Hydroflush. Good stuff!

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Stepto1
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Hydroflush. Good stuff!

Post by Stepto1 »

Just spent the afternoon cleaning the hydraulic system and replacing the ageing LHM fluid with Hydraflush. The old oil was terrible, when I bled the brakes it came out like runny gravy! Bled over half a litre from the back till fresh oil came through.

The car now feels great! The steering is lighter and quicker. The brakes are now much sharper and the car raises and lowers smoothly and quickly. All I can say is is that if anyone thinks thier LHM oil needs renewing, just do it. It makes such a difference. Wish I'd done it ages ago!
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Post by DickieG »

Its strange how many owners take changing engine oil regularly as important yet forget the hydraulic system on their Citroens, good to hear of another owner making sound decisions :D
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Post by Stepto1 »

Too true. It's such a fun job to do as well! The filters were totaly black, it looked like mildew. So rewarding to see them going back in all clean. I cleaned out the tank so it was spotless and bled all the brake lines as per the guide on here, many thanks to the writer of that by the way. Seeing all the filthy fluid coming out, followed by fresh clean oil was such a good feeling, not to mention the air bubbles......

Just driven 260 miles back to Plymouth and it's like a new car. The brakes are great. On the downside, my ailing back box finaly gave up. Oh well, you can't have everything!
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Post by andmcit »

Shame then it sounds like the stuff is going to be a PITA to get hold of in the
future if support and availability of it is being scaled back. :(
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Post by Stepto1 »

To be fair I have no idea what Hydroflush really is. It's sold as a cleaner but I suspect it's just LHM but a different colour so that you're sure you've got all the old stuff out. By using it you're not mixing new LHM with old but have an inbetween medium. Just a hunch. But I'm sure if you changed the old fluid for new LHM then dumped the new/old mix after 1500 miles and replaced with new it would have just the same effect.
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Post by andmcit »

It's been speculated in the past that 50% is boggo LHM and teh rest paraffin!!
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Post by Stepto1 »

It wouldn't surprise me. It would explain the colour!

Whenever I buy I new car, I always drain the engine oil, refill with the cheapest, watery oil I can find and then run it for a few hundred miles. Then I leave the engine to drain of oil overnight. The muck that comes out is really funny. Then I refill with good quaility oil. In the Xantia 1.8 16v the oil that comes out after 5000 miles is still gold and clean. I resent taking it to the tip sometimes! I feel the hydraulic system is the same. It just needs something to dilute the old fluid so the new is not conaminated.
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Post by SwissSPEC »

I think the Finnish use 50% diesel mix in their lhm to clean out the lhm periodically. 1st time i've heard of that, however diesel has lubricating properties so i guess it would work fine?

Oh, i've used hydraflush as well & it kinda grabs the s**t in the system & keeps it suspended within the fluid, seemed to work rather well & i was amazed at how much rubbish was in the system, mind you, probably 1st time it was ever done in 15 odd years :shock:
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Post by addo »

I used a portion of diesel in a Xantia, and don't recommend it on newer models.

What seemed to happen was it precipitated extra hardening of the moulded "rubber" (thermoplastic) hoses and they all split inconveniently, one after another...

Older cars may not suffer this problem.
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Post by SwissSPEC »

Apologies, the finnish info was based on the bx, not sure if they used that method on other models, so i'm guessing that the older models which have slightly different systems to the modern one's it would be fine for. It's certainly would be useful if you could use that rather than that rather expensive hydraflush & thats when you can even get some. I think the mileage used with the diesel in was for approx 1000 miles.
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Post by SwissSPEC »

Thought i'd mention, that my experience with hydraflush has been a positive one, it removed a large amount of crap from the system (BX by the way). I also emptied out all the hydraflush, re-filtered it & put it back in & it got a 2nd chance of cleaning out more rubbish.

I also fitted an external small fuel filter (paper variety) onto one of the hydraulic pipes that went back to the lhm tank reservoir, this also collected quite a lot of crap. Infact it was so good, when i replaced the hydraflush with nice new lhm, i put on another external filter to replace the one that had hydraflush crap in it, & left it on to see long term how much rubbish it will continue to collect from the system. I plan this summer to check it & report my findings for those who are interested in this type of stuff.
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Post by VertVega »

SwissSPEC wrote:... I also fitted an external small fuel filter (paper variety) onto one of the hydraulic pipes that went back to the lhm tank reservoir, this also collected quite a lot of crap. ...
This is a brilliant idea! =D> I think I'll also use this modification.
If I use a transparent filter like this one, as seen in pic. it can also serve as an
unofficial "LHM visual inspection point" (like eyeglass in aircon) :-k

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Post by SwissSPEC »

I'll take a piccy at the weekend & post it up to show you the size of filter (i used a small one) & which pipe i attached it to.
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Post by CitroJim »

Indeed :D An inspired idea! Excellent. We'll all have one soon...
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Post by Stepto1 »

Great idea. Just a thought though. That filter looks like a fuel filter to me which is a much thinner fluid then LHM. Would the filter slow the flow rate or cause a bottle neck?

I believe the system does need a better filter in in. My Xantia has done 1000 miles now on hydroflush. It still looks ok but I took a sample today and dripped it onto an old door mirror. Even with the naked eye it was easy to see loads of debris suspended in the fluid. This suggests to me that the integeral filters are not catching all the rubbish flushed from the system. Maybe the filters wear out over time and need changing?
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