Smelly Xsara

birstall · Post by **birstall** » 31 Mar 2007, 09:26

My wifes car smells. When we bought it we noticed a funny smell. Thought at first that the car might have been previously owned by a farmer (no offence to farmers intended!).

The garage we bought it from fitted a new heater matrix which we thought was done to fix the problem. They also cleaned all the carpets and upholstery.

It's been some time now since we bought the car, however, I've been for a ride in the car yesterday and I notice that the smell is still there. Seems to be a slight burning type acrid smell, so could it be something to do with the heater matrix?

There doesn't seem to be any loss of coolant, and there don't seem to be any other problems with the car. It doesn't have a particularly high mileage. It's a '99 1.6i Exclusive.

Any ideas?

JohnD · Post by **JohnD** » 31 Mar 2007, 10:45

You would get the smell with the heater matrix going. My daughter's Xsara did the same - within it's first year of warranty. And also the water level didn't fall very much. Can you be sure that the garage did in fact replace the matrix and not just pour in a can of Bars leak? (Sorry! I'm a cynical old b***** - at least with garages.)

Post by **CitroJim** » 31 Mar 2007, 11:07

Has it a pollen filter and has it been changed? This could harbour all sorts of nasties.

Stewart(oily) · Post by **Stewart(oily)** » 31 Mar 2007, 12:01

I just changed the pollen filter this week on my Xantia, absolutely incredible, must have been in there for 100,000 miles, once thats swapped then you could try some barrs leaks in case the matrix is weeping somewhere, then its down to the upholstery, febreeze is pretty effective IMHO especially for getting rid of doggy smells.
Stewart

jeremy · Post by **jeremy** » 31 Mar 2007, 13:51

Has it got aircon? If so I seem to remember they can get a bacterial problem - and there may be special cleaners for them. I seem to remember some postings on this subject several years ago.

mezuk04 · Post by **mezuk04** » 31 Mar 2007, 19:12

My fiesta is just over 17k and nearly just about a year old, after the aircon switches off it bloody well smells nasty

jeremy · Post by **jeremy** » 01 Apr 2007, 08:01

So its Fiestering is it?

rabenson · Post by **rabenson** » 01 Apr 2007, 10:26

Halfrauds sell an aerosol that you put in the footwell with the aircon switched on and the doors closed. It locks on and sprays all its contents throughout the car and through the aircon system. This apparently disinfects the aircon system and leaves the rest of the car smelling clean. I used it last year and it worked a treat!

Ron

np · Post by np » 01 Apr 2007, 16:59

I read a usefull tip the other day about air con & smells.The systems suffer from bacterial problems.An easy way to cure this is when using the a/con,switch it off about 5 mins before you switch the engine off.That way,with the fan/heater system still working,it drys the ducting/pipes inside,otherwise,they remain damp & thats where the bacteria & smells come from.

birstall · Post by **birstall** » 02 Apr 2007, 19:02

I've been away at the weekend so I didn't have time to get hold of some Bars to try out.

JohnD - Your cynicism may well be justified! Or if they actually did do the job, did they fail to replace the O rings, possibly? No I'm sure they put some radweld or something in, otherwise I doubt it would have failed so quickly.

I took the pollen filter out when we bought the car and it wasn't too bad. However I gave it a wash and dried it with a hairdryer before putting it back just to be sure.

The air conditioning is not working at the moment due to loss of refrigerant. I'm familiar with the smell you get from A/C and the smell we are getting is different.

The carpets do smell a bit when you get your nose right up to them and I suspect the previous owner had a dog (or dogs!). So I may need some of that anti-bacterial spray to help with this. The car was valeted when we bought it but this doesn't seem to have completely removed the smell.

So it looks like there are probably two causes for the smell. Checked the coolant level again and it is down a bit plus the carpet on the passenger side seems a bit damp, so looks like the main problem is the heater matrix after all.

I'll try out the Bars and the anti-bacterial spray as soon as I can get hold of some and report if these measures fix the problem.

Thanks for all your comments.

Cheers.

birstall · Post by **birstall** » 11 Apr 2007, 10:08

An update:

I've used some stain and odour remover that I bought from the local pet shop on the carpets and seats and this seems to have done the job. Car smells great now. If you're looking for it, look for 'Byotrol' in the description on the back label.

Next, the coolant. I have put some Bars flush in the system and plan to flush this out today and replace with Bars leak.

Can anyone tell me where the best place to drain off the coolant from?

birstall · Post by **birstall** » 14 Apr 2007, 21:03

Well, I managed to flush out the system by disconnecting the top hose from the radiator and then connecting a garden hose first to the radiator fill point, then to the disconnected top hose, then back to the first point, etc until clean water was coming out of every orifice.

Reconnected the top hose, then topped up with antifreeze, followed by quick run around in car, followed by Bars leak, another run around, then another top up.

Now found another problem!

Radiator fans do not appear to be coming on!

Checked fuses - seem OK.

I suspected the fans weren't coming on - but my indy mechanic checked the fans a while back using a diagnostic tool and they seemed to work OK. So is this probably the coolant temperature sensor! I only let the temperature go up to 90 for fear of damaging the engine, but no sign of any movement on fans.

Also, I had previously assumed that the A/C was not working due to loss of refrigerant, however, on pressing down the pin on the Schraeder valve, there was a distinctive hiss. So could the problems be related?

Also, there are signs of coolant escaping from near the top of the plastic coolant bottle, although this may now have been plugged by the Bars leak. Perhaps a sign of too much pressure in the coolant system due to failure of radiator fans?

Any ideas out there? I'm too pixxed to carry on for now. Too much liquid refreshment!

DickieG · Post by **DickieG** » 14 Apr 2007, 21:48

birstall wrote:Now found another problem!

Radiator fans do not appear to be coming on!

Checked fuses - seem OK.

I suspected the fans weren't coming on - but my indy mechanic checked the fans a while back using a diagnostic tool and they seemed to work OK. So is this probably the coolant temperature sensor! I only let the temperature go up to 90 for fear of damaging the engine, but no sign of any movement on fans.

Also, I had previously assumed that the A/C was not working due to loss of refrigerant, however, on pressing down the pin on the Schraeder valve, there was a distinctive hiss. So could the problems be related?

I think you'll find that the fans aren't due to come on until something like 92 degrees so you may need to be brave, alternativley you could bridge the contacts at the switch to see whether the fans do work at all.

Ther air con may still be down on gas despite a hiss coming from the valve, is there enough pressure?

birstall · Post by **birstall** » 15 May 2007, 19:44

DickieG

Just to update you, you were right about the radiator fans and the refrigerant. I let the temperature creep up a bit further and they came on.

For the A/C, I bought one of the top up kits from Halfords and this got it up and running again. I had to press down on the Scraeder valve in the car when topping up to get the refrigerant in. This wasn't explained in the instructions, so I lost a bit of the refrigerant before I worked out how to get it in.

I flushed out the coolant circuits and used Barrs flush, then put some Barrs leak in when I replaced the coolant.

Also used some stuff from a pet shop to clean the carpets and upholstery. This worked well, but after several weeks there is a bit of a used car smell there, but not as bad as before.

However, the acrid type smell seems to have gone, so I suspect that what I was smelling originally was a combination of dogs and leaking coolant. The dog smell must be from a previous owner. We didn't notice this when we bought the car presumably because it had been valeted and the smell was being masked.

Thanks to all of you for your comments.

Stewart(oily) · Post by **Stewart(oily)** » 15 May 2007, 20:04

My Xantia fans dont come on until 95 degrees or so, and thats a diesel, had me worried I can tell you, I was popping the bonnetand pulling the sensor wires off to force the fans to come on, then once I was stuck on the M25 when that would have been suicidal and the temp got to 95, then came down again, be brave and let it go higher

Stewart