GEEEE'z what an adventure!

red_dwarfers · Unread post by **red_dwarfers** » 29 Sep 2009, 22:47

The screen wasn't cracked Chris, but it had a rather large stone chip (about the size of a 10p piece) in the middle down where the wipers sit so at some point in the future it could have. It looks to have been filled in at some point in the past but that looks to be breaking down. There were a couple other small chips and also marks where someone has been grinding near the Xant without covering it up

Phoenix were around £50 cheaper than "autoglass repair, autoglass replace"

as the latter didn't include the rubber sorround trim.

The clutch did do very well

, It's solid proof that the car has been a motorway driver for the majority of its life. Im expecting it to go on and on in my ownership for a good few decades

The old clutch kit is something I will be keeping though...for some bizarre reason.

red_dwarfers · Unread post by **red_dwarfers** » 19 Oct 2009, 21:00

Knocking sound from the gearstick towards engine bay area upon starting on the way to pick up GF this afternoon, think "I'll have a look at that when I get back home". Everything is cool, thankfully, for the journey to her house out in a small village.
Journey back this evening involves knocking upon suddenish engine rev changes and starting/stopping the engine. Get home okay, stick it up on high and find that the exhaust between the engine and cat has cracked down near the connection to the cat.
The Xant did very well to bring me home and just letting me know that it needed some TLC via the knocking.
Not so good when your GF has limited access to a car, there are no buses to said village, nights are pulling in rather fast and the problem arises immediately after a weekend

In other news, I stayed at Sir Jim's Saturday night which was both educational and very kind of him. Apricots and porridge go rather well together, that being one of the things I learnt

I was taken out for a second ride in the V6 and also taken for a tour of MK's finest roundabouts in a Activa, oh yeah! Once again Jim, thanks for your hospitality and the car rides. Your daughters don't realise how lucky they are

I appear to have missed everyone that was going to Santa Pod

Did see a Y reg 1.8 manual xantia is a greenish colour parked up. Had a good chat with the chap who owns the Masarati V6 open top DS and his mate Kevin with a 1.9 8v petrol BX GTi as they were lining up to go around the track. Didn't fancy waiting too long to watch them go on due to the general mishmash of people with massive american cars with big wheels warming their tyres up in clouds of smoke and those with terribly modified small cars. I did watch a couple of everyday people going up the track which was enjoyable.
Driving back was a pleasure, I took a bit of a detour from the A40 as traffic looked to be going a bit slow up ahead. Best thing I did! The countryside was picturesque

Im going to have to pinpoint where that road is at some point.

I'll upload some photos at some point.

Citroenmad · Unread post by **Citroenmad** » 19 Oct 2009, 22:47

Ah, you did well not to lose the exhaust, which is never a great thing! Had a similar thing earlier this year with the C15, just got me home and the exhaust was hanging right off, had been making a heck of a noise and banging while out on a truck and van drive! Good to hear all is well with your Xantia apart from that. Still, must have done more than 200,900 miles by now .....

Sounds like you had an eventful weekend Kev, id have liked to go to santa pod, though again its miles and miles from me!.

red_dwarfers · Unread post by **red_dwarfers** » 06 Dec 2009, 17:23

Well, it seems that it my turn to strip half the interior after discovering a swimming pool above the carpet in the rear passenger's footwell after parking on a hill is here. Got the two bits of soaked carpet drying in the shed for the time being along with an empty vegetable oil container propping up the bit of carpet under the blower motor.
Certainly a difference in the noise produced without the carpet

Unread post by **CitroJim** » 06 Dec 2009, 17:53

Oh Kev,

Not good. I feel your pain

Those carpets will take weeks to dry this weather. can't you bring them indoors and hang them over the banister? Or will that upset domestic harmony?

Check your scuttle seal!

Unread post by **myglaren** » 06 Dec 2009, 17:57

Could it be the scuttle seal given way, considering the recent windscreen replacement?

You?l know by the pong if it is water or coolant

Unread post by **CitroJim** » 06 Dec 2009, 18:05

myglaren wrote: You?l know by the pong if it is water or coolant

Or taste

Kev, if it is the matrix, you know you've been wanting to do one for ages

red_dwarfers · Unread post by **red_dwarfers** » 12 Dec 2009, 19:49

Definitely not the matrix, the inside of the car is drying out nicely, may sneak the carpets inside the house and hope no one notices at some point

Went out yesterday only to find that the handbrake was non operational! Got a lift into GSF today to pick up a new set at £10 a side and it appears that the NS one had snapped and the OS one was going to very soon. Both were frayed terrible under the wheel arches, suprised MoT didn't pick up on it...saying that MoT was almost 9 months ago back when we had snow! Cor time flies!
Easy job fitting the new cables and now I don't have to pull it up as far as I did before which is great!

DickieG · Unread post by **DickieG** » 12 Dec 2009, 20:46

If you think it may the scuttle seal a good temporary (or even permanent) fix is to run a couple of strips of electrical tape across the join between the scuttle trim and the bottom of the screen, at least with this method you can keep a close eye on the effectiveness of the seal and not suffer soaked carpets.

red_dwarfers · Unread post by **red_dwarfers** » 12 Dec 2009, 20:59

I forgot to mention that I took the car back to the windscreen replacement people who resealed the scuttle for me before I stripped the interior

That scuttle trim is now not going to be parting company with the windscreen any time soon!

red_dwarfers · Unread post by **red_dwarfers** » 16 Feb 2010, 19:12

This link could be considered part of my blog.

Continuing from this I undid the bolts holding the wishbone onto the subframe fairly easily (read as seized, but only required a socket bar and a light tap with a hammer to undo

) and tried to split the ball joint connecting the wishbone to the hub, would it budge even with many large whacks with a beefy hammer? No. Not even after plusgassing the night before and a couple of times today, also tried giving it the heat treatment but of course I couldn't do that for very long due to the nearby gaiter. Said gaiter I fear has now lost a lot of its grease capacity.

I then found that I maybe able to knock the rear wishbone bushes off the end of the wishbone so I plusgassed these and tried knocking them off. No such luck, as with almost everything on this job if there is a possibility that something could be seized, it is

The next plan is to take the hub along with the attached wishbone off the car and sort out the bushes, get my brake disc holes back and check over the wishbone to hub balljoint dust cover. Once all this is off I will be able to get better access to the track rods and have further attempts to remove them. I have a funny feeling that removing the hub won't be as easy as I'm hoping it will be...

Then onto the other side

I'm replacing everything that usually goes with wear and tear now everything is off, drop links, track rod ends, front and rear front wishbone bushes, brake pads and brake discs. Its all starting to add up money wise. Gradually taking more and more off, not long until I see something weared on the engine and end up taking that one out

Quite fortunate that I work within walking distance really.

Unread post by **CitroJim** » 16 Feb 2010, 19:58

Oh dear Kev,

The fun continues

red_dwarfers wrote:and tried to split the ball joint connecting the wishbone to the hub, would it budge even with many large whacks with a beefy hammer?

These are on tapers and the only sure way of splitting them is with the use of a very stout balljoint splitter (or taper breaker). It needs to be a seriously large and strong one, similar in pattern to that used for track rod ends but bigger. Sometimes they can take a fair old force to split them.

The old time-honoured "double-hammer" technique works sometimes but it takes a pair of very big hammers and some serious practice. The risk of damage is high also so I don't recommend it. Get a good, beefy balljoint splitter

If you've used heat on the joints Kev, and damaged the gaiters, you really should replace them. That's another whole world of pain

You got your track rod ends off OK in the end?

red_dwarfers · Unread post by **red_dwarfers** » 20 Feb 2010, 21:24

Whats this double hammer technique then Jim?

Track rod ends are not off yet, that one is still to be tackled, maybe with the welder heating element.

I made up a 'Y' tool this morning for holding the hub so that I could undo the drive shaft nut. Only the Mk2 version was able to take the strain after Mk1 turned into a piece of modern art

Will continue at a later date...Im a bit of a CSI fan and I must see the trilogy

Unread post by **CitroJim** » 20 Feb 2010, 21:37

red_dwarfers wrote:Whats this double hammer technique then Jim?

Hard to explain in words Kev but basically you take a 4Lb club hammer in each hand and swing each in some synchronicity at each side of the joint taper housing; a bit like clapping with a pair of big hammers

It takes a bit of practice to get right but it does work and after several "claps" the joint leaps out of the taper a perfect treat. Damage is a real risk if one or other of the blows lands off-target. Practice on a scrapper first...

A great alternative to the "Y" holding piece to undo hub nuts is a steel wheel; the centre hole is big enough to get a socket in to do the job and as long as the wheel is on the ground and well chocked, it'll work bautifully.

If I'm needing to undo hub nuts, it's the first task; loosen them before removing wheels.

Good luck on the track-rod ends Kev. So what't this heating attachment then? better than a propane torch do yo think?

red_dwarfers · Unread post by **red_dwarfers** » 20 Apr 2010, 21:00

Whoops, didn't post about the success of the replacement of all the bits on the front end. Anyway, all of the ball joints, track rods, bushes, drop links, pads, disks etc have been replaced and it passed its MoT with flying colours at the local garage. The tester commented on how well kept it looked with all its shiny bits

I would have been rather annoyed if it didn't pass actually, as the following weekend I had booked up for a weekend away in Stafford direction with a few friends many months previous. The Xantia performed well as per usual

Interestingly, we stayed at a Travelodge on the A38. It somehow felt familiar in a weird way, it wasn't until I realised a few days after getting back that this A38 in Stafford is the continuation of the A38 from Exeter to Plymouth

Quite a long road that one!
Right, back to the task of tracking.
Setting it up was going to be rather difficult by counting threads and measuring due to all of the replacement stuff, so we made up our own tracking tool from an idea Dad had many years ago. Worked a treat

, steering wheel came right back to centre and there has been no uneven wear on the tyres in the 1000 miles or so I've done since we did it. And it also saved a few quid

Little did I know that that few quid saved might have come in handy so soon. While performing the weekly check and browse under the bonnet the weekend just gone, I glanced at the cambelt as the engine was running and found that I could see glimpses of the engine mount every revolution of the engine

After stopping the engine and spinning it around manually we found that there was a chunk 2 or 3 inches long spanning half the belt wide missing. Quite pleased I spotted that

Suffice to say, GSF are delivering a new cambelt and tensioner kit, water pump and dual mass crankshaft pulley tomorrow. We stuck it up on stands and started the dismantling process yesterday so we should be able to get cracking in the next couple of days.

Citroen Xantias don't have a great reputation around my area at the moment

Still, once the cambelt is done, the only other major bit that hasn't been replaced or refurbished is the engine and 'box...tempting fate that really isn't it!