XM OMG demolition derby! (not bangers)

[jonathan_dyane]

This being the first opportunity I have had to regale you with the fun I had at the weekend I feel duty bound to update you all as to my manoeuvres.

 

07:30 Saturday morning and I was sitting in Liverpool South Parkway waiting to be whisked away on a lovely adventure.

 

This took me over the bridge

 

and far south of the Mersey. As you can see I travelled in style

But only because it was cheaper that way.

 

Changing at Crewe a nice man brought me tea and a small box of snacks. I did not eat the seeds.

 

Alighting at Euston I got the underground to St Pancras which was too stressful a phase to photograph, however I soon found myself on yet another platform.

 

The Eurostar was not for me however, at least not on this particular occasion. Instead I was destined to get an awful commuter train to Strood then the rail replacement service to Chatham where I was met by a nice man and following the exchange of some folding I was excited to be finally back in an XM.

 

I didn't stop again until services on the A14.

I had been troubled with wind noise however I'm glad to report bending the drivers door rectified this solution immediately, and with £20 in the tank I hit the road again

 

Rather than driving back to Liverpool I drove to Durham for the weekend to see the parents and there I managed to treat the old girl to a wash and brush up, and also looked into the non-functioning heater fan. Happily I discovered the Peugeot 406 used the same part and this was a simple fix after a visit to the scrap yard for parts.

 

All in all I'm delighted with my buy, and pleased to report that aside from the usual leaking sunroof/aerial and a slight lack of boost (probably the wastegate spring having softened requiring the rod shortening to compensate) she seems in fairly good shape aside from the odd scratch and dent. Hopefully I'll have the sense to keep this one for some time! I'd forgotten how comfy the XM's are and that wonderful sense of well being one feels wafting along. I'd like to think this should be good for quite a few OMGMPG too, and also should OMNOM the veg too, which is just as well because until I get rid of the Vectra/get to the end of the month I'm utterly skint. But in a good cause!

[mouseflakes]

Rather than driving back to Liverpool I drove to Durham for the weekend to see the parents and there I managed to treat the old girl to a wash and brush up

 

Awww - that's a lovely (if slightly awkward) way to show your Mum how much you care.

[mouseflakes]

Nice one JD - pleased to see my old one wasn't quite bad enough to put you off XMs

[forddeliveryboy]

Given recent AS collections I was getting ready for a posh trip to the South of France for a second when I saw the Eurostar! That would be neat - Eurostar then TGV all the way to Gare de Nimes or Bordeaux, to be met by Monsieur in your latest chod purchase and a swift test drive back for a relaxed lunch on the terrace - followed by more wine and a round of boules with his lovely daughters. No rattling car trailers, just the Tunnel or a ferry to slow progress on the return leg.

 

Perhaps A14 - A1 to Durham in an XM comes a close second? Manual or auto, LankyTim?

[jonathan_dyane]

Awww - that's a lovely (if slightly awkward) way to show your Mum how much you care.

Ewwwwww!

[jonathan_dyane]

It is a manual TD (the one I had off mouseflakes was an auto, and was a lovely car that I did 20000 miles of almost trouble free motoring in [needed an alternator and doseur end cap]. I then sold it and it obviously didn't like it's next owner as much because it caused him no end of trouble such as the crank pulley breaking up, complete failure to start in the cold and collapse of the diesel pump. This all culminated in the gearbox failing quite recently...)

[chaseracer]

Well bought, sir.

 

As I may have mentioned previously, I have a large amount of XM spares that need rehoming...

[Junkman]

Awww - that's a lovely (if slightly awkward) way to show your Mum how much you care.

 

Yeah, and as an added bonus, she is paying the water bill.

[dollywobbler]

Nice. Mandarin Red is officially my favourite XM colour.

[richardmorris]

I think I prefer the mauritius blue, but then all of my cars are blue.

[messerschmitt owner]

Mauritius blue is simply the best colour for an Xm and then white. Good news in this being a 2.1 manual. They're the best xm variants.

[mouseflakes]

Mauritius blue is simply the best colour for an Xm and then white.

 

Agree on the white - but best colour is Olympic Blue.

 

[dollywobbler]

Ye gads! Didn't know Olympic was an option! It's my new fave XM colour. Also my favourite BX colour, especially with the late smoked rear lights.

[HillmanImp]

I have to own one of these.

[stuboy]

only reason id got to chatham would be car or female attention... looks very nice

[Joey spud]

Well done on surviving a bus ride from Strood to Chatham...

[NorfolkNWeigh]

When I was young and stupid and the XM was first launched , I got to drive quite a few of them , and hated them!

I found them slow and ponderous, I once nearly came to grief in a 2.0 SEi Auto, when the brakes faded to nothing on a spirited late night cross country dash. Even a 24v manual we had as a fleet demo for a month,couldn't change my mind, even though it would do 150 and sounded great under flat out acceleration ( as I said,young and stupid)

 

But now, I feel I've reached that Big Citroen stage in life, I'd love an early basic 2.0 carb in white, in much the same way if I could afford a DS it would be an ID19- vive la egalitie ,or summat.

I wonder if they did a minge bag basic diesel in France - non- turbo keep fit windows etc?

[beko1987]

Top motor sir. I'm not jelous at all

 

you bastard...

[messerschmitt owner]

 

I wonder if they did a minge bag basic diesel in France - non- turbo keep fit windows etc?

mais oui, certainment.

[DSdriver]

Excellent reportage, I was wafting through Chatham on Saturday afternoon in Thunderbird 2. With superb timing I got to the dockyard just as the skies opened and cats and dogs fell out.

Tell me about the symptoms of wastegate spring fatigue, could it be the reason for the gutlessness of Tbird2 where going down a gear doesn't make it go any faster and I am down to 45mph on big hills.

[the judge]

yum!!!

[jonathan_dyane]

Lots of XM love out there!

 

DS driver there are several things that can cause a lack of boost and the easiest to rectify (but most common) is a split on the rubber hose that connects the injector pump to the air intake and gives the injector pump the 'signal' to dial in more diesel to make use of the turbo. (If you have a bosch injector pump this pipe goes to the 'ufo' on top of the pump. If this is ok and all of the intake hoses are in place with tight clips and no holes next most likely thing (in my experience) is the wastegate needing adjusting because the constant heat cycles cause the wastegate spring to weaken which lessens the boost over time. Ideally to fix this accurately you need a calibrated boost gauge hooked up and you make the adjustment from beneath the car working up the back of the engine where access is so poor you can only either see or touch the item in question. It is a threaded rod going between a bobbin thing and the main body of the turbo and you need to loosen the locknut and screw the threaded portion into it's sleeve to shorten the rod and so increase the boost. There is usually enough adjustment to compensate for a weakened spring.

[DSdriver]

Thanks, I'll let you know how it goes. Noticed today that the temp was climbing above the usual 90 when going up a long steep hill. I am inclined to get someone who knows what they are looking at to sort it out. I had a look yesterday and noticed that someone has put the engine in sideways.

Back to front a la DS I can cope with but that is weird.

[purplebargeken]

Wonderful looking cars, never had one but do lust after. Maybe one day, if there are any left.

[beko1987]

Throw a new stat in a and change the coolant. Mine crept over 90 until I did that!

[jonathan_dyane]

Well I was delighted with the XM and gratified to find that the more I drove it the more it seemed that this was a 'good un'.

 

This made it all the more unpalatable when after three weeks happy motoring I managed to do this:

 

 

Sixteen years motoring without any loss of no claims and I had to go and ruin it all by ploughing into the back of a minicab. Oh how I wished I could have smashed up the Vectra instead which I could have weighed in without a guilty conscience! Fessed up to the insurance bods and confused the woman by announcing that I wouldn't be claiming; no way those sums would add up!

 

I reflected on the best course of action and given that I had no desire for a different car at this juncture I might as well see if I could fix her. I stripped off most of the damaged parts so I could see what the structure looked like:

 

 

Well aside from bending the inner wing to fuck and ripping off the (clearly already rotten) bumper bracket things didn't seem too bad. I was particularly fortunate too in that I had access to specialist panelbeating equipment:

 

 

Thankfully Paul from Anglesey was able to come to the rescue with secondhand parts from a car he had broken in the same colour. Annoyingly as well as mashing up the obvious parts I had also bent the intercooler and smashed the corner off the (otherwise immaculate) radiator so of course I had to replace them too.

 

After a morning of hammering it seemed she may just see the road again:

 

 

And today I finally got her almost back to the condition she was in before I wrecked her (note the addition of correct wheel trims supplied by Lankytim which to my eye improves the look no end).

 

 

Now I can move back on to the list of XM niggles I had to work through and was ready to approach before I had the bump!

[Lankytim]

That's looking a bloody great now, from frag fodder to fixed!

 

My scrapper has a good bumper attachment "mast" thing if you want it, it will need to be welded on though obv.

[DVee8]

Well done that man!

[Bucketeer]

[catsinthewelder]

Top hammer skills sir,  seeing the damage I was sure that it was fucked.

 

I've got to own an XM at some point,  loved them since they came out.