LHM Leak

[RichardW]

[Chlorate]

Crunch time, just dropped the car off at an MOT tester.
I know it needs front tyres and one if not both front balljoints...hopefully not a lot else.

I presume an LHM leak is a failure, and the underside of my car is quite a mess. Is it likely that in the event of a fail he'll accept "Yes, it was leaking. A low pressure fluid return line from one of the hydraulic valves was leaking where a rigid plastic pipe was fitted into a rubber hose, which loosened over time. However I fixed it Monday morning, but didn't have any brake cleaner to hand to tidy up the car and it's likely a bit of LHM has pooled in places and may continue to drip for a while"?
The only way he could really tell where it was leaking from would be to drop the rear frame, but since you can't remove anything as part of an MOT test...

Alex

[myglaren]

Can you take it to an ARC car wash?
During the winter they do an underbody wash to remove salt accumulations, may improve the look of your car as far as the MOT man is concerned.

[Chlorate]

That'd be a good idea, what the eye doesn't see and all that.
He did fail the car on it (among other minor things), and I did explain that I had indeed fixed it and he seemed satisfied. However my ongoing alternator issues and the fact the original garage is now fully booked up until the week after next means I have bigger fish to fry...

[Wimbuus]

As yours is an Exclusive you may well find that it is the hydractive valve return that has popped off. There is a hard plastic pipe that comes from the valve and runs along the top of the subframe, then just plugs into a rubber hose just above that hole. A bit of leakage from the valve, and the pressure is too much and the joint pops. I tried putting it back, came off again, then I put it back with cable ties on it - lasted a bit longer, but still came off - then I fitted cable ties either side and wired them together - never came off again

Do you have a picture of this specific part of the car. I fear we have a very similar issue with an XM I bought with a friend of me. We put it on a car ramp to fix an exhaust leak, and a lot of LHM started spilling out the rear left of the car. Too much for it to just be a leak. So your description of it "popping off" might very well match the issue we are having. We are quite new to this though, so we are not sure what specifically to look for. Sadly, a lot of the provided images in this thread are no longer viewable.

[xantia_v6]

There are also rubber joiner pieces in the LHM return lines and with the age of the cars, they are often splitting and leaking.