Brookjm's BX Handbrake woes

[gordonbennet]

Why have we got such soft spots for BX's, i like Xantia just as much, but C5 never did endear itself.

 

Anyway, for my sake you've, pretty please, got to put some black paint on that heavily rusted front disc and track rod end,  OCD is kicking in and my painting arm is twitching.

 

The parking brake on these used to take some thinking about when carrying these by the lorry load, some of the decks were sliders on the lorry and you'd stop the car well back with the rear wheels on the sliding deck and let the deck pull it in, with a BX, Xantia or first gen C5 (all bloody good parking brakes mind), you'd have to drive the car further  in and then let the deck just slide in under the free wheeling rear wheel...an old chaps head could spin....only good thing was with an auto version you didn't need to worry remembering about locked transmission...with a normal FWD auto car with handbrake operating on the rear wheels if when you got to delivery point and forgot to turn on ignition and pop it into neutral you could do some severe damage to transmission when the deck hydraulics got going if the tyres gripped too well.

[dollywobbler]

They are indeed easy to fit, but a bit fiddly. You need to remove the centre console rear trim, but that's easily done. You need to adjust it at the handbrake end, so the bracket that pulls both cables is nice and even. Finding the hole on the underside can be a bit fiddly. Don't forget to use axle stands! To be honest, I wouldn't entirely trust the standard jack. Was it this BX I put a dent in the offside sill on when trying to use the standard jack?

 

As for rear suspension mounts - there's a subframe instead. It had some welding to the rear boot floor when I had it - I'm not sure he cut away that much of the original floor though, just patched it. The problem area is the front mounts for the rear subframe. You can view these by removing the plastic trim either side of the rear seat. I did this on my current BX the other day and I wish I hadn't! Effectively, this area is right at the top of the sill, in front of the rear wheel.

 

The rear spoiler is exactly what it should wear for that spec, albeit not that colour. It was a right state though. That lacquer is hilariously poor. I think they must have bought it from whoever supplied Matra for the metallic Espaces.

[Minimad5]

Re spoiler: Sorry it was me who sprayed it ! , it was meant as a temporary thing to stop further water ingress (I also placed some black sealant around the base to ensure no water leaked into the car.

I've got the Horn ready to send you, just waiting for DooVlA to hurry up with V5 :/

Glad you are happy with the old girl, and i wish i kept her to be honest.

[mat_the_cat]

One thing which will make it easier changing the cable, is to tie a piece of wire/string to the old cable end inside the car. Pull out from underneath, then use the string to pull the new cable though - saves faffing around trying to poke the new inner cable through the hole.

[mrcitroen]

One thing which will make it easier changing the cable, is to tie a piece of wire/string to the old cable end inside the car. Pull out from underneath, then use the string to pull the new cable though - saves faffing around trying to poke the new inner cable through the hole.

That's how I do it. It also ensures the cable is routed correctly and helps prevent it chafing on the front wheel.

[HMC]

Great tip on how to help thread it through! I rang AEP but sadly they were out of stock. Instead Ive gone for an e bay jobbie which should be on its way as I type according to the claims on the listing. Being skint I ordered one rather than a pair which hopefully wont come back and bite me when its up on some axle stands.....

[richardmorris]

The spoilers were terrible new. My Dad had his painted three times under warranty as they kept bubbling up at the sides.