C4 Picasso V F*** Focus C Max comments plse

[KP]

Simply put if i did not spot that fuel was being sprayed all over the engine bay and demand it get picked up by the garage, we would have been much better off money wise, even though it was a known fault.

I think that Top100 survey is for the standard corrolla car, not the verso version which i think would come much further down as often i would see others in and find out they were in for warranty work as well when taking ours in

If you get a car out of warranty don't forget to remove the DPF and get a decent tuning session on a HDi if you get it and you'll get a good amount of poke and MPG increase to make it better on the pocket and that you have us all here to help out with faults

[cachaciero]

Round town its easy to drive. The low down torque means that traffic jams can be left foot only. Very hard to stall.



The only downside with the C5 is that the suspension is definatly set up for the motorway and A roads. While pretty competent in the twisty back roads, you do occasionally feel and hear potholes more than say, a C6 or even a Xsara Picasso. It's nothing to worry about though.



Take the 2.2 for a spin. You won't be disappointed. If you don't love it, I'll eat my shoes.

Ben

Ben I have a 2.2 albeit an early one, that suspension downside as you put it is one of the things that make me think about steel sprung cars. Almost any steel sprung car will ride comforably on well paved motorways and A roads the clever bit is getting them to do it on on the windy and twisty back roads.
Now as I see it if the C5 suspension does not produce a ride and handling which is better than a steel sprung car then suspension is not a positive discriminator, however the self leveling is.
There is little doubt that the C5 while comfortable on Mways is not as comfortable as the XM was and on back roads is decidedly less comfortable than the XM, overall I am not convinced that it is much better than some of the better steel sprung cars.

Chris recommends that I go and have look at a Mk2 and if I was closer to Doncaster I might well have chosen to go and look at the suggested candidate after all I could always walk away after the test drive and buy a 1.6 but while I started off saying that a 1.6 would be adequate even that 2.2 would represent a considerable annual saving over the current 2.2.

Toyota, well equipped and extremely well built and reliable, good suspension for a steel sprung car unknown from a maintenance perspective

C5 largely a known car, not so well built as the Toyota and not so well equipped as far as one can compare trim levels.

Peugeot 407SW In terms of body style my preferred choice but reliability seems to be very much in question quality of build difficult to judge but probably not as good as Citroen.

C4 Picasso well the Toyota Verso is a direct equivalent and one would expect the build quality and reliability of the Toyota to be better.

Where am I going? don't know yet because to some degree improving the C5 I already have is a bit of a challenge, there is little doubt that I could improve the fuel consumption and handling issues to quite a large degree and still have change from £2K but none of that would alter the VED. or some of the problems which I believe exist in the BSI, and the ESC software.

cachaciero

[Citroenmad]

Have you driven a non H3+ C5? I found the + to be stiffer, but its been a while since i was in one, certainly was no softer, which i was expecting it to be. The H3 cars handle well anyway, for a large car, maybe roll a bit more but not bad for a soft riding car, mine certainly gets made to corner and i enjoy doing it.

The C5 is at home on motorways, its suspension just floats along in true Citroen style. At lower speeds you can feel bumps more than in older big Citroens but its still a very comfortable car with very comfortable seats. I find it irons out B roads nicely too. Ive yet to find a coil sprung car that can match the comfort levels, some come close however. At least i know ill not have a spring snap at high speed!

Good suspension on a Toyota? Really? Ive not been in a recent Toyota, but id not have thought they would be a softly sprung car. Just dug out a road test from whatcar of the Corolla Verso, it says in the ride and handling: a relatively adept handler, and responds quickly to steering inputs. Body roll is fairly well contained. The downside of this behavior is that the ride quality is too firm and occupants can be bounced around over bumpy surfaces.

Not too great going by that!

407s are supposed to ride well, but given that a 407 uses a lot of C5 parts, and has the same engines, the C5 offers more comfort and more boot space.

Do you drive coil sprung cars often? When I drive a coil sprung car i really appreciate the C5 even more for its suspension comfort, but also the advantages of self leveling and adjustable ride heights.

[cachaciero]

Have you driven a non H3+ C5?

No in a word, interesting that you feel it's softer.
I wouldn't be surprised if the H3 was softer, having examined a center regulator in detail my gut feel is that the restrictors built into this are far to small and will result in a higher level of damping than is ideal.
If the front wasn't such a bitch to get at I would have experimented long ago with this. IMHO it should be possible to get the normal ride far better than it is while still having the tightening up when required. I suppose what I am saying is that it should be possible to get H3+ to be at least as good as H2 on an XM and currently it isn't.

The C5 is at home on motorways, its suspension just floats along in true Citroën style. At lower speeds you can feel bumps more than in older big Citroëns but its still a very comfortable car with very comfortable seats. I find it irons out B roads nicely too. Ive yet to find a coil sprung car that can match the comfort levels, some come close however.

Well Chris that's pretty close to what i was saying although I find that it doesn't iron out the lumps in the B roads as well as the XM did.

Good suspension on a Toyota? ......snip...

You may be right won't really know until I drive one, one thing I have learn't about car reviews is that they all appear to be heavily influenced by the reviewers own conceptions I am not convinced any of them are truly objective.

407s are supposed to ride well, but given that a 407 uses a lot of C5 parts, and has the same engines, the C5 offers more comfort and more boot space.

Most reports I have read are very positive about the 407's handling and ride, however equally one reads about high wear rates and early replacement of various joints. Suspension wise it has far more in common with the C6 and C5 III which isn't a C5 .
The SW which is the one that interests me will carry more than enough in the back for my purposes.

Do you drive coil sprung cars often? When I drive a coil sprung car i really appreciate the C5 even more for its suspension comfort, but also the advantages of self leveling and adjustable ride heights.

A few but not on a regular basis but two which have impressed me were a Honda Civic R which seemed to me to be little worse than the C5 in the ride department and considerably better in the handling department, far sharper to drive, and a VW Passat which seemed to ride well didn't get an oportunity to throw it around though Ford Focus Yuk!.

When I had the XM every time I began to get a little jaded a week in one of the companies Astra's would remind of just how good the XM was I don't get quite the same feeling going back to the C5 from either of the two cars mentioned above, maybe I should drive a Focus more

cachaciero

[Citroenmad]

Your C5 is an estate isnt it? They appear to ride harder than the hatchbacks. I replaced a drop link on our 05 estate last year. I thought it would be interesting to see how the car rode without the drop link fitted. SO i drove it around the block, the ride quality was unreal, far softer than the Xm and on par with a CX. I could run over a curb with the front wheel and not even feel it.

Obviously its not safe driving it without drop links, but they do cause ride quality problems. Xms are the same, the connection from side to side by the ARB doesnt give it the best possible ride, as it tends to pull down into individual bumps. The C5 without the droplink fitted just floated over everything.

I dont find the C5s ride bad, its very very good in my opinion, so i wouldn't improve its comfort in that way. I did buy a C5 with comfort spheres on, that was very soft, very floaty and rode like a Xantia with slightly excess gas in its spheres. I removed them as i didnt like it that soft. However, a H3+ would still have the control by the centre spheres, but a soft ride if comforts were fitted to the wheel spheres.

Its a shame you can't regas C5 spheres, as the pressure could be increased slightly to improve the ride quality. Comfort spheres just play with the damping hole which isn't ideal.

I did find the + version much more nobly tha the normal H3. While i do love the H2 suspension on the Xms, i don't miss it on the C5, as the roll less anyway, before the Xm cuts into sports it does roll noticeably.

I can't believe you found a Civic TypeR to ride ok! Ive been in one a few times and i hated it, so bumpy and crashy over bumps, without even getting started on the gearing. Obviously a sporty hatch, but not my cup of tea at all, nothing like a C5!

Passats do ride ok, but ive never heard one good thing about its handling. They tend to push wide far too easily, they are a dull old drive and a most road tests report that even the 130 TDi feels too much power for the chassis. However, if it was the 05? Passat, then they are much improved.

I am slightly comfused you dont get the same feeling of the C5s ride quality when going back to it after driving something else, they are much improved over coil sprung cars in my opinion. Its usually always something people mention when they are in my C5, how comfortable and quiet it is.

[cachaciero]

Your C5 is an estate isnt it? They appear to ride harder than the hatchbacks. I replaced a drop link on our 05 estate last year. I thought it would be interesting to see how the car rode without the drop link fitted. SO i drove it around the block, the ride quality was unreal, far softer than the Xm and on par with a CX. I could run over a curb with the front wheel and not even feel it.

Yes mine is an estate, did my drop links last year. Out of curiosity if you removed the drop links how did you "fix" the ride height ?

Obviously its not safe driving it without drop links, but they do cause ride quality problems. Xms are the same, the connection from side to side by the ARB doesnt give it the best possible ride, as it tends to pull down into individual bumps. The C5 without the droplink fitted just floated over everything.

Still interesting what are we saying here fit lighter duty roll bars for improved ride I could do floating

I dont find the C5s r------------------snip----- could be increased slightly to improve the ride quality. Comfort spheres just play with the damping hole which isn't ideal.

Well that depends if they got the damping hole the right size to start with, I have my doubts the front on mine particularly feels over damped..

I did find the + version much more nobly tha the normal H3. While i do love the H2 suspension on the Xms, i don't miss it on the C5, as the roll less anyway, before the Xm cuts into sports it does roll noticeably.

Well if I add that all together then maybe lighter roll bars is the answer, if the car rolled as much as the XM I wouldn't complain.

I can't believe you found a Civic TypeR to ride ok! Ive been in one a few times and i hated it, so bumpy and crashy over bumps, without even getting started on the gearing. Obviously a sporty hatch, but not my cup of tea at all, nothing like a C5!

Well you make the point that the H3+ is "more knobbly" and yes I was expecting the R to be as you described but it wasn't anywhere near as bad as you describe and overall I found it to be no less comfortable than the car I drive, which is not to say that it was as comfortable as I like.

I am slightly confused you dont get the same feeling of the C5s ride quality when going back to it after driving something else, they are much improved over coil sprung cars in my opinion. Its usually always something people mention when they are in my C5, how comfortable and quiet it is.

As I keep saying I don't find ride quality all that great certainly no where near the XM which would soak up all but the worst of holes and bumps with aplomb even in sport mode.
Now this may be down to the difference between H3 and H3+ maybe an H3 car is a completely different animal, one day soon I will probably find out but as things stand it is no more comfortable than many steel sprung cars and maybe worse than the best.

Having said that suspension is work in progress on my car because I just can't believe that it is the way it is but so far I can find nothing wrong in that all the bits appear to work as they should do. It is my belief that there is something flawed / wrong with the centre spheres because with these in soft mode the car should feel just the same as an H3 and that does not appear to be the case, I also question the fact that the damping is in part set by orfice size in the rear regulator body (not the sphere) and this would appear to be the same for front and rear. It seems to me unlikely that the ideal damping characteristics for front and rear would be the same so I have to assume that the orfice size is a compromise figure to standardize the part.

Anyway had an hour to spare today at work and just across the way there is a very large car "Supermarket" and they had a Pug 407SW and an Avensis almost side by side, the difference in build quality was quite noticable even without opening the doors. They also had a 08 C5 tourer 1.6 parked in amongst the Audi's and VW's I walked past the back of it without really noticing it and from the front it was only the stylized logo that caught my attention.
Prices? oh! yes! stupid IMHO but people were apparently buying, judging by the large amount of cars in the "sold" area of the establishment.


cachaciero

[Citroenmad]

I removed one drop link and gave the car a bit of a test drive. The other side was still connected, however as it was not connected side to side the ARB had no effect. It was slightly higher at the front, but not too far from normal.

Estate cars are usually always harder riding, have stiffer ARBs and springs (spheres in our case). So fitting ARBs from the saloon or different spheres might enable you to achieve a better ride.

Has your C5 ever had new spheres? I know they last a good while on C5s but there are some getting hard now and require replacing. I understand our 52reg SX had new spheres as it was getting a bit stiff. It was fitted with comfort spheres. Ive since replaced the fronts with genuine ones and the rears i have peened over the larger holes in the comfort spheres to give a bit more damping. It rides really well.

So there are plenty of things you can do to give it a softer ride, but im not disappointed with them. Not as soft as an Xm i agree, but since mine dont have H3+ im very happy with the body control and ride.

In truth i didnt buy a C5 for its suspension, though now im used to it it would be extremely difficult to go back to a car with coils, they often dont give as good ride and obviously dont offer the self leveling - which in itself adds to the comfort, if i have a car full of people then with an ordinary car it would be bouncing off the bump stops, effecting handling and geometry as a result of the changed ride height. It seems so primitive now!

[daviemck2006]

I went through the will I, wont I thoughts about changing the c5 for something cheaper to run a few months ago. The only things I would have considered after a lot of thought were a c4 picasso or another c5. Think c5 would win the arguement every time, love the styling of c5 mk3, but too much money for me, espically because I would only buy a hydraulic one for the self levelling for towing the caravan. Think when I do change the c5 it will be a late mk2 2.2 which I'll go for. Dont want or need to change it now though, my 03plate 2.2hdi sx is the perfect car for my needs now, having bought the 107 for commuting. It's saving more than it's costing with the fuel savings, and means the c5 should last a good few more years now, not doing 30000 miles a year.