All Things V6...

[CitroJim]

Yep, they're the ones

[DHallworth]

It's been a productive couple of days recently.

The Activa has had a set of Michelins fitted to it, the back box has been bodged until I get a stainless exhaust on it in a couple of days and it was MOT'd this morning.

The tyres are excellent, nice and quiet, grippy and they've balanced brilliantly. The bodge on the exhaust must of been quite a good one as I didn't even get an advisory on an exhaust gas leak this morning.

It passed at Citroen Glasgow with no advisories

The tester came to find me when he'd handed the keys back to reception as he knows I like to know what he found... He said that it's immaculate underneath and is in the same condition that most of the 2 year old cars they see are in. That's a great compliment on a car that's 18 years old

We went to the cinema last night and we took the C5 for a run. I rarely drive that as it's Cheryl's daily. Every time I drive that car I'm impressed with it. That 3.0 HDi engine is absolutely superb and I must say the C5 X7 has impressed me a lot.

I've just ordered 2 new Michelin Pilot Sport 3's for the 406 Coupe this morning and then it can see some tarmac this summer again too

Anyway, the sun is shining up here today which is a rarity so I'm off to do something outside or take the Activa for a nice long run to celebrate it's Pass!!

David.

[Stickyfinger]

Funny that.....my Activa is getting a Stainless Exhaust as well very soon....all booked in for it's replacement

[CitroJim]

Excellent news on the MOT David, although not very surprising in your case!

[superloopy]

Well done David ... mine is due soon but on a 21 yr old car the underside's condition is nearer to that of a 30 yr old so am not at all confident. That, and the
fact that the OSR brake lights have decided to drop offline (it's not bulb related, have switched the carrier as well) and the horn's gone awol means its time is almost up i think.

Sent from my LG-D855 using Tapatalk

[Deanxm]

It's time is up because the brake switch and at worst the horn has failed!..........OK we all play this card, what new car have you got your eye on then?

Nice result there David, who is making the exhaust?

D

[superloopy]

Forgot ... its rear shuts need doing and the heater matrix is leaking. That enough? Nope ... no new car on the horizon. I've three more in a similarly parlous state to take a long look at.

Sent from my LG-D855 using Tapatalk

[DHallworth]

Nice result there David, who is making the exhaust?

D

It's a company in Bristol called Infinity Exhausts. They're doing one for another forum member and are making me one at the same time

David.

[Stickyfinger]

That would be me BTW

[CitroJim]

Be interested to see the results of this. I might be tempted to go for a stainless TCT system when mine dies...

[DHallworth]

Well it's been a busy week here... Firstly it started off with rehoming Colin's C5 V6 on Wednesday, I've bought all of the parts to give it a major service including a timing belt as it's on it's original and all of the fluids including gearbox oil. Other then driving it home I've not done much with it as I've not had time to service it and it's been overfilled with oil. Initial impressions are that it drives quite well though.

It's got a few scrapes and scratches on it but it'll make a fantastic mile muncher once it's had everything done, it needs a couple of tyres and the tracking doing, then we'll see how it fares on an MOT.

Today has been an interesting day too... I have taken on a restoration project... a 1988 Citroen CX GTi Turbo 2. It's silver with black leather. It was sold at the Scottish Motor Show in 1988 to a photographer in Paisley, when it was 3 years old it was bought by it's current owner and has been with him ever since. It was garaged 10 years ago and has been on axle stands with all 4 wheels in the air for a few years. It was last running 2 years ago. The only stipulation that the current owner has put on the car is that it has to be restored and put back on the road.

It's about 85 miles from home so I'm hoping to get over for it in the next few weeks and then the fun begins

Anyway, first things first, find a CX manual as I know very little about them. Is there a specific CX forum?

David.

[Mandrake]

Very jealous David! This definitely warrants a visit some time when you've made some progress with it.

I owned a 1978 CX for a few years (although Dad drove it most of the time) but it was only a 2347cc Carburetor model (115HP) with minimum trim levels... I always lusted after a Series 2 CX GTI Turbo 2, and it is definitely on my Citroen bucket list... I came very close to buying a 1988 Series 2 CX GTI (one step down from the Turbo 2) in 2005 but the seller kept mucking me around so the deal fell through. Instead I bought the Xantia VSX...

Have you driven/owned a good CX before David ? (I don't recall ever seeing you talk about CX's)

By the way the 0-60 time of the Turbo 2 is 7.4 seconds - faster than any Xantia including a Manual Xantia V6... Although it's "only" 168 HP at 5000 rpm compared to the 194 HP at 5500 rpm of the Xantia V6, it has a massive 294Nm at 3250rpm compared to 267Nm at 4000rpm for the Xantia V6. That, and it's 100Kg lighter... also I think in some regions (not Europe) the engine is actually tuned to 188HP, although I'm not sure what the differences in the engine are to achieve that. (possibly just a tweak of the boost pressure )

Can't wait to hear more... I'm far from an expert on CX's but I have some familiarity with them from years gone by and might be able to answer some questions you might have, although its long enough ago that seeing it in person would help jog the memory

By the way at the top of your list of jobs to do will be replacing the rear suspension arm bearings - much like the Xantia's etc they wear out and the wheels start leaning before the suspension starts seizing, but for some reason the CX really munches on the rear arm bearings far more than Xantia's do...

Obtaining the right spheres might be challenging too, the Turbo models of CX have much stiffer damped spheres than all the other CX models, and Series 1 and Series 2 Spheres differ quite dramatically, at least at the front, (as the front suspension piston diameters are larger on the S2) so even S1 Turbo and S2 Turbo use different spheres from each other! Like trying to find Activa spheres, you might have some trouble finding the Turbo 2 variant of CX spheres as they were not sold in great numbers, and with all that extra power it really shouldn't be run on standard rolly-polly CX spheres...

[DHallworth]

Thanks for the insight Simon.

My dad owned a CX when I was a kid, it was a DTR Turbo 2 Estate, the block went porous on it so he had the engine bay steam cleaned, unfortunately they got water in the LHM and the first time my mum drove it after the engine was cleaned the brakes failed going down a steep hill.

Other then that I've only ever been in one CX and have never driven one, hence being quite excited about this

David.

[Mandrake]

I bet.

They are a great car and have plenty of interesting quirks.

The Diravi steering is the first thing you notice when you drive it - I believe its the exact same design as the Diravi used in the SM, and I think it was also used in very early (not later) LHD XM's. Super sensitive and precise, but with no "road feel" - you could hit a big pothole and not feel a thing. Nothing that hits the wheels will deflect their angle or cause any movement of the steering wheel. Some people say no road feel is a bad thing but I never found that - if you push the car to the limit you don't feel the steering get lighter like you do on conventional power steering, but you do feel the car slide, so I never found it an issue, and having the steering wheel angle be completely impervious to any bumps you hit on the road means you can just hold the wheel straight and it will go perfectly straight without any deflection caused by bumps or camber of the road!

A standard CX rolls a lot but despite that is very grippy at the front even at slow speeds, provided you have the right tyres. Because the steering is so high geared and assisted you can chuck it around slow tight corners as if it was a much smaller car.

Unlike the conventional power steering in later models like Xantia's that have a separate pump output or a flow diverter valve, the power steering on the CX ran directly on the high pressure output from the main accumulator sphere, (the same one that feeds suspension) and unlike conventional power steering that uses oil flow constantly it only consumes oil flow for a moment when you turn the steering until the wheels take up the demanded angle then stops again with the wheels hydraulically locked at the desired angle. If the accumulator sphere is flat on a CX it causes the steering to "lag behind" where you are trying to turn when making parking manoeuvres!

Like later models of DS it also has a "front brake accumulator" which is basically another accumulator sphere fed by the main accumulator sphere through a one way valve whose sole job is to supply the front brakes. So even if the belt snapped and the steering consumed all the pressure stored in the main accumulator the brake accumulator will still supply the front brakes. The sphere is screwed into a weird little threaded base that is jubilee clamped to the frame. (!)

The gear lever uses a weird double linkage system with lots of little ball joints and linkages, those can wear causing a lot of slop in the gear lever, likewise the nylon ball that supports the gear lever can wear.

The CX is the only Citroen that has both a transverse mounted engine and a full front suspension sub chassis - how they managed to jam both in together I don't know, especially when there is a spare wheel under the bonnet too! To do so the engine is tilted a long way forward - about 30 degrees. Unlike later Citroens where the front struts attach directly to the body all the front suspension components attach to a massive subchasis with a cross link that goes above the engine as well as below. The suspension is mechanically incredibly strong. It also has proper double wishbones at the front although the geometry is slightly compromised due to the brake discs compared to something like a GS that has "perfect" double wishbone geometry. (The top balljoint has to be offset inwards slightly to clear the brake disc)

The CX has another feature that I believe is unique among models of Citroen, at least those in the Hydraulic era. Not only do the front and rear both have full suspension sub chassis's (an XM/Xantia only has a sub chassis at the rear with struts mounting directly to the body at the front) the entire body shell is mounted on both the two sub chassis and an underlying end to end chassis that links the front and rear suspension sub chassis together.

You can see it really well in this video starting at 50 seconds, as well as the massive suspension chassis frame going over the top of the gearbox just behind the engine:



The purpose of this is that the body is fully isolated from both suspension sub chassis with rubber bushes to isolate the body from road "rumble" that you feel on a lot of cars. If they were to just mount the body onto the two sub chassis with rubber bushes then the flex would upset the suspension geometry during cornering and compromise handling - their solution ? Link the front and rear chassis together with a middle chassis that bolts them directly together. The middle part of the body shell also mounts onto this middle chassis via additional rubber bushes. Having this centre chasis means no twist between front and rear chassis is possible during cornering and yet the body is still fully isolated from the suspension chassis with a large number of rubber bushes. So the CX has both a monocoque body shell and a small chassis underneath it. Genius!

It really does work too. One thing that you will notice about the ride of a CX is the near absence of the low level "rumble" from hard chip surfaces...Compare that to a GS where the front suspension chassis was bolted directly to the body, which transmits a lot of road rumble into the body and spoils an otherwise excellent ride. (A CX rides much better than a GS, as much as I loved the GS)

Of course there is the large single front wiper (new back in the 70's at least) and concave rear window that doesn't have any wiper as the vortex created removes the water. (Well at speed anyway) The biggest let down of the CX sedan is the boot space - which kinda sucks to be honest.

The CX is very low to the ground with a low somewhat stretched out seating position, and feels wide at the front, although in truth it probably isn't as wide as an XM and probably similar width at the front to a Xantia. With today's trend towards tall MPV style cars even in cars that are not an MPV you will feel very low to the ground indeed in a CX...(I even find my Xantia looks low to the ground compared to a lot of modern cars! The CX is lower still...)

Like the DS it is a lot narrower at the rear than the front - both the body, and the wheel track!

Just remembered another quirk that was specific to the Turbo version of the CX - instead of standard imperial rim sizes of the lower CX models (which used 14" rims) the Turbos used Metric Michelin TRX rims!!! Trying to find tyres for those rims these days that don't cost a fortune will be very hard indeed! I think most CX Turbo enthusiasts these days have decided to go with modern custom / after market rims that take standard size tyres as its just too expensive and difficult to buy suitable tyres for the TRX rims. (Even back in the day they were rare and expensive)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelin_TRX

The original CX Turbo tyres were 210/55 VR 390 TRX, which is an approx 15.3" rim.

I think you'll enjoy working on it David - apart from Engine ECU and ABS (I think S2 CX's had ABS - our old one didn't!) I don't think there are any other computers in the car...

Here's a CX Turbo video that always gives me a chuckle for some reason:

[CitroJim]

Excellent news on the CX David

Looking forward to hearing all about it over the next few months...