Xantia sinking at front

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angle
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Xantia sinking at front

Post by angle »

Hi,

I have a non-sinker Xantia that over the last few weeks I've noticed has started slowly sinking at the front when parked up. It happens slowly - when I parked it up last night there was about four fingers gap between arch and tyre, it had dropped by maybe half a finger when I needed to use it after a couple of hours, but by this morning it was down to two fingers. I need a day when its not raining to be sure, but there's no obvious signs of fluid leaks and when you start it up there's no stop light and it rises back to its normal level in a few seconds.

Having done a quick search of the forum it seems like my first thought of accumulator probably isn't right - in any case, while it ticks relatively quickly its not every ten seconds. I have hydroflush sitting in the garage waiting for when work/family/weather/light align, as I'm not sure the LHM has been changed in a long time, its slightly overfilled anyway (I've taken as much as I can out with a syringe and the float is still at the top) and its just gone past 108k - is it worth putting off worrying until I've flushed it and got new LHM in and see how it looks then?

Thanks!
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by xf1ref »

Hi Angle,
If you removed LHM with syringe with car on normal position is wrong...the level for LHM is done with car on maximum height.
Also my xantia slowly sinking at front and back when is parked after few days but I think is a circuit pressure loss.
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by Mandrake »

Personally I don't think the front dropping from "four fingers" to "two fingers" (about 30mm) over night is anything to worry about.

Of my three Xantia's two of them including my current one drop by about that amount over night, and that is with good spheres and hydraulics in good order.

Due to the way the anti-sink system works the height loss when left to stand can be somewhat unpredictable - very small differences in the hydraulic system from one car to another can cause a large difference in how much height is lost over night, without any obvious cause.

With anti-sink the irony is the better the condition of the accumulator sphere the more the car will tend to sink when left. This is because when parked the anti-sink valves don't close until the system pressure drops below the suspension pressure - until that happens the suspension can sink due to leakage through the height correctors just like a non-antisink model.

A good accumulator sphere keeps the system pressure higher for longer thus there is more time for the suspension to sink via height corrector leakage before the anti-sink valves close and "lock" the suspension at that height. (Leakage is reduced by a couple of orders of magnitude when the anti-sink valves are closed)

You can demonstrate this effect by doing the following - park the car with the bonnet popped open and shut off the engine. Use a 12mm spanner to bleed the pressure regulator (turn 180 degrees anti-clockwise then nip it tight again 5 seconds later) then leak the car overnight - if the suspension is otherwise in good order you should find it looses little if any height.

This is because bleeding the system pressure causes the anti-sink valves to close immediately. If you find yours hardly sinks at all when trying this test I wouldn't worry about it.
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by VertVega »

I used to have a Xantia which also developed this around 360k km. I sold the car after 400k km. An internal leak caused this. There was no external leak.

In order ot fix this symptom I replaced the accumulator, applied hydraflush, changed LHM and still it had this "annoying" feature. As Mandrake mentioned above, after accumulator replacement it took a bit longer time for the car to sink but overnight was alrady too long time :) Car rised to drive height and after that short waiting time everthing worked fine. So I decided to live with it.

Edit: I was suspecting the location of the internal leak in anti-sink valve but I never replaced that part.
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by VertVega »

Adding a pic of anti sink valve (marked as #1) . There are 2 of them in Xantia.
In my case I was suspecting the front one which is located under the LHM tank.

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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by angle »

Well, its been parked up since Sunday when I filled it up with hydroflush, and so far its stayed level. I'm not going to pretend to understand why, but thank you all for the help you've offered.
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by Hell Razor5543 »

Hydraflush is a cleaning agent, and so it might have got some crud out already. Don't use it for more than 3,000 miles (5,000KM) as it is not as 'greasy' as LHM, and so things might start to seize up if you leave it in for too long.
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by bill hughes »

Hi all
excuse my ignorance but what is a non- sinker xantia, as my xantia sinks at the rear end to the extent that some of the tyre is up inside the wheel arch, but comes up when I start the engine, also the "stop" light stays on for about 10 seconds, is this normal.
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by Hell Razor5543 »

A 'sinker' Xantia is one produced before the anti sink valve and sphere at the back of the car. These have only 5 spheres (one for each corner, and the accumulator sphere).The later Xantias have a 6th sphere and (AFAIK) another anti sink valve, mounted at the back, just in front of the spare wheel.
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by bill hughes »

Thanks for that Hell Razor. I now where to look
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by dragen »

I have a 2.0HDi non-hydractive Xantia which is sinking at the front, noticeable when in town even with short periods of like 30min's between starts, and the 'Stop' light comes on for a period before able to drive, haven't had this with previous Xantia. Primary Accumulator sphere issue? Cheers
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by admiral51 »

Just a hunch but possibly a leak from one of the return pipes on the front struts.
I had a similar issue with the car sinking similar to yours and that was with less than 2 year old spheres, the STOP light was on for 10 seconds when starting.
It was a slow leak not losing lots of LHM but enough air getting in to let the pressure drop.

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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by dragen »

@admiral51 Thanks for that, I don't have any leakage (apart form when the dog ripped off a low pressure return :-D ), but yeah I can park for 10 minutes and nose has slumped and I need to wait for things to pressurize again. Slightly annoying tbh when doing lots of jobs in town, otherrwise not an issue with longer drives.
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Re: Xantia sinking at front

Post by CitroJim »

Anti-sink valves rarely fail. A common cause of sinking at the front is nothing more than a little wear in the front struts.... I had a couple of Xantias that did it, one much worse than the other in that it would fully sink overnight, but to be honest, it was never a serious problem, no LHM was used, it soon came up in the mornings and it never got so bad I felt the desire to swap struts.

I'd not worry...
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