Citroen Xantia with a couple of problems

Gordy.H · Post by **Gordy.H** » 02 Jun 2004, 19:04

Hi,
Can anyone help?
I have a 1997 2.0 16V petrol Citroen Xantia with a few problems! 1st problem I encountered was the engine briefly loosing all power when accelerating, also there is an orange light on the left side of the dash board with what looks like a picture of an engine on it comes on. This only happens for a split second then carries on running okay.
Problem number 2 is now and then the cooling fan comes on when the engine is at normal temperature also sometimes with this problem the temperature warning light comes on with the STOP light but the temperature is still at it's normal level. I've also noticed it only seems to happen if the engine has been running then switched off for a few minutes then started again.
The 3rd and final problem is again if the engine has been running, switched off then started while still warm there seems to be a delay in the engine speed slowing once the accelerator has bee released. The revs also seem to be very erratic.
Any help with any of the above would be very much appreciated, my thoughts so far are it might be an electronic problem with the ECU, other than that I haven’t got a clue!!
Cheers

ItDontGo · Post by **ItDontGo** » 02 Jun 2004, 20:13

ECUs dont really break very often but the wiring fatigues and gets corroded.
Your ECU can tell you what the first problem is by using a fault code reader. The light is flashing on the dash to tell you that it has stored another code in its fault code memory. I am working on some diagnostics at the moment but as they are not ready I will have to recommend a rival of ours Gunson. You can get these from Halfords and they are a rip off but they will tell you what is wrong.
The other problems... anybody got any suggestions?

oscarloco · Post by **oscarloco** » 03 Jun 2004, 00:58

The second problem could mean low water level. I had a similar problem on my '94 ZX Volcane 2.0, the temperature light would come on at around 90 degrees and when I checked the water level, it turned out the water level was too low.

Panjandrum · Post by **Panjandrum** » 29 Jun 2004, 18:07

I've seen the power loss with orange light problem on my Activa, when passing on the motorway. Weird thing was - the revs dropped drastically at the same time - but only according to the rev counter.
It went away after service when "they" did something with the ECU.

ItDontGo · Post by **ItDontGo** » 29 Jun 2004, 21:56

Well the rev counter works off the pulses to the ignition coils so it is likely that the ECU temporarily stops sending pulses to this system. Alternatively it could be that the ignition coils are breaking down and shorting this circuit. I dont really know Xantia ignition systems at all so thats just a guess. The coils on my AX work directly off the ECU so when they packed in they affected my rev counter.

Stempy · Post by **Stempy** » 29 Jun 2004, 22:47

My guess would be flywheel speed/position sensor or associated wiring if the engine cuts and the rev counter stops working.
If it's got aircon the stop and too hot light could be a duff sensor or aircon bitron unit. Engine temp rises when you switch off so the sensor or it's connector may be up the shoot, and when you start up again it thinks it's too hot.
Lastly, a bunged up idle stepper could be the cause of the erratic revs etc.

markallinson · Post by **markallinson** » 30 Jun 2004, 00:07

Sorry to hijack the thread but itdontgo, what diagnostics tool are you working on, will it read fault codes, reprogram keys etc? I would be very intersted...