Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful SOAB)

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Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful SOAB)

Post by wurlycorner »

Got my Activa off the blocks and back on its wheels today after a lot of work (still some more to do) eager to find the rear suspension no longer being rock hard and...
:evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil:
Bloody thing still is rock hard

So work carried out;
Rear anti-sink, Activa and Hydractive spheres have just been changed, no difference
The rear suspension spheres were changed a few years ago, with no change
I can hear electro valves operating when the doors are opened etc. so they appear to be working?

What next?

By process of elimination, I assume it is actually just stuck in 'hard'?
Or have I forgotten do something weird and wonderful that you need to do when changing sphere's on a Xantia/Activa in comparison to a CX (my staple experience of hydraulicism!)

One thing I have noticed is that the 'hard' button doesn't appear to do show any reaction when it's pressed, except with the headlights on.
  • With the headlights off, there's no light on the button. Press it and still no light on the button.
    With the headlights on, it lights up orange. Press the button and the light goes out. Press it again and the light comes on.
I'm assuming that's not correct and the way it should work is;
  • Headlights off, there should be no light on the button. Press it and it should light up bright Orange.
    With the headlights on, it should be lit dim orange. Press it and it should light up bright Orange.
Correct?
So what does that tell me?

This is rather getting on my tits now tbh, so some advice would be appreciated.

Cheers
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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by Xaccers »

The button lights are white bulbs with coloured plastic caps on them. The plastic burns from the bulb's heat so it can make it hard to see the light, however when activated it shouldn't make a difference if the lights are on or off.
The sport button only makes the car's decision to switch to hard mode easier rather than make the suspension flip into hard mode when pressed.

Juliet had a hard rump, and it was due to the rear manual height adjuster. The link that clamps to the end of the control rod that runs front to back under the car was too far one way holding the back down slightly too low. On the end of the link there's a pip that at normal ride height must be bang in the middle of the square cut out of the arm that comes out of the actual height corrector.
With the car idling and settled on normal height, how many fingers can you fit between the rear wheels and the top of the wheel arches?
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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by CitroJim »

Iain, that you can hear the electriovalve singing is no guarantee it is actually doing the job.

Switch off the engine, close all doors and wait 30s for all electrovalves to switch off and go silent and then open a door. Leave it open for a few seconds and then close it again. This will cause the suspension to switch to soft mode and operate the electrovalves.

Listen closely and you will hear them click when it goes to soft mode, then sing and most tellingly when they switch back to hard mode you'll hear a big click. So listen for click - hum for 30s and then big click.

If you don't hear the big click at the end and the singing just tails off the electrovalve did not switch and the most often found cause for this is the need to carry out the Hydractive Diode modification, details of which can be found on here.

Note that you'll only hear the clicks clearly when the system has good pressure and hence why the test must be done shortly after switching off the engine.

Low system pressure can also cause the valves not to switch and is known to affect Activas more than others as they have a very hungry hydraulic system; the electrovalves need both an electrical signal and the right amount of system pressure to switch.
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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by Peter.N. »

I had this problem with my C5 and found the radius arm bearings were siezed :x

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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by wurlycorner »

Thanks guys.

I don't think rear ride height is an issue (but will feedback on numbers of fingers etc.). The rear arm bearings are fine (it's had plenty of time up in the air for me to move the arms about by hand :lol: )

Jim, I'll re-check the electrovalves as you say and feedback - thanks for the description. I do hear clicks, but possible I could be confusing whether it's front/rear or both that's clicking... I'll double check I haven't been making that mistake.
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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by Peter.N. »

It probably isn't the arms but I would add that mine moved with no weight on them but stiffened up on the ground.

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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by wurlycorner »

Didn't get much investigation work done today (ended up making a rash decision to buy car number 10 instead :roll: ) but anyway...

Too windy outside to hear if the electrovalves were working properly or not, but having said I don't think there's anything wrong with the ride height at the back, today the car was completely misbehaving on even the most basic stuff! :evil:

It's easier to show than explain what it was doing, so I took a video. Unfortunately it ran for 15 minutes and is 1gb, so too big to upload to photobucket!

:-k need to work out some other way to show it..
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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by Xaccers »

upload it to YouTube
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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by wurlycorner »

Yeah, would do except to do that you have to sign up to a google+ account these days and I just do not want to even exist in the facebook/google+ world!!!
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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by Xaccers »

Google+ is nothing like Facebook (thank goodness), it's actually useful for starters.
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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by wurlycorner »

But Google+ requires to know and log every scrap of your person so it can try and assimilate you into the Google Borg... :evil: (Facebook are crap, so they're not that efficient :lol: )
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Re: Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungratef

Post by Northern_Mike »

Xac wrote:Google+ is nothing like Facebook (thank goodness), it's actually useful for starters.
Please could you give us one example of it's usefulness? I'm sorry, I find it just as dim as Facebook.



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Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungrateful S

Post by Xaccers »

wurlycorner wrote:But Google+ requires to know and log every scrap of your person so it can try and assimilate you into the Google Borg... :evil: (Facebook are crap, so they're not that efficient :lol: )
Even if that were true, Google are lovely, join the GoogleBorg, they have cookies.
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Re: Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungratef

Post by Northern_Mike »

wurlycorner wrote:But Google+ requires to know and log every scrap of your person
..

You mean of "a" person, surely? Just use completely false details - my name is all that's accurate on my Facebook account, absolutely nothing else is! For example, ! Facebook thinks my date of birth is the same as an old sort code I used to have for a long closed bank account.

Does anyone truthfully answer security questions? I answer all mine with complete nonsense.


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Re: Re: Rock hard rear suspension Xantia Activa(aka-ungratef

Post by Xaccers »

northern_mike wrote:
Xac wrote:Google+ is nothing like Facebook (thank goodness), it's actually useful for starters.
Please could you give us one example of it's usefulness? I'm sorry, I find it just as dim as Facebook.



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I can give you several:
Google docs - create, edit and share word and excel documents.
Hangouts - not just for messages between people (via data and SMS), but also group discussion. I'm a member of several hangouts between different groups of friends relating to different topics/issues.
Groups - full of useful information, from science, art, cars, tv shows, books, you name it there's a group for it. A lot of help with my Raspberry PI came from one of the Google+ groups.
Drive - online storage of files for sharing, including photos which is handy when you want to post to the forum.
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