Le bus oignon - Xantia of many Autoshiters - GYPSY CURSE

[vulgalour]

oh, those things.  Xantia predates them so not an option in this instance.

 

Spent some of my lunch break colouring in stone chips and scratches all over the car, the bulk of them being on the front end which was beginning to look unsightly.  Looks far better now.

 

I really want to get the machine polisher to work on this I'm just holding off until all the niggles I can find are dealt with.  I did notice a tiny new bubble appearing where the rear quarter meets the bumper on the passenger side which is ideally a bumper off job to fix so is getting left alone for now as I have been told removing the bumpers is a hateful job on these.  There's some tar spots to take off on the drivers door again and the front bumper has many, many stonechips to remedy, and a big scrape on one corner when a weirdly cambered junction resulted in my bottoming out the front corner on the road surface.  Boot carpet has been shampooed and is drying, looks immensely better for it but won't be able to go back in for a couple of days as it takes forever to dry out once it's got wet thanks to the thick foam backing on it.

[vulgalour]

A few days ago my brother drove the Xantia and his Gypsy Curse struck again, rendering something broken for no good reason.  We suspected glow plug relay as it had been making funny noises and the glow plug light wasn't coming on.  I could have got a reader and found out for definite but decided to gamble on purchase a second hand relay for a tenner against the £18 or so for a reader and that gamble paid off.

 

The part I got wasn't from a Xantia but a Xsara Picasso, just happens that it's the same thing.  The original was a Valeo relay, this one is stamped Cartier.  The only other difference is that this has four teeth for the plug where the original has five, but given than the plug that attaches only has four sockets in the right places I thought it a gamble worth taking.  A brand new relay was going to set me back £40-60 depending where I bought it from and I was loathe to pay that much if I could solve this for a tenner.

 

 

Plugged it in, put the battery back on and the car fired up without hesitation.  Not taken it for a test drive yet but I'm quietly confident all shall be well.

[purplebargeken]

Cartier...... your car has a Cartier watch relay. I haz impressed.

[Lacquer Peel]

How is it with the 405 seats?

[vulgalour]

So much better!  My brother remarked on how much nicer they were and thought they were GT seats rather than regular Pug seats because of how supportive they are.  They've made a huge difference to the comfort side of things.  Just wish the steering wheel weren't so far away, then it really would be comfortable.

[The Moog]

Excellent news with the seats

[vulgalour]

Of course it's irrelevant because as soon as the Princess is on the road I'll not drive anything else and never* break down or need the Xantia.  See also airborne pigs, bankers with decent morals and politicians that can only tell the truth.

[Lacquer Peel]

I wonder what you could do about the steering wheel, according to Parkers a reach-adjustable column was available as an option on some models.

http://www.parkers.co.uk/cars/reviews/citroen/xantia/hatchback/equipment/

[vulgalour]

That would be a perfect solution, but I bet it's a bastard to fit even if you can find one.

[ruffgeezer]

Are you absolutely sure that one isn't adjustable? I am pretty sure all of the Xantias I had were....

[vulgalour]

It adjusts up and down but it doesn't adjust towards and away.

[ruffgeezer]

Hmm, I might have to conduct a poll of all the knackered Xantias at work and see if that's true.  I'll let you know if I find one that does adjust in both ways.

[vulgalour]

If any have the rear centre console ashtray still working could you rescue it for me? Mine is all broken and I think something is missing from it as I can't figure out how to fix it.  I could also do with the centre console electric window trim if there's one of those available as mine has screw holes in it.

[Noel Tidybeard]

It adjusts up and down but it doesn't adjust towards and away.

iirc its not impossible for these to get stiff* from lack of use- i'm sure i've heard/read about someone having to "quite firm" with the wheel to get the adjustment back

[bub2006]

I'd have thought a mid spec late xantia would have up down and forward and back adjust. My xsara has it and it's only a year newer and not really high spec. I think like folk have said it may be stiff through no use.

[vulgalour]

I'll go rag on the steering wheel and see if I break anything...

[vulgalour]

... both feet braced against the dash and pulling the steering wheel with both hands results in nothing.  I reckon there's no forwards-backwards adjustment on mine.

[beko1987]

On the XM there was a proper chunky lever on the LH towards the dash plastics that once unlocked resulted in a full floppy and adjustable in every direction steering wheel. I assume the Xantia is the same

[Lacquer Peel]

Neither of my Xantias had reach adjustable steering wheels, but the Parkers spec list suggests it was an optional extra on two models. Possibly an error.

[vulgalour]

The vertical plane adjustment is got by a similar lever to that Beko describes in his XM which is located underneath the steering column shroud out of view. and does allow the wheel to go up and down in an arc rather than a straight line so there is a point where it is closer and a point where it's further away but the distance is negligible. I do find it plausible that on a top end model there would be reach adjustment in addition, as many toys as this car has, it doesn't have body coloured trim and mirrors, heated seats, heated mirrors, leather, a sunroof or alloy wheels as standard.

[vulgalour]

I have just sold this car back to the person I got it from in the first place.  Smiles all round.

[Noel Tidybeard]

i may have an answer for the uppy-downy-inny-outy steering wheel lottery-

 

iirc there was a bit of uncertaincy concerning airbag proximity to drivers fizzog with wheel extended around 95/96/97 so some cars that had airbags only had uppy-downy adjistment until further data was amassed

frinstance my 96 vecturd was uppy-downy but 97 got inny-outy as well

[KruJoe]

SOLD!?

To Moogie?

Are you buying a Rover now Angyl? I have one two two-and-a-half R8's for sale. Cheap. Ready for Vulgalourisation. You in?

[vulgalour]

Sold to Chompy, who owned it between Moog and I.

[vulgalour]

And I'm waiting to see the result of the Rover Raffle before taking the plunge on an R8.  I can be picky and can wait so I'm definitely wanting a 2 door if I do get an R8.

[purplebargeken]

Rover + Vulg = a given.

 

Wurthers at the ready!

[Cavcraft]

I can be picky and can wait so I'm definitely wanting a 2 door if I do get an R8.

 

 

{clears telephone lines and personal message box}

[purplebargeken]

Vulg, try Peter Best Insurance Services. I'm with 'em and they have been pretty good on pricing when others have been stupid. They might be able to do this on a 'modern classic' policy.

[vulgalour]

So, the Onion Bus went back to Chompy and I ended up with this: http://autoshite.com/topic/21187-1994-rover-414sli-2407-update/

 

That meant I was leaving the fate of this car to the one person it hated the most.  What could possibly go wrong?  To start with, he got on with finding out what was going on with the brakes.  This turned out to be badly adjusted handbrake cables, something Mike and I never investigated because the brakes always worked and were just sometimes squeaky.  It looks like the Xantia might have had just one front disc replaced at some point in its life, given how the adjustment went.  Once adjusted some more power was found, unsurprisingly, because the brakes weren't on a little bit most of the time any more.

 

Good!

 

Searching for more things to resolve, Chompy took the opportunity to tweak a couple of items I've forgotten the name of to release more torques successfully.  He was most unlike himself because he just moved things the minimum to get some power rather than all the way to maximum and a bit further.  The result was very good and all was well.

 

Today, he came back to the unit to sort out the actuator arm and tweak it a little further.  The car was still being good and I followed him in at a leisurely pace  because we weren't in silly mode and then I see him pull up and put the hazards on.  Chompy never does this.

 

Then he handed me this.

 

That would be part of the auxilliary belt.  We limped the Xantia the few yards to the unit with the belt getting louder and flappier and generally more worrying.  Got it into the unit and straight up on stands and were both very grateful for the belt failing when it did.  It's a serpentine belt and we were expecting it to be a bit of a bugger to sort.  Luckily, just around the corner is Citromatics who got a brand new belt in under an hour for something like £18.  Here's the old one in situ.

 

Chompy was a little worried his tweaking had caused the problem but on seeing the old belt Citromatics said it was just a really old belt by the looks of it that had been damaged, it was a "ticking time bomb" sort of thing.  After a surprisingly short amount of time the new belt was fitted.

 

Then Chompy did some more tweaking and found more torques and now the Xantia is happy and Chompy is happy and I'm happy and all is well.  Accumulator sphere is up for replacement next as that is showing signs that it's on its way out, it's the only sphere that hasn't been replaced.  After that, Chompy is fitting a new timing belt kit which he's justifying to himself as not too bad a job because he can release yet more torques when he does it.

 

I dunno, this Chompy, he's all torque these days.

[Ghosty]

I can be picky and can wait so I'm definitely wanting a 2 door if I do get an R8.