xantia air leak in fuel system

Szegedi · Post by **Szegedi** » 27 Feb 2005, 02:31

My xantia has all the symptoms of bad cold starting etc. I have read all the posts about it and after changing one suspicous glow plug I have decided that it needed some professional help. My local mechanic had changed pipe which goes from filter to motor with clear plastic one and also installed one way valve there. What a good idea! Now I can see what the problem is. I can clearly see air bubles from filter to the motor. Obviously somewhere in the system is the leak. After few hours of parking I can clearly see about 10 cm of air bubble in the pipe. Also the engine when cold tends to stop dead when I have to slow down and remove foot from acceleration pedal to stop pedal. Maybe the leak is somewhere in the system where the heat seals it? Any ideas? Apparently there is some heating block below the engine where pipes goes to preheat the fuel? Since the car should be lifted to see it, it will have to wait till Monday, and perhaps also a Bosch specialist? I would appriciate any feedback...

ghostrider · Post by **ghostrider** » 27 Feb 2005, 04:25

Hi Szegedi
I've not had this problem on the xantia but had it more than once with the BX, the probem there was always the metal fuel pipes from the back to front being corroded, not enough to let fuel out but enough to let air in as the air molecules are smaller than the fuel ones. I was not aware of a preheat on the xantia, maybe only fitted in the EU? Again on the BX the metal pipe going into the preheater had a nasty tendancy to come loose again letting air in but not fuel out, I fixed this with Loctite once or twice and then gave up and bypassed the preheat altogether, there were two versions of the preheat one electric the other engine temp. The engine heat one was useless as it only preheated the fuel once the engine was warmed up when it wouldn't matter so much!!
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Mercedes-benz 300 slr

tonespeed1999 · Post by **tonespeed1999** » 27 Feb 2005, 13:36

check the main rubber fuel hoses that run after the steel pipes under the car to the hand primer near the o/s bulkhead.these tend to go hard and crack causing them to split open.they dont always leak fuel but certainly suck air in.
quiet a common fault on old xantia.

jeremy · Post by **jeremy** » 27 Feb 2005, 13:50

I think the BX fuel heater on the back of the engine was removed when the fuel filter was mounted adjacent to the thermostat - as that device is intended to heat the fuel.
jeremy

tonespeed1999 · Post by **tonespeed1999** » 27 Feb 2005, 14:08

the fuel heater on the xantia is directly under the fuel filter housing.the fuel system is not directly connected to the fuel heater so shouldnt cause any problems

Szegedi · Post by **Szegedi** » 01 Mar 2005, 19:33

PROBLEM SOLVED!!! It turns out that there was a small crack in fuel filter housing. When changed all problems disappeared! Now my Xantia starts on first turn every time(even today when it was -7C). Thank you all for your suggestions.