Bloody Xantia Lower Bayonet hose!!!

[ecohouse1]

Damn that hose!

After it popped off on the morning rush hour a few weeks back, I have been paranoid it happening again. So thought I had the bright idea of tapping it home on the upper bit with a long pry bar resting on the metal flange of the bayonet. You can locate it "easily" enough on the lower part from underneath but the upper part of the connection is a bugger to get at, because of the bend of the hose and its alignment/location.

Tapping away at it last Tuesday from above and pssst - little stream of coolant starts up!

Car now stranded! What a plonker! Order new hose (this one only 6 months old!) £45 for nowt! Then lay in the sleet for an hour on Saturday fitting it. Managed to save 90% if the coolant - it was only 4 weeks old which also had Stop Leak in it, so that was a relief!

Used silicon grease on the assemply this time and the bayonet & seal popped in much smoother and sat deeper in the radiator socket, so that the clip went in and actually held the hose in as I was yanking it and the whole radiator was moving. So hope thats it properly seated! Used it on the header tank and block outlet too and makes fitting the hose a breeze. Gave them all a good tug after the clips were reattached and they seemed solid enough.

Anyway learnt the hard way that tapping away with a pry bar and hammer near rubber hoses you can barely reach is not advised

The joys!

[spider]

Is this the one with the metal end and the o-ring held in by a wire clip or the plastic twist affair also found on the bottom of some 306 radiator hoses ?

I've not seen the oring / clip one (also on a 406) come off before normally you have to destroy them to get them out for a radiator change etc as they corrode in.

The bayonet yes but generally I think they pop off under pressure if at all, they should not decide to come off later so once its been fitted / bled / ran up to temp it should stay on.

[ecohouse1]

Yep its the steel collar with the retaining clip - slots into a plastic female in the Rad. 3 grooves in the hose bayonet slot into the same on the Rad.

The old one that was the original from 1999 was welded into the leaky Rad with corrosion so that I had to cut off the hose and the radiator stub to get the Rad out.

Got a new lower hose and Rad in June last year, then all the jolly japes 6 months later when the buggering thing popped off at rush hour! Believe me - there is no quicker way to drain your coolant! Plus the coolant level warning was not working then either so the only way I found out was steam pouring out by the headlamps and the heater going cold!!Thank god it was a frosty cold morning!

Give me a normal stub and jubilee clip any day!

[CitroJim]

Give me a normal stub and jubilee clip any day!

Indeed, they were not Citroen's finest hour

[evilally]

I recently fitted a Nissen radiator to my 406 and had real trouble getting the lower hose to stay put (brand new OE hose too). When the car got up to temperature it would just blow off. In the end I put a jubilee clip over the spring clip to secure it:



Spring clip can no longer liberate itself from the 3 grooves. Had no problems since.

[spider]

Pity a certain year or so of 405 owner when they changed to two or three types during that year of production. A failed top / bottom or radiator would mean replacing all three items.

These days they will have been long replaced so not a problem.