bleeding coolant on xantia 2.1TD

[stevecritchlow]

Hi
I've just changed the anti freeze on my 2.1 TD Xantia (1997), and when I came to bleed the air from it I found that the system was totally different from the 1.9 Xantia as described in my Haynes manaual. It appeas that my expansion tank is at the high point of the engine and that there is in fact no bleed valves at all.
However, since doing the change my car seems to be running a little hotter than it used to, and Im a bit nervous about this as I have along motorway journey coming up. Has anyone out there got experience of the 2.1 engine and able to tell me if I've done the change correctly
ta
steve

[Peter.N.]

The 2.1 td engine has the thermostat in the return pipe, so there is no restriction to water entering the top of the block, as long as you keep filling the header tank until it wont take anymore, the whole system should be full, its a slow process though. You can, if you would feel happier, disconnect the heater return pipe and, with the engine running, keep topping up until the water flows freely with no air bubbles.

[Johnno]

Hi Steve
Morning, Steve
Sad to be on the forum on a Sunday morning, eh? I doubt the Roman senators would have been so keen [;)]. I've changed the fluid in my 2.1 and also didn't find any bleed valves (tho' I think there is one in the area behind the fuel filter). It didn't seem to matter - I pulled the small overflow pipe off the right hand side of the rad and used that as a bleed. I suppose if you were concerned about the coolant in the head, you could release the top hose from the left side of the radiator and swivel it to the vertical. This should make the exit of the hose the high point in the engine bay.
There is bound to be a "proper" way, but I've had no problems thus far.

[Johnno]

Double salutations! I'm clearly not awake yet. Anyway, Pete's explanation seems to sort the issue.