Le bus oignon - Xantia of many Autoshiters - GYPSY CURSE

[ruffgeezer]

I've had some of the Missus' home made chilli tonight, so I too am having

 

POWER CLOUDS!

[KruJoe]

Today, at Castle K_Joe:

 

 

C_Snake brought the Xant for preventative fettling.

E_Cabbage doing the honours.

Apprentice MEKANIK KITTEH not impressed.

[vulgalour]

CALENDAR

[Bren]

Exhaust looks like a cherry bomb!

[Lacquer Peel]

Does E_cabbage retain the skin on his knuckles?

[Lacquer Peel]

It is an easy job on an FSO Caro 1.9 diesel.

[binhoker668]

Well there y'are.  My Xantia hit 110,000 on the way to work this morning...

[vulgalour]

Sometimes I miss this car and then I do wheelspins in the Rover and I don't anymore.

[320touring]

I have been trying to find another xantia td estate being raced ... Alas, I cannot. Wonder if you guys can?

is that because they look almost static in the videos and you think you're looking at a picture?

 

[dugong]

I have been trying to find another xantia td estate being raced ... Alas, I cannot. Wonder if you guys can?

Would you like me to race you in my ZX estate?

[vulgalour]

WHITE FRENCH CAR RACING SERIES

[dugong]

WHITE FRENCH CAR RACING SERIES

LE SERIE EXEMPLERE

[320touring]

Regardez la voiture avec le claaag

[vulgalour]

Rules:

Safety berets must be worn on the race track

Wine and cheese to be consumed at every given opportunity

Smoke

Brakes are optional

[KruJoe]

 

 

 

 

 

They're away!

[vulgalour]

Is the Xantia just slower because it spends the first 5 seconds trying to make the towbar touch the tarmac before setting off?

[Noel Tidybeard]

Rules:

Safety berets must be worn on the race track

Pernod and cheese to be consumed at every given opportunity

Smoke

Brakes are optional

FIFY

[320touring]

Nope just slower coz the tyres are a bit shit due to the age and lack of rubber left, that and the fact it weighs in at around 1360kg which is loads more than the 205!

Lol I love excuses

If it helps, my Octavia is 140okg before removing anything..

[Lacquer Peel]

My Caddy is supposed to be between 950kg and 1150kg depending on who you believe, and it's getting V70 TDI injectors. EAT MY VEG SMOKE.

[Richard]

Nope just slower coz the tyres are a bit shit due to the age and lack of rubber left, that and the fact it weighs in at around 1360kg which is loads more than the 205!

Lol I love excuses

 

It's inertia. The 205 was quicker off the line than just about everything it raced because there is less weight to get moving.

[320touring]

It's inertia. The 205 was quicker off the line than just about everything it raced because there is less weight to get moving.

definately a factor - getting going is the most difficult bit!

[Lacquer Peel]

Now you've lost the A/C radiator there's more room for a big intercooler.

[320touring]

"Not sure if it's made a difference to performance yet, guess there's only one way to find out!"

 

8th November...

[KruJoe]

 there's more room for a big intercooler...

 

... or a basket you can drop ice cubes into before each run

[Richard]

I've been trying to think how that could be done with a vertical intercooler.

[KruJoe]

 

You're welcome

[320touring]

I might put hot water in mine- just to give you lot a chance;)

 

seriously though, looks like good work and cooler air can only be a good thing!

[beko1987]

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.

Sorry to drag this up, but can you remember if this belt was a boggo Xantia aux belt? I know the air con has been removed for much cooling improvements, but is the air con condensor still belted up with the rest? I kind of need one this weekend as it's started shredding again, but got intimate with the cambelt with hilarious results!