 years, namely the driver
End of rant [:D] [:D] [:D] [:D] [:D] [:D] [:D]
Back to the C5, it sounds like Citroen are still developing technologies that are firmly in their tradition of the past, comments about other cars brakes tell us that for citroen to stay ahead technically things need to move on, the Activa system must be somewhere near the limit of the development of the hydraulic suspension technology so other things need to be found to continue to make Cits attractive to us die hards. After all it's not the hydraulics per se that makes a cit its the fact that they found a different, elegant solution to the varying requirements of a suspension/ braking/steering system
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