Le bus oignon - Xantia of many Autoshiters - GYPSY CURSE

[beko1987]

Cool. I cant help you with the wand as I dont have one, and tbh I wouldnt trust it to post as their fragile as hell! Sure you'll find one though. You need a new filter cover as the latch at the front will be snapped off - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dyson-Dc01-filter-cover-yellow-used-great-order-/151236983108?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item23366d3944 or a bungee cord around the whole thing, which will make getting the hose off a pain! Not sure if I have a spare one of those, will check...

 

DC04/07s are the last of the good ones tbh, nothing wrong with them and can be had for £free! Motors for them arent quite so rare as DC01 Amtek ones.

 

Beige Henry as a workshop vac? SACRALIGE! Should be put to retirement in my collection at his age... (does it have the beige floor tool and brown hose too? Will be pre 1984 if so...) I hope you use him with bags?

 

I need to get into the shed this weekend so will get you some stuffs together and box it up for a postage quote with somewhere cheap.

[vulgalour]

Here's beige Henry.

 

Missing a wheel, no tools, bits of gaffer tape here and there... still works but hardly collectible surely?

[beko1987]

Mmmm your right, past being a collectable now!

 

Front or rear wheel?

[vulgalour]

Front castor, makes him a bit annoying when he falls over like a drunkard.

[MikeKnight]

Henry tells us he drinks just to steady his nerves.

 

Since he was in the great vacuum war and all.

 

So we tolerate his constant falling over.

[ruffgeezer]

Henry's drinking is the least of his worries;

 

[purplebargeken]

That is a very expensive habit he has there!

[ruffgeezer]

No wonder his pupils are always so big.

[purplebargeken]

Still, he looks very happy. 

[vulgalour]

After a frightfully busy week I've had some time today to do naff all.  I'm no good at doing naff all so instead I determined to fit the Peugeot seats to the Xantia.  Shortly after getting them I'd determined to repair the split seam in the driver's seat, it's a fiddly job to do without stripping the seat down.  I made sure that the only damage was to the seam, it looks like the fabric has just given way on this edge but is otherwise quite sound.

 

Then, using long bead-headed pins hold the fabric about where you want it to sit.  Slightly tricky with velour as it does have this tendency to roll up as you try and control it, and it's stretchy so it's easy to make it sit wrong.  Patience is your friend with this job.

 

Finally, using a blanket stitch, pull the two halves of the fabric together until it's all closed up.  Velour is great for hiding any unevenness in the stitching.  This seat has seen many, many miles so you can excuse the slight sagginess, I'm happy with this.  Better yet, no more need to put a cover on it.

 

Fast forward to today and I already knew that it was a simple matter of unbolting one set of seats and dropping the others in, at least in theory.  However, I wanted to retain the airbag wiring and pretensioner bolts as I've still got an airbag fitted so that meant some chopping and changing.  I'm not sure if it's the design of the seats, but the frame on the Xantia seats seems to be slightly deeper than the one on the Peugeot although all the bolt fixing holes are identical.  Here's the underside of the Xantia drivers seat.

 

Here's the Peugeot seat after taking the runners off.  I then had the problem that I couldn't remove the rest of the frame which I need to do if I want to swap the airbag stuff over.  Problem being the fixings...

 

The bolts that hold the rail to the frame are really easy to get to and remove.  The ones behind need a tool that has the relevant head but is Allen key shaped and wouldn't you know it I don't have one of those tools.  I tried to use a regular Allen key but something about the shape of the bolt heads made this impossible.  You can't get in to drill out or cut off the heads of the bolts to separate the frame either.

 

So unfortunately that means the driver's seat doesn't have the airbag bits fitted until I get the relevant tool.  The bit that gets in the way on the drivers seat is the height adjuster bracketry, since this isn't fitted on the passenger seats that was much easier to move across.  However, even this wasn't as straightforward as it should be since I found the corner of the seat frame had been twisted slightly, probably when it was being fought out of the Peugeot, I'm pretty sure this is the same corner that had the seat rail cut through.

 

 

Do you know what though, it didn't matter.  With a pry bar I managed to get the bolts to line up and that pulled the frame back to square again once it was in the car.  The seats don't look too bad in the cabin either, they're a close enough colour match to the original that you don't notice they're replacements so easily.  I did swap one of the Xantia side trims on to the passenger seat to hide the airbag gubbins, a straight swap because of what I'd moved over.  I'll do the same with the driver's seat once I get the frame properly sorted over.

 

 

 

Most importantly, the comfort levels have increased rather a lot which is the main reason I undertook this job.  I feel much more confident that I could drive the car for a greater distance without pain and discomfort now that the hard Xantia seats have been removed.

 

Next on my list is a single spoke XM steering wheel to replace the Xantia one that's in there at the moment.  This will also delete the airbag so all this seat base swapping stuff will likely become a moot point anyway as I'll probably delete the airbag stuff from the car completely.

 

I have been wondering if a Peugeot rear seat will fit in the Xantia next to match the front seats.  Then I'd just need another seat or two for the fabric to retrim the door card inserts and you'd think it was all factory.

 

[Lacquer Peel]

Is it a torx screw on the seat frame? Glad the 405 seats are comfier and make the Xantia easier to live with.

[purplebargeken]

Excellent swap! Looks almost factory as you say. Comfort is important, great work.

[vulgalour]

Yup, tis one of those funny torx head bolts.  Pretty annoying really, all the fixings on the Xantia are that type.

[Noel Tidybeard]

would the xantia seat covers not fit the puglit seats?

[vulgalour]

To swap the covers I'd have to swap the foams as well, and that means dismantling quite a lot of the seats.  Far easier just to swap the base frames.  While the metal parts of the seats are apparently the same, all of the plastics trims, internal foams and fabric covers are completely different, surprisingly so.  Some of the plastic trims are transferable, this is quite nice for the back-adjuster which is far easier to use on the Peugeot seats than the awkward domed version on the Xantia seats.

 

 

 

 

 

I've lost the map pockets in the back of the seats by fitting the Peugeot ones, but I don't mind that because my map wouldn't fit in the Xantia seats anyway.  All in all, I think the Xantia seats are a rubbish design when compared to what was on offer from Peugeot.  As a new customer I reckon I'd've gone with the Peugeot offering purely because the seats are that much better even though the Xantia is a more refined and floaty car.

[KruJoe]

Best of both worlds now, eh?

 

I'm looking forwards to the verdict on the seat swap following your next long distance run. Fingers crossed!

[Hendry]

I'm surprised the Xantia seats are uncomfortable, this was something I always took as a given with big French stuff was proper comfy wafty seats. Although tbh I dont remember early C5 cloth seats being particularly comfy now I think about it.

[vulgalour]

Repainted the rear wiper on the Xantia today, as you can see here.  Looks better than it did.  Little things, really.

[vulgalour]

I repainted two of the Synergie trims in silver and offered them up to the car and hated them.  For some reason, when they're a smooth uniform silver they don't look as good as when they're bashed about a bit.  Time for a rethink.  Went back to my notion of painting them white and I like this much better.

 

 

 

White wheel trims are a massive style faux pas, I am aware of this fact.  One thing that these will need beyond some remedial flatting and polishing after a dog-paint interface, is to have the fake vents reblacked.  I think I'm keeping the Citroen chevrons white, I have a feeling blacking them will be a step too far away from an OEM look.  90s special edition Xantia?  That's kinda what I'm aiming for.

 

[Matt]

White wheels on white cars are full of win. I'd be tempted to paint the actual wheels white and just leave them on display.

[vulgalour]

The steels on the Xantia are quite a nice design, but better suited to a Peugeot 405, they look really clumsy and old fashioned on the Xantia.

[Bren]

With the white trims it looks like a 70's concept car.

[MrBiscuits]

Strangely reminiscent of this one:

[MrDuke]

The white-on-white is exactly the kind of way I'd have expected a Ltd-Ed BX to look, in the mid-80s. Very French imo.

[vulgalour]

While I've been musing over 80s and 90s special editions I started to get ideas for zebra things.  Then I found this little picture which I reckon could work well 'leaking' down from the rubbing strip at the front of the front doors.  Doubt it would be that difficult to get something like this made up as a pair of mirrored stickers in black vinyl that I could apply myself.

 

 

It would also satisfy my craving for something zebra related on or in the car.

[Ghosty]

Without the vents painted that looks like a weird '90s concept car... Didn't expect the finished article to look good but it does!

[purplebargeken]

Looks ace. I like zebras! Stripey horses are fab.

 

I saw a Citroen C6 the other day. I didn't know what the heck it was, I like it though, oh yes. 

[vulgalour]

Proposed design for the new front door corner decals.  The new Citroen Xantia Xebra edition.  May need to make the barcode a bit longer for proportion, I've not played with these on a photo of the car yet and I don't really do this sort of design normally.

 

[KruJoe]

The white-on-white is exactly the kind of way I'd have expected a Ltd-Ed BX to look, in the mid-80s.

I used a variety of white wheels on my Ltd-Ed BX14 off of the 80's.

 

 

 

 

(It was sometimes white, honest.)

 

 

I also painted my Maestro with zebra stripes once, but I sadly don't have a pic.

It did have white wheel trims though.

 

Angyl - are your Xebras lacking tails?

[Timewaster]

I don't mind white wheels but they have to be EXACTLY the right shade, and I fear these are a bit too bright.