My HDi Xantia - help required pg5

[Duke137]

Just giving my Xantia some appreciation here!

Low cost reliable steed and despite a minor mishap with a ball joint and a bust gear linkage has been pretty good to me. I've treated it to lots of new bits (full exhaust, suspension pipes, spheres, timing belt etc) as a prevention is better than cure type of thing and it has so far been A1.

I treated it to one of those executive rear blind parcel shelves this week and just ordered some new door speakers to replace the poor OEM ones that have no bass whatsoever! Shortly before this pic I did an engine flush and dropped the oil/filter.

[Peter.N.]

Not had a Xantia, mostly XMs but I will say that the Hdi engines are brilliant, I have one in a C5 also a 406, both done around 200,000 miles and running perfectly.

Peter

[Duke137]

Installed my new EDGE Speakers today, serious improvement on the muffled rubbish that was there previously, very happy!

This car is quite a nice place to be now, just needs a full valet, it's amazing how ditched cars get in a short space of time?

Here are the speakers: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/250670625211" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Mandrake]

Did you install those on only the front doors or the rear doors as well ? As from memory the rear door speakers are smaller.

Do they fit behind the grills or did you have to leave the grills off ?

[citroenxm]

The 8v HDi 2.0 engine IS the best so far of them all, though the later 2.0 16v engine from 05 is almost as good.

My HDi 110 is now on 259k .. ALL original except the engine pump and that was because of a cutting out issue...

otherwise, original head, original turbo, second clutch about to get her third one, and still 50mpg!

Takes us EVERYWHERE!

[Duke137]

The 8v HDi 2.0 engine IS the best so far of them all, though the later 2.0 16v engine from 05 is almost as good.

My HDi 110 is now on 259k .. ALL original except the engine pump and that was because of a cutting out issue...

otherwise, original head, original turbo, second clutch about to get her third one, and still 50mpg!

Takes us EVERYWHERE!

Nice! Hope mine is that reliable long term, I'm on 163k in mine.

Did you install those on only the front doors or the rear doors as well ? As from memory the rear door speakers are smaller.

Do they fit behind the grills or did you have to leave the grills off ?

5.25 on the rears, should have said! Yes they fit snug behind the grills all round! The rears are £18.70 delivered from the same seller so for less than £40 I am well happy with them!

I just don't understand how these people make any money selling on ebay for that?

Should mention I am running a non-standard Sony head-unit and that always improves things a bit.

[Duke137]

Can anyone tell me, does the Ariel just screw out of the roof? I'm on about the lower part with the square base or is there a nut on the inside?

I recommend these EDGE speakers if anyone is looking to upgrade on the cheap. They fit straight in, only faf is the wiring but I just cut the new cable they sent into little tails and bullet connected them to the original wires after I cut the connectors off for the factory shoite

[CitroJim]

It's secured by a nut inside...

On a sunroof model it's easy, juts unclip the motor access panel and the aerial base is right there..

On a non-sunny car it's necessary to drop the front edge of the headlining a tadette...

Do this by removing the sun visors and the front door grab handles and then peeking back the door rubbers...

[falling-out-with-my-car]

on my S2 the ariel base sufferd badly from corrosion over the years so I replaced the whole aerial lead I didnrt have a sunroof so I gently prised the roof linning back at the windscreen and just had enough room to insert the new aerial lead I ran it down behind the passenger front pillar and covered it with the door seal job done, the radio reception is absolutely brillinant now, the earthi g was so bad before the signal dropped out completely, the modern replacement kits dont have a bolt quite as long as the citroen one so I had to commpromise on some of the fittings but it has never leaked at all, I did take a stanley knife to the head linning between the visors to create a three sided flap to access the aerial base but it was easy and you can't see the join when it is folded back and brushed over gently with a brass swede brush.

[Duke137]

on my S2 the ariel base sufferd badly from corrosion over the years so I replaced the whole aerial lead I didnrt have a sunroof so I gently prised the roof linning back at the windscreen and just had enough room to insert the new aerial lead I ran it down behind the passenger front pillar and covered it with the door seal job done, the radio reception is absolutely brillinant now, the earthi g was so bad before the signal dropped out completely, the modern replacement kits dont have a bolt quite as long as the citroen one so I had to commpromise on some of the fittings but it has never leaked at all, I did take a stanley knife to the head linning between the visors to create a three sided flap to access the aerial base but it was easy and you can't see the join when it is folded back and brushed over gently with a brass swede brush.

Thanks that is good info, I will take that on board. The Ariel is fine on my HDi this is for the TD I bought for my old man, he loves his five-live

[falling-out-with-my-car]

we have a lot of radio stations over here in Kettering Northants and before on the old citroen aerial I couldnt pick up one of them now I get the lot, you should find a deep metal drum at the base of the aerial this is what was badly corroded it is made of alluminium and bolts to the steel roof by the central aerial bolt, it corrodes like the rear arms do with alloy against steel only on a much smaller scale.
I can't believe Citroen didnt see this one comming.
If your going to replace it bear in mind you'll probably need an extention kit as most of the replacement aerials only have a 1 meter long lead, The extension connector will invaribly end up inside the passenger front pillar so you'll need to be very patient openning the moulding enough to squeeze the connector behind the moulding but it will fit, ease the moulding back gently as it can shatter as they get brittle over the years. the molded ends mean you'll have a bunch of wire to hide in the passenger foot well somewhere around the heater fan. these replacement aerials have such a thin internal core it isnt worth cutting them down to size the job then becomes far to fiddly and soon you find youv'e chopped to much wire off and need a new extention cord.
best to buch it up with a tag tie and burry it up under the passenger dash board it wont rattle up under there.
regards Nigel.

[falling-out-with-my-car]

A seperate note on speakers that prevent you fitting the front grill.

I had a similar problem in my BX years ago I bought some nice speakers that were the right diameter to fit the doors but to deep
so that the magnet wouldnt sit inside the door and the grills wouldnt go back on.
so I made a template of the apperture that the speaker goes into in a frame pattern so the speakers would sit inside the plywood frames, then I cut some 3mm pieces of plywood, I wanted to do this in stages to see what depth was required anyway I needed 3 for each door glued them together so they were 18mm deep, I painted the plywood with flat grey paint to match the door panels, then I drilled and screwed these frames into the door panels then screwed in the speakers to the frames the grills were not hard to adapt to fit I can't remember how I attached the grills but it all looked pretty good when finished with no screws showing yes the speakers stuck out a bit but it didnt look odd and the speakers didnt get in the way of peoples legs, this expands the depth of the speaker box and somewhat improoves the sound as well. all easily removed to return to orriginal condition if need be.
and the battle scars remain behind the speaker grills.
regards Nigel.

[Duke137]

I'll be fine with the Ariel mod, I might give it a go at the weekend actually. The kit my Dad ordered for me (he lives in France and is taking this TD over there permanently in November) has an extension so shouldn't be a problem at all. As for the corrosion area you are right, there are always areas of stupidity on all cars and is to be expected. Alot like the rear cill/door jamb on Xantia's, the bloke incharge of that department was obviously keen to finish that friday and get his arse down the pub.

Another issue I have, I need to remove the NSR door card as I have zero power to the door, the central locking will not work and neither does the door speaker so there is potentially a wiring fault in the rubber grommet/dustcover slug. I guess they pop off once you have undone a few screws/clips? Is there a guide or can someone just give me a heads up, thanks.

[falling-out-with-my-car]

The door card unclips as it has rawplug style push in plastic plugs which have a plastic disk on their heads these inserts into
the hardboard of the door card. you need be very careful removing these and it pays to have a few spare when you do as they are brittle and occasionally snap there is a tool for removing them that citroen use it has a U shaped low profile head to it.
The door panel will be covered in a thin polystyrene sheet which will need to be cut open to access the wiring and taped up again laterwith duct tape.
The screws for the door card are situated under the main door handle at the very top near the door opener there is one philips screw and at the bottom of the top part of the handle, there are two screws below the main handle you will need a phillips screwdrive with a number 3 head the screw heads are quite bigg and in deep holes. I would tend to think that the problem is probably wiring within the door its self
maybe something has shaken loose by the door being slammed the rubber boot setup tends to be fairly reliable on the front doors.
It could be water has got in at the bottom of the glass and caused some corrosion in there.
when washing my Xantia I always open the doors afterwards which lets the water drain from the bottom of the doors instead of letting it puddle in the doors where it raises the humidity when the panel warms up this is esspecially effective on the rear doors.
where you will see quite a lot of water drainning from the bottom of the doors close to the central pillars.
On the estate the rear door is designed so that water enters between the panels and drains out the bottom over the rear bumper
if you go in a car wash open the rear boot door afterwards and you will see the water drainning from the door to the ground.
although the rear boot doors tend to be fibreglass so drainning the boot door just lowers the humidity.
The bonnet can also collect quite a lot of water between its panels to. and raising it will drain the water from within.
again reducing the possibility of high humidity causing corrossion as the panels warm up.
regards Nigel.

[Duke137]

Thank you, you know your stuff it would seem!

I have broken a few cars in the past but this is my first xantia, I know how things go together/rot etc but I just wanted to check I wasn't going head first into a school boy error of breaking something lol

Appreciate the info RE the wiring, I was thinking it might be broken at the door but I am sure I can find the problem like you say.

I might take a few pics and post my findings, may help someone else doing a search on door card removal, lock not working, broken wires, bad connections etc.

On the downside, I scraped the bumper on my fence post the other night, first time I have ever scraped a car in 11 years of driving! Never mind, at least it's only a Xantia worth a few hundred quid lol