I thought I'd found the source of the oil mist making a mess of the pipery over the cam box (slightly loose clip on air-hose to inlet manifold).
Sunday morning early, it's a fast blast down the M5 to sunny Devon, so even though I've not done a lot of miles in the last 2-3 weeks, Friday afternoon it was time to change a noisy drop-link and a quick oil and filter change. While waiting for the oil to drain, I cast my eye over the engine - more mess over the turbo pipery! As James May would say "Oh c@*k!" Wiping up the mess (yet again) the rag caught on something on the underneath of the boost sense pipe to the injector pump - great big split in it.
Of course it's not only the REAL source of the oil mist but also why it's not been my imagination that she's become really gutless. The amount of lost pressure through a 5mm pipe when there's a howling blast down the main pipe ten times the diameter is relatively insignificant; but the injector pump wasn't sensing any boost pressure so it's been hopelessly under-fuelling the engine. Found some decent reinforced fuel pipe the right size, but the horrible Citroen clips wouldn't do up over the larger external diameter - no jubilee clips small enough in stock, had to go 'over the hills' to buy some with the pipe just pushed on hard. What a difference - I no longer have to rev the nuts of the poor little engine to go up hills and the lack of rattles from the N/S/F is wonderful!
The signs were all there, I just failed to put them together; oh dear, must be getting old!
