Various Grand Picasso Niggles to sort - Advice please

[Michel]

Well, much as I'm enjoying the Grand Picasso, it has a few niggles I'd like to get sorted before the winter, which are beginning to annoy me somewhat.

1. There's a whiff of diesel fumes in the cabin sometimes. It was chuffing when I got it, I was obviously aware of *all* the pitfalls - injectors, turbo, oil pickup blockage, etc and have budgeted to replace them all as the rest of the car is pretty sound. I've nipped the injectors up, chuffing gone, still a whiff of fumes. The turbo is sooty, which points to the DPF having been off and not put on properly I believe. Whatever, it's going to have to come off. I can get a pattern DPF new for £160 ad a turbo core for less than £100. Has anyone any experience with aftermarket DPFs? My line of thinking is as I've budgeted for one (a more expensive one), and the rad etc has to come out to replace it, I might as well put a new one in to save any issues over the next 100k or so.

2. The EGR Valve. I wish to clean it out or replace it. It looks a total b@st@rd to get at and remove. Is this the case? It can go and get it done at a garage if so.

3.The left rear caliper/stupid electric auto-handbrake is sticking. Am I looking at a recon caliper, or can I lubricate the mechanism without taking it all apart?

4. The plastics in the the boot are looking well rough. Has anyone tried going over them with some wet and dry paper, then painting them. I often carry people in the rearmost seats, and it looks rubbish!

Finally, I want to install a screen in the back, preferably a roof-mounted drop-down flat panel thing for long journeys. Have any of you done this in any of your motors? Tips would be appreciated.

thanks

Mike

[RichardW]

1. Don't know about aftermarket DPFs - but my 307 was smelling even though there was (initially) no chuffing - new set of seals sorted it. So, you might need to be prepared for new seals if the DPF joint doesn't cure it. It is awkward to get that joint gas tight - I failed, as did the garage that did the clutch on our C4 - somehow he managed to get the shield off without taking the rad out, but I don't know how! Make sure you lift the DPF and get it well seated on the turbo before trying to do the clamp up. Get a pair of the exhaust pliers if you haven't already!

2. It's not as hard as it looks. Once you have removed the wipers, scuttle, sound deadening, cabin air intake scoop, air pipes, air filter, fuel filter and bracket and air box, access to the top of the engine is not bad You will need a pair of Clic pliers to undo the clip to the cooler. There is a replacement clip available from PSA which is a bolt up type - starting the bolt was the hardest part of the whole job. I changed ours in a couple of hours.

3. I would probably go with a replacement caliper. One of the ones on my 307 seized up, but even after I screwed the piston out I couldn't really see anything wrong with it. Check however, that it is not a cable problem - the LH cable is operated by the outer of the primary cable - ours was not brilliant and I was wondering if the primary cable was a bit poor meaning it was struggling to pull this side. Primary cable is available separately, not not too many £££ and doesn't look too bad to change.

4. No idea!!

[Eddie Nuff]

Richard's got most of it but to add:

Definitely the seals.

Take the dpf off, separate it and clean both ends with a jet wash and Mr Muscle. Leave them to dry in the sun for a good few hours.

Always remove scuttle etc, airbox and pipes. I even take the bonnet off. You can clean it out with diesel for a couple of days but if you replace it buy decent not cheap Chinese crap off ebay.

[Michel]

3. I would probably go with a replacement caliper. One of the ones on my 307 seized up, but even after I screwed the piston out I couldn't really see anything wrong with it. Check however, that it is not a cable problem - the LH cable is operated by the outer of the primary cable - ours was not brilliant and I was wondering if the primary cable was a bit poor meaning it was struggling to pull this side. Primary cable is available separately, not not too many £££ and doesn't look too bad to change.

I had a look at this the other day, there seemed to be a clip that holds the cable in place where the plastic end of the outer sits on the caliper that had gone walkabout, allowing the cable to be move about further than it should, and not releasing. Coupled to that, the pads are absolutely shot - likely due to the binding, so a new set are on order. I removed the sliding part of the caliper and greased the top slider pin liberally. I fashioned the spacer/clip that had gone missing out of a cable tie, wound the piston back and reassembled. After a few "electronic parking brake failure" and "ESP/ABS" warnings , it all settled down when I pumped the pedal a few times.

I'll be putting new pads in it on Weds or Thursday.

Question - what is the round "UFO" thing on the lower part of the brake caliper that unscrews with a 6mm Torx, that one has to remove to get at the lower bolt? It doesn't appear to be connected to anything or do anything...

[RichardW]

I think it's just a balance weight - there must have been some resonance they decided they needed to damp out. I found that I could remove the bolt complete with the damper with an open end spanner!

There isn't a clip or spacer listed separately, it should just be part of the cable - possibly someone has had the cable out, and broken it.

[Michel]

Well, I put a new set of pads on the rear. The N/S caliper lower slider pin was so seized that I had a few moments wondering if it was some odd type of caliper that I'd never seen before that only had one sliding pin - it really was that tight! Beating 7 colours out of it, and plenty of twisting with the mole grips got it out eventually I cleaned the pin up with wet'n'dry going from 150 grit to 1500 grit, cleaned the hole in the caliper out best I could and put it all back together with lashings of brake grease.

Brakes took a while to adjust themselves, I'm going to recalibrate the handbrake with Diagbox later on this evening. It's still sticking on sometimes, but seems not to do it as much if I let the handbrake off manually rather than let it auto-release.