Gold Sinker Mk1

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aerodynamica
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by aerodynamica »

Ha thanks, I went for a spin after the traffic died down this evening and it is definitely working properly. I found that the hydractive lamp is still acting like an ABS test lamp and so far hasn't began flashing to show a recorded fault (or two or three..) so it seems fine. I should admit (and I'm surprised noone pointed out the possibilty!) that the ECU I fitted is actually from a 1995 XM. Of course this means the parameters from the sensors are all a bit different so this means it'll react a bit differently - and it does! I would say that with it expecting a bigger car it slightly over reacts and so feels a little more sensitive. In sport mode it holds on to the stiff setting for a longer duration than the Xantia settings (I actualy recall this characteristic from my old Hydractive 2 XM) but largely it's barely different.

About the faulty ECU. Unless there's a dry solder I'm wondering if this stuff was all caused by the fault memory getting too full (?)

Anyone have any thoughts on that?
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by CitroJim »

aerodynamica wrote: About the faulty ECU. Unless there's a dry solder I'm wondering if this stuff was all caused by the fault memory getting too full (?)

Anyone have any thoughts on that?
Yes, it's always been my belief that clearing a load of stored faults from a Hydractive ECU can make a world of difference...

You just need a member with a suitable later Xantia (or XM) nearby who can pop the ECU into theirs and do the necessary...

I, for one, will be most interested to learn the result Graeme...
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aerodynamica
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previous convictions: totaling 52litres of LHM in one go:
1968 ID19B 'Old Polly' Stellar white
1993 Xantia 1.9 TD SX Mk1 Sinker Silver
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1982 CX 20 Pallas 'Old Goldy'
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1977 CX 2400 Pallas C-Matic 'Aphrodite' Regatta Blue
1982 GSA Pallas SE Silver Pearl
1980 CX 2000 Reflex Vallelunga Red
1978 CX 2400 Pallas C-Matic 'Prometheus' Midnight blue
1984 BX 14E 'Cecil the slugmobile' Maroon
1987 Fiat Panda 'the mighty panda'
x 97

Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by aerodynamica »

Yes Jim, I wonder what would happen if I managed to hook up the ECU and clear the faults. The XM H4 ECU is still functioning well with the pedal sensor working well - still not really sure what's different about the Xm coding versus the Xantia programming of the H4. It seems to respond fairly similar to the previous ECU. If anything it's the pedal sensor sensitivity that's a bit higher, again, probably anticipating the inertia of a bigger car. Anyway, I think I would reinstate the original ECU if I did manage to clear the faults and that it was actually physically sound (that it might not be..!)
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by CitroJim »

The XM and Xantia ECUs are programmed a little differently but for test purposes they can be swapped... Certainly for the purposes of reading/clearing faults/testing.

I've even run an Activa Hydractive ECU on an XM for testing on one occasion!

Swapping standard and Activa ECUs need a modification to the keyways on one of the connectors if you ever want to try it...

Sadly it does not turn your ordinary Hydractive Xantia into an Activa :(
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by demag »

How much memory is reserved for faults then? I would have thought you could get thousands logged. No?

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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by CitroJim »

Dave, that I don't now but I don't think very much... I think the most I've ever seen recorded is maybe ten,,,
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by demag »

Oh that's not a lot is it.

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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by CitroJim »

demag wrote:Oh that's not a lot is it.
Doesn't need a lot really Dave and it is late 80s technology... It was pretty advanced in its day...

There is only a small number of faults it can log anyway...

Thankfully it doesn't run Windows... Otherwise it could log thousands and no doubt regularly blue-screen :lol:

Incidentally, speaking of advanced for its day, the Xantia/XM Hella vacuum cruise control ECU is based on a Zilog Z80 8-bit microprocessor...

When you think that appeared in the late 70s it really was rocket science then...
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by demag »

Haha. Reminds me of something I read some years ago when Chrysler were having some issues in the US. I think they had to do a big recall on a safety issue and one of the big bosses at Microsoft made a sarcastic comment about the recall. Chrysler's CEO said he could imagine hitting the brake in an emergency and a message popping up on a screen: "Are you sure you want to use the brake?" :-)

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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by CitroJim »

:lol: And they once said that if cars ran Windows you'd have to press the 'Start' button to stop it..

I do believe that may now be the case in some 'moderns'?

I further believe some 'moderns' now have a start button reminiscent of my first Mini... :roll:

Whatever next? A starting handle perhaps? 'Crash' gearboxes maybe? Hey! What about a choke control? :lol:
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by myglaren »

CitroJim wrote::lol: And they once said that if cars ran Windows you'd have to press the 'Start' button to stop it..

I do believe that may now be the case in some 'moderns'?
It is indeed.
While this may be open to interpretation, a man was killed when his car wouldn't stop, the stop button did nothing.

The Independent.

Happened with a VelSatis a few rears back too.
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by CitroJim »

All that <spherical objects of a personal nature> makes me more and more resistant to running a 'modern' :twisted:

I just can't trust the technology and the experience with the 207 I have on SORN (possibly for a long time) underlines that in two big thick red lines...

I can't trust software at any level... 30 years of working with it professionally has done that to me...
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by Mandrake »

myglaren wrote:
CitroJim wrote::lol: And they once said that if cars ran Windows you'd have to press the 'Start' button to stop it..

I do believe that may now be the case in some 'moderns'?
It is indeed.
While this may be open to interpretation, a man was killed when his car wouldn't stop, the stop button did nothing.

The Independent.

Happened with a VelSatis a few rears back too.
I'm very skeptical of the facts surrounding this story. Yes the man died and that is a Tradgedy.

But did the cruise control kill him ? I don't think so. It did potentially malfunction but it didn't kill him.

When you read about the call to 999 one of the questions he asked is should he try pulling on the handbrake to which the person assisting said I don't know I'll find out, which they never did.

But the smoking gun is why didn't he just press the brake pedal damn hard ???? And why wasn't that the first thing the 999 operator suggested ?

No normal car has an engine that can overpower the foot brake. Not even in 1st gear. I have a 200hp Xantia V6 and I can floor it in first and stamp on the brake pedal and the brakes will still slow the car down.

There is no way that his brakes could not have safely slowed the car down in top gear even if the throttle was to the floor. I just don't buy it.

A failure of the cruise control AND a complete failure of the foot brake on the same car ? Unless the ABS and cruise control ECU's had been hacked or there was other deliberate sabotage I just can't see it.

For that matter did he make any attempt to take it out of gear ?

The lack of a conventional ignition key has nothing to do with this incident.
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by Hell Razor5543 »

I do trust software will do something; just not always what I want it to do!

It does not help that, in the past, major software houses (yes, I do mean you, IBM (amongst others)) paid their programmers by the amount of code they generated. This meant if you produces 2 different versions of a program to do a job, and one was 16,000 lines of code while the other was 10,000 lines, you would submit the 16,000 version. Paid to write bloatware!
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Re: Gold Sinker Mk1

Post by white exec »

There is a huge amount of truth in what you say, Jim.
The only certainty is that 'automated systems' will, at some point, fail.
When that happens, the only rescue may well be manual intervention.

It's the reason why fully automatic London Underground trains have a driver still in the cab. The system, ultimately, is not trusted to cope with (a) failure, and (b) all emergencies. Tube trains full of people are expensive things, and calamities are almost intolerable. Aircraft auto-pilot systems likewise. The same cannot be said of road traffic transport, where the perceived costs of even major 'accidents' are regarded as acceptable, even though they happen on an almost hourly basis, and where a charge of corporate manslaughter is unlikely. The advent of driverless cars will bring all this into focus, and will be a legal minefield.
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