1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate - 05/07

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vulgalour
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1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate - 05/07

Post by vulgalour »

This is my current daily drive, and a nice thing it is too. I wasn't going to get attached to it, I ended up being given it by my brother after he got fed up of it breaking things and being French. Luckily this coincided with my own car - a 1980 Austin Princess - failing her MoT on some welding that turned out to be a bit more substantial than initially pointed out at the garage so I could be kept mobile.

It was very scruffy when we got it, had a very noisy wheel bearing and a wheel out of balance at nearly 70mph. Apart from it trying to part company with one of its wheels on the way home after buying it, the journey back was pretty much uneventful.
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It probably hadn't been washed since 2006 and had spent a good portion of its life under a tree. Plenty has been spent on it in the past, it comes with some history, and it feels like a really solid car. My brother and I spent a while cleaning it and fettling to find as many issues as we could and it performed pretty well until one day the clutch pedal clip broke. It was the proverbial straw and after he was towed back by my Dad and my brother had replaced the clip, I was handed the keys and told to make the problem go away.

This I was happy with given my circumstances. I knew the car needed a clutch (still does, got to wait until after I've moved house to get that sorted), a front wheel bearing and ball joint, a lot of cleaning and a couple of rear outer light clusters but very little else. It's easily the best car I've ever owned condition wise and certainly has the most amount of toys. Not quite as comfortable as my rotten old non-turbo diesel BX estate but much better put together overall.

The suspension was a bit hard and the car a bit skittery when cornering hard, some investigation found that there was about a litre too much LHM in the system and once this was drained and set properly, everything improved on the handling and comfort front. What came out wasn't great, and this is apparently from a system that was recently flushed and the filters cleaned. It's another job for after I've moved house.
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A little while ago I got the front wheel bearing and ball joint replaced, which really transformed the aural comfort and tightened up the handling a little more. I also picked up a factory roof rack from the previous owner who did the repair work for me which will be very useful At this point the car has done about 2000 miles since April between my brother and I, including a faultless 400ish mile round trip to Maidstone where the car proved itself to be a very capable mile muncher and fairly good on fuel, though not quite as good as my old BX. This was the journey that cemented the car as a keeper rather than a stop-gap for me. It's trouble-free, very solid overall and in need of little more than cosmetic fettling to make it like new. Having done only just over 100,000 miles it's barely even run in.

After getting the new rear light outer lenses, something I was putting off until someone broke the already cracked lens more when they reversed into me in a supermarket car park, I couldn't resist debadging the tailgate.
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This rear arch and bumper had a nasty scrape and there was a long shallow crease along the rear wing. I've done the first bit of fill and paint and it's now look much improved, especially now there aren't black scratch lines in the rear bumper.
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I'd like also to get the rear corner sorted out where the black plastic is deformed from an old injury, well before me or the two previous owners got hold of the car. Oh, and that red Princess is my other Princess which is due to be leaving once the last few pre-MoT jobs are done.
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Fettled the other arch too which had some rust staining and cracked paint. This is the worst part of the bodywork and the only bit that requires any welding, everything else is really solid. Just cleaned, rust treated and painted for now to stabilise and tidy the area.
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Got the fuel filler pocket and flap cleaned up and the drain cleaned out. Since this car runs on veg oil - fresh and used - and has done in the past, previous owners hadn't done a great job of cleaning this up and it was all gunged up. I make sure it's always clean, you only realise the car is running on veg when you smell it these days.
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My short list for important things are an LHM flush, brake overhaul and replacement clutch. There's numerous dings and stonechips to resolve, some bits of interior trim to replace and just a general deep clean of everything to make it as good as it can be. In the meantime it'll be used for everything it can be used for, it's a very practical, very affordable, very solid French estate car which is very difficult to find a worthy competitor for.
Last edited by vulgalour on 05 Jul 2015, 22:05, edited 10 times in total.
lexi
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by lexi »

Very practical and useful Zanty.

The Princess. I had the type before it. Morris 1800. The room was fantastic and a very nice ride.
As much legroom in the back as Vel Satis.
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handyman
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by handyman »

Welcome to the Forum, Vulgalour. Once you've entered its portals, you can never leave. :shock: Bit like Hotel California, but more Gallic & garlic.

Your estate puts my donkey to shame! :mrgreen: Mines a year older with two & a half times more mileage. Looks like your anti-sink sphere needs changing though.

BTW, the rot at the bottom of the D panel, rear door shut, is quite common on estates. Not advisable to use anti-corrosion fluid on the rot before you get it welded, as the phosphoric acid sinks into the platelets that form the steel & makes it a bit of a pig to get good welds on. Better to use it once the repairs are done. Look on the stickies for the cause of the corrosion & how to cure it.

Also worth checking the door hinges, both to door & post, for cracks and especially the drivers door. They do fail but can be repaired. 8-[

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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by handyman »

Lexi, I had one of those 1800s, but mine was the Austin version. Had proper leather upholstery, bench seats & a fabulous heater. The perfect passion wagon when I was courting. :lol: :lol: :lol:

Do remember the steering wheel was reminicent of an RM1, both in size & angle. No power steering either, that was for sops.

I bought it outside a breakers yard for £20, as it was due to be scrapped & my cousin had one & wanted some spares. I took it for a MOT & it passed without even touching it. Cousins banger then became the donor car & ended its days at Walthamstow Dog track in a banger race. [-X [-X

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vulgalour
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by vulgalour »

It is sat in the low setting in the first picture, but it probably does need an anti-sink sphere anyway because the nose is a bit lazy. Nothing terrible, it's on the cards as an eventual job, but we're going to flush the LHM and check the adjusters and whatnot are all greased and in reasonable health before fiddling with spheres. It had all the other spheres replaced with new ones fairly recently and it does ride really well as a result.

The next job I'm actually sorting out isn't really an important one, but an opportunity has presented itself to swap the alloys for some steels and Synergie wheel trims, which I prefer. Should end up looking like this providing I win the auction.
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Looking forward to this alteration, it brings the car closer to how I want it to look; a big smooth pebble of nineties Citroeny goodness.
handyman
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by handyman »

Your alloys look like the 14" Saxo ones. Are these 15"?

BTW, I think you might find Synergie ones are 5 stud with a completely different offset. May not fit your Xantia. :shock: They dont evenfit XMs.

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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by vulgalour »

Current alloys are 15" Xsara, similar design to the 14" Saxo ones and a bit harder to get hold of. The Synergie wheel trims I'm putting on are a push ring fit so it doesn't matter how many wheel nuts are required, the bonus is that they look very close to being monoblock alloys so may fool a couple of folk.
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by isisalar »

One thing to definitely check is the strut tops. There's a sticky at the top of the page.
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vulgalour
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by vulgalour »

What symptoms would I be looking for on that front? As far as I'm aware there's nothing wrong with the strut tops.
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by Old-Guy »

Strut top (mounts); the typical symptom of impending failure is the top gaiter falling off the retaining lip at the top. This is the underside of the mount and the gaiter refuses to stay on because the retaining ring is the bottom edge of the mount which has distorted.

If you don't catch a failing mount in time the strut 'spears' the bonnet - expensive but not terminal. Much better to replace strut tops BEFORE they fail and save the cost of a replacement bonnet! It's all about age - the O/S on my 1996 estate showed signs of imminent failure at similar mileage to your yours.
2011 Grand C4 Picasso VTR+ 1.6HDi in Kyanos Blue
1995 Xantia Estate SX 1.9TD in Vert Vega "The Green Lady" - after 11 years now owned by XanTom
1998 Xantia 2.1 VXD Estate in Mauritius Blue - R.I.P. (terminal tin-worm)
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vulgalour
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by vulgalour »

I can't see anything amiss, nor does it feel like anything is wrong, so I'm going to chance it for a bit longer. With things like the clutch needing to be done and cash being tight while we wait for a date for the house move, I'm just going to have to hope it doesn't break before I get chance to sort it.
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vulgalour
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by vulgalour »

Today, I did something that many people won't understand. I swapped the attractive Xsara alloys on the Xantia with some much less attractive steels and trims. Mike also paid a visit in his silly red car.
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There is method in the madness though. I agree, the Xsara alloys looked great on the Xantia, they really did, but they weren't very me. I wanted something a bit more me and to do that I needed to get the Xantia back on some steel wheels. The fact that the steel wheels have Michelin tyres in the factory size rather than Westlakes in a low profile is, for me, a large bonus and while the wheel trims do look a bit Halfords they are Citroen original. Note also the Xantia roof rack, front bar pushed back so it's more aesthetically pleasing to me. The gains in MPG without the roofrack on the car are so minimal that it makes more sense to leave it fitted, I pull the front bar forwards if I need a larger roof rack.
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The other lovely thing Moog brought me was the parcel shelf. It makes a huge difference to how tidy the car looks from outside and reduces cabin noise considerably inside.
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The new tyres are very, very grippy and the clutch feels better on these wheels than it did on the others. The speedo also appears to read more accurately and it's slightly less effort to get the car moving. In addition, the ride feels smoother and the wheels now fill the arches much better so all in all I'm much, much happier with the car as it is.

I'll be happier still when the Synergie wheel trims I've bought are delivered as I'll get all of the above and some sexy looking wheels instead of the so-so wheel trims look I've got going on right now.
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by oscar »

Hi if you need a rear sphere (middle rear) one ive a good one here tested when i got it from Edwards at billericay just pm me.
have a radio dash thing for a replacement standard size radio cassette/cd still in packet plus a turbo and set of injectors plus some other bit's if i remember right what i kept
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by vulgalour »

@oscar: I'll get back to you on that one once I've moved house, which looks to be happening on Monday!

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Today, my Synergie trims arrived. They do need a repaint to make them perfect, I'm just not yet decided on if they're going white or factory silver yet. I am decided that I really like them.

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Somehow managed to rack up 130 miles this week but I don't feel like I've been doing a lot of driving, not the first time I've noticed that with this car either. Annoyingly, the front number plate has fallen off three times since taping it on. The tape stays on the plate perfectly well and the plate has been lightly heated and bent to match the profile of the bumper in an attempt to help it stay in place, but the current tape doesn't seem to like the bumper plastic. I have reattached the plate with some supposedly stronger tape which I hope likes the bumper plastic more than the old tape. I really don't want to use screws, they spoil the clean look I'm aiming for.
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Re: 1997 Xantia 1.9TD Estate

Post by handyman »

Ever thought about using screws? 8-[ That tends to be a pretty foolproof way of getting the number plate to stay attached. You may find that the black plastic section of your bumper is 'textured' which means any tape you use will have limited adhesion. Flat smooth surfaces are the ideal for this pate tape.

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