Whistly turbo - Xantia Exhaust?

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Kowalski
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My Cars: Ex 05 C5 2.0 HDI Exclusive 145k
Ex 97 Xantia 1.9TD SX 144k
Ex 94 Xantia Dimension 1.9TD 199k

Whistly turbo - Xantia Exhaust?

Post by Kowalski »

My Xantia 1.9td seems to be a little more whistly of late. Originally I didn't notice any turbo noise at all from the car but over the weekend I started to.
It's not an unhealthy sound, and the turbo is definately still working and the engine pulls strongly which leads me to believe it is an exhaust problem rather than a leaking intake side.
My Xantia has a catalyst, and I'm thinking if I have to replace the front pipe (with integral cat) I'd probably be able to de-cat the car.
Is there anything else that would produce the same symptoms? and can I decat the car without falling foul of MOTs and the like?
nick
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Post by nick »

My '97 Xantia TD became very whistley after the inlet manifold gasket became brittle and started to break up. It got progressively louder over about 6 months, up to the point where pedestrians would turn round to look where the sound was coming from. Even when the sound was really bad it made no difference to performance or fuel consumption.
With regard to the cat, you can safely remove it and its not required for the MOT.
Nick
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Kowalski
Posts: 2557
Joined: 15 Oct 2003, 17:41
Location: North East, United Kingdom
My Cars: Ex 05 C5 2.0 HDI Exclusive 145k
Ex 97 Xantia 1.9TD SX 144k
Ex 94 Xantia Dimension 1.9TD 199k

Post by Kowalski »

Would that be the gasket between the manifold and the block?
If so, did you manage to remove the manifold without having to remove the engine? I thought that the exhaust and inlet manifolds shared a gasket which would make changing the one shared gasket a big job since the turbo would have to come off.
nick
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Post by nick »

Yes its the gasket between the manifold and block (well the head rather than the block I suppose...)
Early XUD TD's shared a gasket for inlet and exhaust, while the later ones had two separate gaskets, so its possible to remove one and not the other. I don't know when they changed over though.
As you say yours has a catalyst, I assume its the '97 you've got the problem with ? If so, you should be ok, as my '97 TD has the two-gasket setup so yours probably will too. I did mine without touching the exhaust or turbo, access was a bit tricky though.
The problem with mine was that the gasket is made from something plasticky, rather than a nice metal one like the earlier TD's had. It had just gone brittle with age.
Nick
nick
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Post by nick »

By the way, to make absolutely sure if this is the cause or not, its worth trying what I did - use a piece of hosepipe or similar as a sort of stethescope to listen all round the air pipework. Its much easier to pin down the exact source of the leak this way, as sounds tend to echo a bit round the engine bay.
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Kowalski
Posts: 2557
Joined: 15 Oct 2003, 17:41
Location: North East, United Kingdom
My Cars: Ex 05 C5 2.0 HDI Exclusive 145k
Ex 97 Xantia 1.9TD SX 144k
Ex 94 Xantia Dimension 1.9TD 199k

Post by Kowalski »

I've had a look at the exhaust properly now, after poking around in the engine bay. The first pipe on the exhaust had a little hole in it where it joins with the catalyst. A little wire brushing made the hole a little larger as the rust dropped off, now I reckon I can stick my finger in it.
Anyway, it appears its new front pipe time because the pipe is in a bad state generally (other pin holes appearing and paper thin in places), and could well be the orginal factory pipe.
Hopefully the decat will give me better performance and fuel economy (wishful thinking ?).
nick
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Joined: 14 Mar 2001, 01:49
Location: Market Rasen, Lincolnshire
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Post by nick »

I'm glad the cause wasn't as tricky to sort out as mine was !
It could well be the original downpipe, other than the back box mine still has all original exhaust at 130k (its starting to look a bit dodgy in places though.)
I think you should notice a slight improvement in performance & economy without the cat. When mine needs a new exhaust system, probably quite soon, I think I'll ditch the cat too.
Nick
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