Conrod failure

[oscar]

Hi but if you read that first link i posted up that is what blew his engine up when he started it up and theres a string of injector problems with that engine.
We still don't know how OP arrived at his situation re speed/running etc as would be of note for others running that engine and i know frauds have had some major failures with it.

But if i was in his shoes i'd take someone that is qualified etc and make arrangements with where car is to all have a check/look it over to see what has failed and if other damage to other components around it and not alot of room to swing cat under bonnets these days but once all had a look and agreed on whats been found then sit down and discuss it properly as the reason i say to check/investigate first is so A they bung all the bits back on engine and few miles down road it goes bang again because a part was faulty.(and yes happened before)B.you have a ball park figure for job and not a blank cheque which if go to them with that they can't really say unreasonable as not blaming them and both parties in the open if have a clear picture of whats going on.
Because it would be very unfair on you and unprofessional of them to expect you to fork out any figure they come up with at end and im sure they'd rather you was a happy customer at the end of it all!
Plus you could always say your on this forum and many ask what happened and how to avoid it happening to them which in turn could make less problems for citroens with warranty repairs!

As for Injector failure Neil123 don't for get these are electronic ones so the feed/switching is at injector head unlike 1.9/2.1 indirect type with pump and at very high pressure so if they go open/fail can dump a fair amount of fuel in bores in a short time i think its something like a 1000 bar was chatting to a mech while back on a fraud mondeo that had a cacked system with injectors/system mucked up and sounded like a bag of nails. i know my dive bottles @300bar and figure he gave me was way far higher.

[neil123]

I think the dealer would almost certainly agree a price/time in advance for an engine swap.

I suspect if it threw a rod through the block it wasn't on startup.

I take your point about very high pressure - 1500 bar is possible on HDis - but that doesn't tell us how much fuel it'll flow? A bit like a 40,000v coil will fire your plugs, but it wont boil your kettle?!

Unless the pintle blew off altogether, the flow is physically restricted by the size of the injector nozzle. At con-rod escaping speeds, that isn't very long to flow fuel sufficient to hydraulic lock. I'm not convinced, although I could be wrong!

[Jaf]

I'm not convinced either! I had an engine with kis fuel injection. It's mechanical fuel injection. The fuel meter stuck open and just spinning the engine over pumped 5litres of petrol into the bores, went straight past the piston rings and into the sump, knackering the big ends on the way. Of course it's not the same engine and it was only spinning over, so at high revs there would be a lot more fuel but I still don't see it.

[citronut]

my friends 2008 Relay engine had complete failure at about 130K and just out of warranty ( miles and period ),

it had been service at the correct intervals by the dealer,

i dont know what the damage to the engine was, but it was put down to injector failure that caused to engine to die,

the total bill was around 7k which citroen stumped up half of, they must have felt guilty as it had only just had a service not long before it died,

my friend had reported running issues at the to the dealer when he presented the van for the last few service's,
but they could not find out wrong, ( dragging the warranty to an end???? so they did not have to foot the hole repair bill ???? ) ,

he was also surprised to find out it has a F*O*R*D lump in it, he only bought the van thinking it were a PSA unit under the hood

[oscar]

Hi citronut there all the family engine made by powertrain a joint venture?.
Friend had a 1.8 escort van throw a rod at idle was sitting in traffic at a flood when a range rover stormed through it other way and bow wash swamped in take and bang one dead engine.

The injector problem is becoming the main culprit and think citroen know it! as spoke to spares place i use and they said had loads of problems like this but it's funny that most have disappeared from net about it!

[CGATCX25GTITURBO]

Citroen 'in my experience' won't budge after they have made an offer.. Dealers do have a warranty pot to play with, as a contribution was offered by the dealer to repair my Picasso .. In the end I put it down to a poor show and moved on. I sent my findings to VOSA (they said they may make a bulletin for testers) emails to Auto Express ETC didn't even warrant a reply to me.. I had the car repaired at my cost cheaper than the contribution Citroen wanted.

These manufacturers know the score playing by their rules and we still keep buying their products so why should they need to change.

my experience

I spent 6 months backwards and forwards with them..even with the support of a proactive dealership.. wasted time I should have moved on in the first place.

All the tests etc may incur extra costs and I would be suprised if you managed to change the manufacturers postion :/

Just my thoughts of course

[Gethro]

Reading with interest: FYI the good lady was just coming off the motorway on a slip road, slowing down for the traffic lights at red.

Still trying my negotiation skills with dealership GM, but all avenues are being blocked. With Citroen also giving deadline running out of time. Their tack is swaying now towards "just your bad luck" away from "lack of oil" and "you've put the wrong oil in it" Why then is there a reluctance to allow the engine to be opened and find out once and for all and why did the the oil light not come on or the engine seize. Defo oil in car as police and recovery vehicle had to block traffic to put sand over major oil spillage on road. Getting fed up debating now and last poster is right: the manufacturer( and dealerships) only play by their own rules. I realise my mistake was probably taking back to the garage that did the recall repair. Hard for me now to prove if it truly was just back luck, my Indy mechanic's oil change, the way the car was driven or if the recall was actually done, and done properly, if the failure was related to the recall or if the conrod or its associated parts had a manufacturing defect. As I've said before surely Citroen themselves will want to know too: thus when we asked if we proceed with works can we have the removed part, we have been advised we can't as citroen want them back. we advised we would therefore pursue citroen to give us their final report. The sceptic in me suggest there'll be no further investigation or report.
No christmas card for us from dealership or citroen.

[oscar]

Hi spoke to edwardes and son at Billericay Essex he says he has a 16valve one but not 8 valve if interested and not sure where you are hes pretty reasonable.01277651486

[neil123]

Gethro, have you asked the DP if he would be prepared to do as I suggested? If so, what was his response?

Genuinely interested!

Neil

[ashy90]

Absolutely dreadful service. Catastrophic engine failure 37 days out of warranty is not acceptable, and certainly not a car that is 'fit for purpose'.

They should be paying 100% of the repair costs.

After the terrible trouble a good friend of mind had with their C4 Picasso and the dealership, I can honestly say I will NEVER ever buy a new Citroen. Shame as I like the ds3.

[neil123]

Absolutely dreadful service. Catastrophic engine failure 37 days out of warranty is not acceptable, and certainly not a car that is 'fit for purpose'.

They should be paying 100% of the repair costs.
.

Good grief Ashy,

You do understand the meaning of '37 days out of warranty#?

Warranty is the bit that makes it easy to claim for stuff while its in warranty. Servicing loyalty is normally the thing that gives rise to goodwill outside warranty. Anything else, like European consumer law etc may or may not help but it surely won't be obtained just by mentioning it to the dealer!

The car has lasted several thousand miles since the dealer last saw it, and thirty seven thousand since Citroen themselves saw it. It has existed in unknown operating conditions, and latterly with oil and filter of unknown provenance, which may or may not be the right viscosity, fitted by someone else.

And Citroen should pay 100%? Really? I'm beginning to remember why I got out of the trade now!

I think Citroen are being quite good about it, seems to be the dealer who is being iffy.

[Stickyfinger]

The car has lasted several thousand miles since the dealer last saw it, and thirty seven thousand since Citroen themselves saw it. It has existed in unknown operating conditions, and latterly with oil and filter of unknown provenance, which may or may not be the right viscosity, fitted by someone else.

As said above, Citroen will ONLY be liable IF the ConRod has a manufacturing fault which WILL be visible.

Personally, I think you need to forget Citroen and fit a 2nd hand engine.....take back your engine (give them NOTHING !) and have the conrods looked at in your own time. IF there is a fault, then claim via smallclaims process for costs.

[citronut]

if these engines have a high fail rate why purchase a second hand unit from a salvage company, which you will probably not have or know the history of,

i still would remove the car from there premisses before they cover up what ever it is they are concerned about you seeing/finding out,

as they have told you basically you have no right's or business seeing or knowing what really caused the engine failure,

im sure they know and are trying to hide the truth!!!!!

[oscar]

hi well im with Citronut on this why should you be denied any rights to see car etc as this is the way they are all trying to fob off on us you have to accept whatever business say/want!

One thing is if the injectors did fail as many have and caused this i would think you still have grounds under not fit for purpose as this is now a well known fault thats killed many engines as if im right in the link i posted to here the end of the injectors break off so jam piston along with fill bores and don't forget these modern engines have very little free space in combustion chambers.
But don't know if rod broke or went from little end or big end and if big end went could have been when pistons downish then cranks rammed it against block wall and pushed it through? or even piston broke and dropped gudgeon pin or the bolts have failed maybe not done correctly or shells not sized right and seized?
So engine wasn't under load as OP says was slowing down so would have been hot from on M'way so more under engine breaking
Gethro did your wife notice anything happen before it broke?

[CGATCX25GTITURBO]

All this reminds me of a debate I got into with Aprilia (Piaggio) in 2010.

I bought my son a used but very low mileage (400 miles) RS50 and only a year old. I spoke to the supplying dealer before I drove to wales from Hull, to verify the milage was correct and asked general questions about the bike (its what they or the owner didn't say that was later the problem)

I serviced the bike myself from then on ( I worked for a multifranchised Motorcycle dealership through the 80's repairing most makes and models ) so was more than qualifed to look after it Anyways one day my son said the bike didn't sound quite right so I had a listen.. crank bearing giving up I thought and we decided to pull the motor.

Stripping the bodywork took the longest. What I found was the balance shaft was almost 180 degrees out I thought wow thats not good! (I knew I wouldn't be able to claim under the bikes warranty as I had serviced myself) and contacted Piaggio as I (wrongly) believed it had left the factory like that.
Long and the short of it.. It had had a crank replaced at 200 plus miles UNDER WARRANTY, the owner and the dealership omitted to tell me this while I was making my enquires. To be fair the Piaggio manager did try to help but it boiled down to the same thing... I could have done it... because I opened it up! In reallity (in my opinion from what 'I' had witnessed) the dealer had put it back together incorrectly and didn't use the dots to line the gears up.. Piaggio were free of the claim 'as the factory didn't do it, the dealer had stripped and rebuilt it, so the dealer could blame me beacause I had stripped it and dealers don't make errors do they? In this case it had destroyed the balance shaft its bearings, the gears on to the crank and crank bearings.. I rebuilt it at my cost and rested in the knowledge it had been put back together correctly.

It can be debated around and around they can always go back to... it's out of warranty and this is a goodwill gesture..take it or leave! Just like I got with my Picasso sills.
I took loads of evidence back to them regarding perforated corrosion from the inside out, had it put through an anti corrrsion inspection at a delaers 'where it passed!' proved there anti corrosion for 12 year boast for Picassos was WRONG and I was still told take it or leave it... or you just end up going around and around and getting wound up while searching for options I even asked how many successful anti corrosion claims had been made.... no answer, as one would expect.

In summary if you strip it they can debate it might not be parts from your engine or your could have contributed to the failure however independent your inspection may be.

I hope you manage to get it sorted, I vowed never to buy such a new car again.