Simon's new Xantia V6 and Leaf blog

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Mandrake
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

Unread post by Mandrake »

Here are the exact tyres that were on the car already, apart from the one odd tyre at the front:

https://www.mytyres.co.uk/cgi-bin/rshop ... p=R-255906

The same fuel efficiency rating of C, but a slightly better wet braking rating than the Vredesteins... but that's normal for an all season to not have quite as good wet braking performance as a summer tyre isn't it ?
Simon

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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

Unread post by daviemck2006 »

It was only under really heavy brahing going downhill that the abs kicked in with the vreds on the 107. I have also had summer vreds on a few cars and even they were good in the snow. I rememder once in the c5 with summer vreds in heavy snow coming across on my way to work my boss stuck in a snow drift in her husbands jeep Cherokee. I towed her out and continued to work with no problems. She went home! I think you will be happy with the vreds.
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

Unread post by lexi »

Ha ha! Getting the AA out for a puncture? It's no wonder the prices are going up with women and hair dryer owners going all helpless with little problems like that! Oooo help mr AA man.............I have a puncture and am taking photos of it as it is a very serious breakdown for my blog :rofl2:
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

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It will get worse, so many single mothers bringing up useless (practical skills) kids who cannot even change a plug.....but hey, they can do glitter painting and microwave a chicken nugget !
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

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Stickyfinger wrote: 18 Aug 2017, 20:31 It will get worse, so many single mothers bringing up useless (practical skills) kids who cannot even change a plug.....but hey, they can do glitter painting and microwave a chicken nugget !


This has been highlighted as a serious problem fairly recently... Can't recall where now but the lack of practical skills in youngsters that we older ones take for granted is having detrimental effects on youngsters' employability...

A very sad situation indeed :(
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

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lexi wrote: 18 Aug 2017, 18:45 Ha ha! Getting the AA out for a puncture? It's no wonder the prices are going up with women and hair dryer owners going all helpless with little problems like that! Oooo help mr AA man.............I have a puncture and am taking photos of it as it is a very serious breakdown for my blog :rofl2:

If my blog bores you I'm not twisting your arm to read it - there's always the unsubscribe button in the bottom left hand corner of the page... ;)

I've changed more punctured tyres on the side of the road than I can remember over the years, usually in the rain on the side of a busy road and I've never once in 25 years even had an AA membership let alone called on them, however the Ion is the first car I've owned with no spare tyre, so that changes the situation.

I was offered a free year of AA membership when I bought the car so why wouldn't I take that up ? I was actually thinking it would be more useful if I got myself into a situation where I was stranded with a nearly flat battery unable to reach a charger (or I reached a charger with little charge left and found it was out of order) but so far that hasn't happened to me.

If there's no spare tyre and the inflation kit fails on a serious puncture I don't see what else I could have done other than call someone ?

Incidentally the puncture was quite unusual - its a hole the size of a ball point pen in the inner sidewall quite close to the rim - how the heck it got a puncture there I don't know. The AA man tried to do a puncture repair on it unsuccessfully but to be honest I wouldn't consider a puncture repair on the sidewall in that area to be safe to drive on even just to get home... [-X

The relevance of posting about it is thus far I'm not aware of any EV's that have spare tyres - even space savers, and I don't think any ever will. The spare tyre would take up valuable battery space. So if EV's do eventually take over (as I think they will, for passenger cars) we're all going to be in this situation of having no spare tyre sooner or later. Things are looking up for the AA and RAC.... :lol: They might get less call outs for broken down engines but a lot more for punctures!

Personally I will mourn the passing of spare tyres, but unfortunately it's just the way things seem to be headed! :?
Simon

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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

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If my blog bores you I'm not twisting your arm to read it - there's always the unsubscribe button in the bottom left hand corner of the page... ;)
It is an anorak of anecdotol melodrama in the extreme mostly. Grossly geeky and a source of constant amusement. I can react to it however I wish.
That old chestnut of "you don't have to read it" is page one line one carp! You overstate the obvious, as usual. Like "Oh, a very unusual puncture!"
It's brilliant! :lol: You should post it up on autoshite...............just for laughs like. :P
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

Unread post by Skull »

There may be an option of 'run flat tyres' (replacement wheels required) to overcome this problem of a spare tyre (or lack of) but I know they are pricey 8-[

A pen sized puncture right next to the rim I would think someone had stabbed my tyre or took a shot at me :shock: Be interesting to see if there's anything inside when you get the tyre off .....
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

Unread post by white exec »

The full size spare wheel, and later the skinny spare too, was deleted by many manufacturers, partly to save space - yes - but also to try to wring a whisker more off the fuel consumption figure . . . they were that desperate!

Toy pump and aerosol sealant is a joke in most circumstances, and cannot tackle a sidewall hole of slit - the most common cause of sudden loss of air. A nail in the tread can stay there for weeks/months undetected, so slow usually is the leak. On top of that, the sealant usually renders the tyre irrepairable.

Skinny spare is a MUST for any car, EVs included, I would think. Without it, what is the driver/AA/RAC/rescue to do, apart from trailer the car away? Crazy.

Toyota UK (marketing) took the decision to drop spare wheels from some of their vehicles. Customers complained in their droves. Some potential customers refused to buy the vehicles unless a spare wheel was included. Toyota caved in, and re-introduced both full-size spare or skinny spare as a no-cost option (if the customer insisted). Clear moral there.

_______

Do remember a stormy, wet and windy night in Church Crookham, at the end of a long working day. Vectra hatchback, boot full (and I mean full) of printing plates and chemistry. Blow-out. Where was the spare? In the boot, but under the lift-out boot floor. Out came all the goods, under the only street lamp, in the rain. Kneeling in a puddle, the wheel got changed. Wonderful, wonderful GM... Citroen do it better, at least on the XM.
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

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And the Xantia, I dread having a boot full (up to 600kg) of cast iron radiators and have a flat in the C5x7 (under the rear floor!)
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

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Skull wrote: 19 Aug 2017, 10:04 There may be an option of 'run flat tyres' (replacement wheels required) to overcome this problem of a spare tyre (or lack of) but I know they are pricey 8-[
I wonder if run flats are the way EV's will end up going - it's possible some of them already use run flats, I'm not sure, but I do know none of them carry spares wheels.
A pen sized puncture right next to the rim I would think someone had stabbed my tyre or took a shot at me :shock: Be interesting to see if there's anything inside when you get the tyre off .....

Didn't get a chance to look inside the tyres for incriminating evidence - I handed the wheels over to cooper brothers this morning and let them worry about changing the tyres for me... ;)

I was wrong about where the hole was, when I got a better look with the wheel off the car it was right in the middle of the sidewall - the worst possible place. Looked more like a slit as well. I doubt anyone had slashed it, I drove about a mile with no problems at all then it went completely flat in the space of 100 metres at crawling speed.
white exec wrote: 19 Aug 2017, 10:43 Toy pump and aerosol sealant is a joke in most circumstances, and cannot tackle a sidewall hole of slit - the most common cause of sudden loss of air. A nail in the tread can stay there for weeks/months undetected, so slow usually is the leak. On top of that, the sealant usually renders the tyre irrepairable.
Indeed. The proverbial nail in the tread is not only usually repairable, but leaks very slowly, if at all! This went from driving normally to completely flat in probably 30 seconds and was right in the middle of the sidewall, and as you say, the tyre goo won't seal the sidewall due to the way it flexes there. I wasn't worried about having to replace the tyre afterwards as it was already down to minimum tread and due to be replaced anyway.
Skinny spare is a MUST for any car, EVs included, I would think. Without it, what is the driver/AA/RAC/rescue to do, apart from trailer the car away? Crazy.
In my case he fitted his universal spare wheel and followed me home! As it was only 10 miles that was a reasonable solution to an un-repairable tyre, especially when I have a 2nd car available to drive and had my little boy waiting to be picked up. Had I been a long way from home the only option I suspect would have been to do the same thing to the nearest tyre garage, however its an unusual size tyre so even if there was a garage within reasonable driving distance (Scottish highlands anyone ?) realistically I could still be stranded there waiting for a tyre to come in. Definitely a holiday ruiner.
Do remember a stormy, wet and windy night in Church Crookham, at the end of a long working day. Vectra hatchback, boot full (and I mean full) of printing plates and chemistry. Blow-out. Where was the spare? In the boot, but under the lift-out boot floor. Out came all the goods, under the only street lamp, in the rain. Kneeling in a puddle, the wheel got changed. Wonderful, wonderful GM... Citroen do it better, at least on the XM.
Similar sort of situation here - the somewhat useless goo and pump kit resides under the rear seat in the car as there is nowhere else for it to go, so to get at it you need to completely remove the rear seat base - which is quite easy if nobody is sitting on it! Luckily I was alone in the car at the time, but I still had to remove a great lumbering baby seat and shove it in the front.

If there had been two of us in the car plus baby boy in his seat everyone would have been out of the car into the rain just to get at the stupid repair kit. There is almost enough room under the bonnet (since there is no engine there!) so I really don't know why they didn't put the kit in there...
Simon

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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

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New Vredestein's fitted to the rear this morning and off for a test drive. :) I like the look of them a lot - a good looking well designed and very deep tread pattern that reminds me a bit of the old Michelin MX and XZX patterns from my GS days - back when all tyres were somewhat all season in their design rather than today's heavily summer optimised summer tyres that are completely useless in winter or cold weather!

Initial impressions in today's warm weather were not actually that great - under acceleration around corners they felt quite "squirrelly" at the back (rear wheel drive, and quite a lot of torque available from the small motor) and I was easily able to get the rear to push wide or wriggle and squirm under acceleration around tight corners both in dry and wet, and I was seeing the ESC (traction control) light flashing up a lot more than I've ever seen before.

I went for a blast on the motorway to check the wheel balance, the balance on the old tyres wasn't very good with quite a bit of vibration from 70-80mph and more worryingly, vibration under hard acceleration as low as 50mph. I'm pleased to say that these are well balanced and the vibration under acceleration is gone and from 70-80mph there is only a very small amount of vibration now, which could well be coming from the front tyres which are untouched at the moment and will be getting replaced in a couple of months.

After I'd done about 30 miles I noticed that the rear tyres were "feeling better" and whilst I wouldn't say the grip is as good in dry/warm conditions as the old worn summer tyres, it isn't too bad and certainly acceptable for the intended use of the car - which is commuting, not tearing around corners as fast as possible. The payoff will be in the winter when I can still move instead of being stuck! :lol:

From what I've seen though I don't think I'll be putting all seasons on the Xantia any time soon - there is definitely a compromise in the summer performance even on a car that isn't a performance orientated car, so I wouldn't like to see what it would do to a Xantia V6's grip and handling...

I noticed that there was a lot of black goo (bead lubrication/sealant) between the rim and the tyre - is it possible that when the tyre is newly fitted and this goo is still there that the tyre slips on the rim a bit when accelerating or cornering and that this might have been the cause of it feeling a bit squirrelly ? I noticed after I got back there was a bit of white coloured staining between the rim and tyre as well, soap used while the tyre was fitted working its way out ?

If so I guess the tyres will feel a bit better once the black goo / white stuff have worked their way right out, as the improvement over about 30 miles driving was quite substantial.

Ride quality is considerably better at the rear than before (not surprising with new deep tread and softer rubber compound) and the tyre roar from the rear is more or less inaudible now even at motorway speeds. =D>

One thing that didn't go away though is I see the ESC light flickering on in situations where it never did before, such as hard acceleration on only a very slight bend, and I wonder if this is related to tyre rolling radius mismatches ?

Obviously the much increased new tyre tread depth will increase the rolling radius of the wheels slightly, but even besides that the tyre does look slightly higher in profile than the old tyre despite both being 175/55, and the front tyres have not been touched.

So I wonder if the increased radius of the rear tyres relative to the worn front tyres is right at the limit that the ESC system will accept before it starts registering false positives ? Hopefully that problem will go away when the worn front tyres are replaced and their rolling radius increases in proportion too...I know that some ESC systems are very finicky about the rolling radius of wheels matching closely!
Simon

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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

Unread post by Skull »

It may be that the releasing agent used on the tyres took a while to scrub off ... I remember years ago having a new set on my motorbike and wanting to fit some stabilisers for the 30 mile trip home in pouring rain :roll:

The ESC sensor issue will be interesting to find out if it re calibrates when the fronts get changed .....
Last edited by Skull on 19 Aug 2017, 14:06, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

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Mandrake wrote: 19 Aug 2017, 12:51 I drove about a mile with no problems at all then it went completely flat in the space of 100 metres at crawling speed.
Beware of snipers :?
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Re: Simon's new Xantia V6 and Peugeot Ion blog

Unread post by daviemck2006 »

On a small commuter/city car like yours or the 107 they are fine, but I wouldn't put them on the 407 coupe. I'm not really anticipating using the 407 much in poor weather. I expect Gabriel will get that job and no idea what she is wearing
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