Sourcing Spheres

[Old-Guy]

If you're looking for spheres, it may help to know that some spheres are used on a variety of models - though to complicate matters, which goes where can have changed over model life so check RP numbers! Formore information, read on.

O/S/F strut sphere blew on my XM V6 a couple of months ago. Replacements from AEP (aka citroenspares on eBay) ordered on Sunday, arrived Tuesday.

While I was researching where I could get a pair of new spheres, I compiled a sphere table for the XM with all the Citroen and IFHS equivalents together with Vol, Pressure and Damper; discovering that AEP (citroenspares.com) are no longer restocking IFHS spheres - just selling off their existing stock - which fortunately included a pair of front strut spheres.

With new front strut spheres, the ride at the front is still rather stiff and Sport/Normal modes are indistinguishable (at the front) - front Hydractive sphere gone?

The rear suspension is still soft, though for some months it goes up and down for no reason when the car's stationary in traffic - sticky height control mechanism, flat rear anti-sink?

There's an invoice to the previous owner dated March 2023 for 7 "reconditioned" (re-gassed and painted?) spheres and a new Main Accumulator. The obvious deduction is that Accumulator failure prompted a check of all the spheres. The next, expensive, step in sorting out the ride is to replace the rest of those 'reconditioned' spheres before any more go.

This last week-end, finally getting around to ordering replacements for remaining 5 'reconditioned' spheres, I discovered :-
1) Only rear wheel spheres are available from IFHS, none of the other 3 I need.
2) While it's obvious that the first two letters of IFHS part refs are the car model (XM, XAntia) and the middle 2 digits are the pressure, less obvious is that the last 2 letters are a random code for volume and damper.
3) An IFHS Catalogue, not only lists all the IFHS sphere references by car/variant and RP but has a very useful cross reference table (page 12). Checking 529304 for XM50RU, I first saw XA50RU on the line above. I noticed several more instances of XA/XM pairs of IFHS refs that have the same Citroen reference. But not the front and rear wheel spheres - they are unique to the XM V6 (ES9 J4) - that's what the Exclusive badge really means!

So, bar the rear Hydractive sphere (X_50AR), of which AEP have no stock, I've been able to order IFHS spheres; fortunately Febi's limited range of spheres does include that one.

[mickthemaverick]

I missed the link to the catalogue when I first read the post, so I have highlighted it in blue for other member's benefit.