Citroenmads Citroen blog.

[Deanxm]

Being a C1 driver i cant see you have never changed a clutch before now Chris, some C1's actualy make it home from the dealer before needing a new clutch .

The activa was doing the same though, on the way home from the cxm last year it was pretty bad and a steady run at 70mph was called for, in fact after leaving i went to get petrol and there was a bad hill with a roundabout at the top and that had to be taken very gently .
when i got home it was aweful, just nursed it about when needed, now its perfectly driveable and will alow full throttle but maybe tomorrow it wont, its very fickle, the bite point is high though so the clutch is shot but there is no oil in there i know that.

D

[Citroenmad]

Being a C1 driver i cant see you have never changed a clutch before now Chris, some C1's actualy make it home from the dealer before needing a new clutch .

The activa was doing the same though, on the way home from the cxm last year it was pretty bad and a steady run at 70mph was called for, in fact after leaving i went to get petrol and there was a bad hill with a roundabout at the top and that had to be taken very gently .
when i got home it was aweful, just nursed it about when needed, now its perfectly driveable and will alow full throttle but maybe tomorrow it wont, its very fickle, the bite point is high though so the clutch is shot but there is no oil in there i know that.

D

Your quite right, C1s have a poor record with clutches. However its always put down to wear and tear as the friction plate is usually just worn thin and so is put down to driving habits. Many people ride the clutch when at junctions, keeping the car still on the bite and this wears it out. As a city car they must get a lot of stick in this way, also its easy to overrev the C1s if your not used to them and so slip the clutch when pulling away. Its mainly down to driving as that is the only way to wear out a friction plate, many C1s have done many more than the average mileage on a clutch, I know of a few with over 100K and still on the original.

However, all facelift C1s, like ours, have a bigger clutch from the Yaris and are much hardier. So perhaps the clutch in original C1s was a bit weak for the job.

My C5s clutch only slips at 2000rpm if ive floored it at 2000rpm, it then revs about 5-600rpm higher and then the speed catches up with the revs. I did 80 miles in it yesterday, driving quickly but avoiding full throttle at 2000rpm, it only slipped once - when I tried it at 2000rpm as it seemed fine.

I took my C5 into the garage today who is doing the repair, ive not heard how far they have got with it but ill ring tomorrow and find out how its going. Hopefully it will be finished on saturday but it depends if any more bits are needed when they strip it down.

[Deanxm]

fingers crossed there are no surprises of the unwanted kind, not that it can be much.

D

[Citroenmad]

fingers crossed there are no surprises of the unwanted kind, not that it can be much.

D

Thanks Dean, I hope not

I would have liked to drop by and see what there is to see with the gearbox out but im working all day tomorrow.

I had bought the new clutch and oil seal and left those in the car, so hopefully it doesnt need much else.

[RichardW]

so hopefully it doesnt need much else.

3 litres of LDS at £15/litre when it runs all over the floor when you disconnect the PAS return pipe to get the box out....

Hopefully not a new DMF at £300 odd, and hopefully not a new power board - as long as he is not heavy handed with the +ve feed it will be OK

What you would see if you went down when the box was out was a huge pile of bits, wondering how on earth you were ever going to put them all back together

[Citroenmad]

Thanks for that, very reasuring

[CitroJim]

What you would see if you went down when the box was out was a huge pile of bits, wondering how on earth you were ever going to put them all back together

Don't worry Chris. If he's a good engineer he will be able to put it back together perfectly. You should have seen me in action when i was doing my Old V6, especially when the gearbox was in bits...

Years back when I used to overhaul laser printers for a living I'd purposely leave one totally disassembled on the bench on a Friday afternoon just to wind up the boss. he used to say "You'll never remember how that all goes back together come Monday morning..."

I always did...

So don't worry... There's no difference between a laser printer and a C5; they're just an assembled pile of bits - the same as any other electro-mechanical device...

[RichardW]

It took me about a week to remember where the 10mm flanged nut had come from after we did the cambelt on the Xantia - eventually recalled we had taken if off the cable tray for the injectors to allow some movement

We got my mate's C5 back together, but it is alarming when there are bits everywhere, wires hanging out all over the place, and a huge pile of fixings. Funny how good your recall for these things is when it comes to re-assembly.

[Citroenmad]

Well the news is ... the garage has not had time to fit it in yet. Some jobs carried over so mine was pushed back. Oh well, hopefully next week it will be repaired. Very glad ive got the Xantia to use.

I hope it does all go back together as it is now, im very pleased its not me doing it

Ive not got a very good past history with garages, they usually fail me, either by damaging the car, not getting to the bottom of the fault or thinking its fixed when its not. One garage had one of my cars over three months trying to repair a fault. Now I try to do most things myself but this is a bit beyond my capabilities I feel. Ive used this garage before and they do a good job, ill wait and see.

[Citroenmad]

Me and my dad have decided to stay on site for the ICCCCCCCCCCCR as we aim to be there from Wednesday to Monday. Its only 70 miles from here so I had considered driving each day but I guess a lot of the evening entertainment will be good to experience. I will be popping home a few times but I should be there for most of the event.

So today we set out in search for a new tent, we eventually settled on one, a far too extravagant one which will no doubt take me the full week just to put up. Its as big as a hotel and weighs as much as a twin axel caravan - well almost! Its bags and other camping kit filled the Xantias boot today, ive no idea how im going to cram all that in the 2cv for the event, it will be interesting!

Three of our cars will be at the event, all are now booked in.

It promises to be a very very good event, 901 cars checked in when we spoke to Mick at the weekend.

[lexi]

Well the news is ... the garage has not had time to fit it in yet.

Probably doing all the good jobs first Better with the autos Chris.......Noone of these probs
How many miles did the clutch do?

[Citroenmad]

It might be going in tomorrow or Wednesday ...

How many miles did the clutch do?

29500 miles
By no means a record going on other internet reports of the same problem. Im a bit dissapointed with it.

Im expecting the clutch to be in good condition, just contaminated with oil. Time will tell and ill report back with the findings. I just want it fixed now, its dragging on somewhat!

[lexi]

Ah!. Sore bill for a crankshaft oil seal. Then you end up putting new bits in as the thing is stripped so we might as well?

[Citroenmad]

Ah!. Sore bill for a crankshaft oil seal. Then you end up putting new bits in as the thing is stripped so we might as well?

Yep, sore indeed!

It will get a new clutch and things since its stripped. If I get off lightly then it will be around £400-500 in repairs, if the DMF needs replacing then it'll be at least £200-£300 more.

To be fair to it, its the only problem ive had in the year and 18K miles ive owned it for. Still dissapointing to be having all this work done to it though, I don't like a car which dissapoints me, it often doesnt stay for long afterwards. My previous C5 went the same way ...

[Citroenmad]

Im still waiting for my C5 going into the garage to get stripped down to find the cause of the slipping clutch. The garage has had a few jobs which turned out to be bigger than first thought, so mine has been pushed back till Monday now.

As the fault comes and goes I thought I would use the C5 today as I had quite a few miles to do. I did my usual 70 mile Uni commute this morning which was fine, no slipping of the clutch. Then coming back from work this evening I went for an overtake on a B road and was rather slowed down by the clutch slipping, I then had to drive more carefully as it would slip every time at around 2000rpm. Strange that it had been fine all day (driving hard as usual!) and then for it to suddenly start to slip.

Looks like im back in the Activa for tomorrows commuting then I like using it but didn't plan on using it this winter and expose it to all this salt if I didn't have to.

Can't wait to get it fixed, its been dragging on far to long now! I've been tempted to take it to another garage who can fit it in sooner but I want to stay loyal to this one.


Ive recently rediscovered the Fuelly MPG caluculator, as can be seen in my sig. The Activa seems about right but the C5s figure is very slightly inflated due to there only being two fill ups so far and one was a long motorway drive. Going by my usual calculations it does baout 48mpg on an average week.