Project BX17RD - the further adventures of PBO

[vulgalour]

Mike had mentioned there was a patch of something under the BX, from his description it sounded like it could have been the side we'd fixed.  Today, by chance, I ended up swinging by the unit so I could get a look.  There is indeed a patch of something under the BX, and that something looks like LHM.  It's not a big leak and it's dripping from the bottom of the trailing arm.  I didn't have time to investigate further.

 

 

I didn't have time to have a look underneath and investigate further today.  I'm wondering if it's the union for the new pipe that goes into the height corrector weeping a little and just needs tightening up a bit since that's in this sort of area.  It could of course be something else, there's plenty of things that can leak.  I'm not overly concerned because it's not a bad enough leak that it's constantly dripping or pouring out when the system is under pressure.  I'll investigate over the weekend if the Princess jobs go smoothly and I have time.

[strangeangel]

There is indeed a patch of something under the BX, and that something looks like LHM. 

 

 

I'm not overly concerned

 

 

It's the only way to remain sane.

[vulgalour]

Right then, been a while since I updated here, things have been busy so there's not been a lot of BX fettling time available.  I had a look at the windscreen seal to see what was needed today because, when I was inside the car, I noticed the passenger footwell was damp.  Since I've no sunroof and as far as I'm aware the door seals and window seals are good, I assumed the heavy rain combined with the not-quite-sorted corners on the windscreen seal may have been the cause.  A quick investigation revealed the windscreen trim seal hadn't actually stuck down for the most part and while the windscreen appears well bonded to the frame, water had got in under the rubber seal.  I spent quite a bit of time cleaning out the sealant from the channel between the windscreen and the windscreen hole before rust treating everything so that anywhere I'd scratched through the paint and any residual surface rust was not going to be an issue.  There was space inside the unit today so I could leave the BX indoors for the treatment to cure before applying fresh sealant and reapplying the rubber seal trim.

 

The leak at that back corner hadn't reappeared and indeed, the suspension is fine.  So perhaps that was residual from some other problem.  With the BX indoors I'll be able to see if it's leaking afresh when I next visit the car.  Where last time the bumper absolutely refused to sit in place properly, this time it went in with merely moderate effort, on my own.  Just as well really since Mike was busy fixing other cars today so it was good not to have to pull him off those jobs to help.  I didn't have any washers or screws with big enough heads for the bottom bumper holes so I couldn't put those in at the moment.  That said, with the side slots and top three screws fastened down the bumper is a very snug fit now.

 

 

 

Also remembered to reinstall the grille.

 

The bonnet has settled a little more, it's almost where it should be now.  For some reason the headlight on this side is sitting wonky, if I got it straight then it popped off the bottom inner ball joint so I'm not sure what needs adjusting there to sort it out.

 

The electrics have come over all French.  The rear drivers side light cluster won't work at all. I've cleaned the connectors, the bulb, the sockets, the earth points I could find, and nothing.  This is very annoying because it was working perfectly fine.  The front side repeater on the opposite side and the front sidelights on both sides have also decided to go on strike and have been similarly disinclined to cooperate.  As a result, left the car like this because I couldn't really go any further.

 

 

There was just one last job I did which was to refit the back half of the exhaust which quietened the car down considerably.  The glow plug relay gave no bother at all today, suspension is working lovely, brakes still nice, etc.  Just to get to the bottom of the electrical gremlin really.

[dean36014]

Drivers side light feed is a plug in passenger light. Clean that connection should sort it. Great work

[vulgalour]

Oh of course, they link across the back don't they?  I forgot they did that.  Thank you!

[Broadsword]

Looking forward to hearing this is back on the road. It's going to be really rather well sorted isn't it!

[vulgalour]

 

That's better!  Culprit was the small green connector on the passenger side cluster had come unplugged.  I readjusted the joining ribbon so there was a bit more slack on the passenger side so it hopefully won't do this again.  Also replaced the blown brake bulb on the driver's side.

 

Up front, the inoperative side repeater was just a poor contact between bulb and holder, that now works.  The sidelights were both poor contacts and one blown bulb on the passenger side.

 

With that done all the lights are now working as they ought to.  I did buy some sidelights but couldn't get back to the unit since I was at the mercy of Mike's schedule since he's been shuttling me about today, so I'll fit the replacements when I'm at the unit again.  Next was to try and get something done on the bonnet and have a look at all of the adjustment.  I found out part of the reason for the misaligned headlight is a bent locator/adjuster.  I did what I could with it to improve the alignment but realistically, I need more than the hour and a half I had today to adjust and tweak all the various parts to improve this.

 

After spending a considerable amount of time faffing with what little adjustment there is on the bonnet and lights, Mike and I go things to the point that the next round of adjustment is in the wings, which need moving a small amount in and out to correct the panel gaps to the bonnet.  There was a balance to be struck on adjustment, since there really isn't much of anything to be had.  The bonnet was got as straight as possible so that it still functioned with the latch, this then corrected the lift on the driver's side a bit and created a similar lift on the passenger side.  The slam panel does appear to be deformed slightly, possibly pushed down, this was more obvious when looking for witness marks on the bonnet and comparing one side to the other.  Some of the deformation was addressed with careful application of wood and hammer above the driver's side headlight though I suspect ideally the whole slam panel needs pull up and forwards a millimeter or two.  It's possible the car has had a minor bump at the front at some point in its life, there's a witness mark on the leading edge of the bonnet and the front plate doesn't match the rear, that combined with the minor deformation found today all points to a minor incident which is easy to rectify once you can find exactly which bit is slightly off.  I could do with another undamaged BX to compare it to side by side

 

I'm not overly concerned about it at any rate.  Most of the time the angle you view the car from means you can't even see the alignment issue, it's only a nuisance because I know about it.

 

The last job for today was to reglue the windscreen seal in place and tape it down so it stands the best chance of fitting well and staying put.  We've used Tigerseal, which is probably a bit overkill.  Eventually I'll probably get a new screen fitted with a new seal, just not yet.  Pre-MoT jobs are now down to the small bit of welding on one sill step and, ideally, the fluids and timing belt change.  It could go before those are done, but I'd rather I get everything as sorted as possible before it goes on the road to reduce the risk of FtP.

[vulgalour]

Let's have a little BX update.  First thing to report is that even though the BX has been sat outside in lots of rain, the passenger footwell is bone dry.  I consider the windscreen reseal a success on that one.  Next up was to have a fettle with the parts I'd acquired recently to improve a few things.  First, let's do the parcel shelf.  My original one has really good blinds and loads of sun fade, the new one has really poor blinds and virtually no sunfade at all.  Let's see if we can make one good one out of the two of them.  First up, I removed the blinds which is five screws on the back of the parcel shelf, it then slides out of the slots that hold it in place easily enough.  You can see here just how faded my original one had become.

 

With the plastic piece out that holds the blind you can then inspect what you've got.  There's no fixings in here holding the blinds in, they just sit in shaped slots.

 

To remove, you simply lift them out.  To get the pull tabs out you can flex the plastic slot just enough to get them through without breaking anything.  It's then a simple, if slightly fiddly, affair of popping the relevant blinds and holder together before screwing the unit back onto the parcel shelf.

 

Another thing I noticed on the replacement shelf is that one of the clips for the strings was broken.  I simply swapped one from the old parcel shelf.  I also salvaged the other good parcel string as a spare for future use, just in case.  To remove these, use a small flat blade screwdriver to push the tang in as you apply pressure to the fixing to pop it free.  Be sure to keep hold of the little plastic washer this goes through to lock it all together too.  Installation was very straight forward.  I'm still on the look out for a replacement shelf clip that goes on the back seat to replace the one that shattered.  Only problem now is the new parcel shelf highlights just how bad the sun fade is on surrounding parts.

 

 

 

 

Next job was to replace this passenger seat base with the one I acquired.  This is a phenominally easy job.  There's two not-tight spring clips at the front just behind the front-back adjustment bar, and two rubber bands at the back that hook into the seat base to keep the seat back trim in place. Undo all of these items and the base simply lifts out.

 

 

I got a little scare when I saw the bright blue version of the fabric in the car because I thought that was what the interior used to be like.  Honestly, I've never seen a BX with that blue cloth for the interior and that's a shame, it looks fabulous.  Mine does seem to just be the usual grey, even though the front grab handles/arm rests are blue and there's a blue tint to the interior fabrics and carpet.  I digress.

 

Side-by-side you can see the wear on the original darker grey base, and how nice the replacement lighter grey base is.  Wait... oh bother.  Same fabric, different greys.

 

Oh well, it'll have to do.

 

I also got a replacement fan blower dial.  The one on the car (on the right here) is cracked where the replacement isn't.  And yes, both have managed to lose the metal spring clip so if anyone has any of those or can point me to where to get them, I'd appreciate that.  It's worth noting that the blower fan only works on max speed too, I believe this is a regulator issue and something that's common and easily fixed so it's on my list.

 

Finally, I had a bit of an experiment with the dashboard.  It has a big brown sunburnt looking patch on it, which is plausible given it's life in the sun, and it felt chalky.  I know usually once vinyl burns like this you can't rescue it.  Nothing ventured nothing gained, I decided to see if I could scrub any kind of 'oxidisation' off, like you would T-Cutting paint, using a variety of potions.  The best results came from the Autoglym Insect Remover, weirdly, and a lot of the burn is much less obvious now.  I'll keep plugging away at it and give it a protective coat of Autoglym Vinyl to see if it brings it back.  The dashboard was easily the worst bit of the interior because you see it all the time and it now looks much better, so I'm happy with that.  Surprised too, since it didn't really seem to bring any dirt off on the cloth

 

 

The same process is unlikely to save the door bins which have started to crumble in places where they're nearly white.  This also shows how blue the grey fabric is in the BX, I'd assumed this interior was the normal grey tweed and vinyl one but perhaps there was more than one grey offered at this trim level.  Perhaps it's just the effects of too much sunshine.

[Broadsword]

Top fettling action there. The fading on the old parcel shelf is impressive. Sorry about the seat colour, it’s something that clearly would have been pretty impossible to tell from photos when you are comparing two shades of grey on different cars. Maybe a bit of suitable fabric dye could help?

[vulgalour]

No need to apologise, I didn't even know there were two greys until I put it in the car.  I'll keep an eye out for more grey interior stuff in the future, for now that seat base is in much better shape than the one it replaced and unlikely to shed bits of foam everywhere either, so it's a good thing.  Still really happy you mentioned that parcel shelf by chance when we visited, would have been a nuisance trying to get one otherwise because of the size and weight of the thing.

[Meter rat]

May I ask what you are doing with the old blinds? My blinds are good, but the little clips that hold them up are missing, so I could do with these if possible.

Regards Ian

[dean36014]

I scrubbed holy hell out that dashboard when I bought it so probably why it didn't bring much dirt off. Looks much better though. I have a feeling that parcel shelf was meant to be light grey, I might be wrong though. Glad you've sorted the leak, come on MOT now!

[Zelandeth]

Interesting...I never realised the BX had the sun blinds, knew the XM had them but never realised they were on here.

 

Really is a car which suits white.

[vulgalour]

@Meter Rat - I was just going to bin them.  If they've got useful bits to you they're yours for postage/collection.

 

@Dean: It would already be MoT'd but SOMEBODY decided daily driving a Princess was a good idea so SOMEBODY has ended up having to spend all his BX money on Princess parts.  The parcel shelf was the same colour, the stripe of unbleached carpet under the blind is exactly the same colour as the other parcel shelf. I genuinely thought it was supposed to be light grey too, it's incredible how much the interior has actually faded in some places.

[Ghosty]

Fan only working on max sounds like a regulator/resistor pack issue indeed. My 850 had the same issue when I bought it, and a new resistor pack restored all four speeds. Presumably the electrickery is bypassed when the fan is on full.

[dean36014]

On the bx it can also be the tracks needing cleaning inside the heater control panel. Might be worth checking before doing the heater resistors

[mat_the_cat]

Fan only working on max sounds like a regulator/resistor pack issue indeed. My 850 had the same issue when I bought it, and a new resistor pack restored all four speeds. Presumably the electrickery is bypassed when the fan is on full.

BX uses a transistor to control fan speed, so different to most cars. Usual failure mode (no blower at all) is corrosion of the transistor case, but it has been known for the transistor to fail short circuit, giving full speed all the time.

https://bxclub.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=17847

[vulgalour]

One step closer.  BX is now insured in preparation for an MoT.  I was going to go with Lancaster but they wanted a frankly absurd £1400 for the priviledge as opposed to Performance Direct's rather more reasonable £170ish for exactly the same policy.  Next: book an MoT.

[vulgalour]

MoT booked!

 

Now the anxious fretting begins.

[The Moog]

MoT booked!

 

Now the anxious fretting begins.

Fingers crossed.

[bangernomics]

Bum clenched for you.

[vulgalour]

Time to do the pre-MoT stuff that might need to be done.  I trundled over to the unit today and my main goals were to check all systems were functioning properly and do that last bit of welding on the sill step, specifically this little bit that was formerly covered with a little square of gaffer tape.

 

 

To get to that I had to remove some interior pieces first.  Fold the seat base forwards and undo the three 13mm nuts to allow you to lift it out of the car.  Then it's a 17mm bolt for each seatbelt, and half a dozen screws for the plastic trims.  I removed the trim that goes along the sill completely, but just propped the B pillar trim to one side since I didn't actually need to full remove it.  I folded the carpet back out of the way of welding and grinding sparks, and moved the passenger seat as far forwards as it would go, to protect everything from damage as much as I could without dismantling the whole interior.  This approach seems to have been successful.

 

With the trims removed I could see into the pocket that houses the bolt for, I assume, the rear subframe.  There's a little bit of rust starting at the seam in there but I'm going to just ignore that right now and come back to it at a point when I can actually drop the whole rear subframe to access it properly.  From the outside it's not really apparent there's anything other than some light surface corrosion, at least as far as I could tell, but I'm sure the MoT next week will decide either way.

 

I chopped out the rotten bit of the sill, and then hit some filler so chopped out how much rust there really was.  A nice easy shape to fabricate at least.

 

Then employed some paper to mask off the surrounding areas.  Since there's quite a bit of bodywork tidying I want to do on the sill-down area of the car, it made no sense to make this perfect today so perfect is not what I aimed for.

 

After weld through primer, regular primer, seam sealer, top coat, and lacquer, it was ready to have the interior reassembled.  I want to clean back the sills both sides fully to deal with the minor rust bubbles at the ends where the rear quarter overlaps, a common problem area, and I'll make this repair tidier and neater at that point since I'll likely have to repaint a good chunk of the sills at the same time and it makes more sense to do the area all in one go.

 

Refitting the interior was very easy.  I could do with the bottom B pillar trim since this one looks to have been hit with something in the past and it's got a lot of cracks in it.  Other than that, everything went back together very easily and quickly and I could then go through all of the pre-MoT checks I'm able to do.

 

Lights - all functioning normally

Brakes - they stop the car pretty well, handbrake works too, hopefully they're strong and balanced enough to pass the test

Tyres - old, but don't appear to be too old or too worn.  They will be getting replaced as soon as I can afford to, probably with some Uniroyals as I've got on the Princess

Suspension - no leaks, goes up and down seems good.

Oil leaks - there is an oil leak, possibly two, on the driver's side.  It looks like one is possibly the sump plug, but that could also be whatever the other leak is higher up simply running down the engine and dripping off the sump plug.  I'm not sure what this could be, it's not a huge leak, oil isn't pouring out, but I would like to locate and sort it.

Wipers - new on the front, reasonable old one on the rear.  Both washer jets are working.  Single wiper on the front still entertains me more than it should.

Exhaust - doesn't appear to be leaking, no smoke out the back, doesn't appear to have any rust holes or perforations anywhere

Rust - I think I've dealt with it all now.  I hope I have.  I couldn't find anything that looked like it would be a problem for an MoT.

Seatbelts - all work, not frayed or anything like that

Warning lights - come on and go off like they should, not that there's very many of them on this car.

 

I'm cautiously optimistic.  I'm not expecting a clean sheet, I know the car isn't perfect, but equally I'm not expecting a catastrophic fail.  We shall have to see what happens next week.

[Meter rat]

Good luck with the MOT. I thought yours would be on the road before mine. The CCC Northern Rally is on the 16-19 May at Wetherby. Maybe we’ll see you there?

[dean36014]

I'm hopefully going up in Shonky so could be a few autoshite bx's there hopefully. Good luck for the mot!

[vulgalour]

I didn't know about that, would be a good opportunity to meet up, hopefully I can trundle over.  I could probably only do the 19th because of work.  There's a double edged thing if ever there was, work is being really good at the moment so I can afford to sort out the BX, but that also means I have very little spare time.  I'm actually putting the BX through the MoT now because I want to switch to it as the main car so I can pull the Princess off the road for a couple of weeks to get through some bodywork and stop spending so much money on petrol for a bit.

[vulgalour]

Today, Mike found some Maserati tri-tone airhorns.  Neither of us know where they came from but they're mine now.  Very loud, much beep.  That's one potential MoT fail now fixed.

 

The rear wiper that looked okay decided today was the day it was going to fall apart.  Mike found a box of wiper blades that he forget he bought and had one the correct size.  Best price!

 

I gave the interior a much needed vacuum, wiped down the vinyl, cleaned the glass... it needs a proper deep clean at home but at least now it smells nicer in there and isn't covered in dust and workshop grime.

 

At the back, I removed the Chevronics sticker which was looking a bit faded and worn out, and both of the France badges because I really didn't like where they were situated.  The rear end looks much tidier now.

 

I am putting the little aluminium France badge back on, next to the number plate, because it's a nice little thing.  I repainted it and gave it a coat of varnish and I'll stick that on when I'm next at the unit.

 

The only thing to do before the MoT now will be to make sure the tyre pressures are as they ought to be on the day.

[Tadhg Tiogar]

Today, Mike found some Maserati tri-tone airhorns.  Neither of us know where they came from but they're mine now.  Very loud, much beep.  That's one potential MoT fail now fixed.

201904-07.jpg

 

....

Triple air horn gets my vote. Are they by Fiamm?

[vulgalour]

I think they are.  They have the Maserati name and logo stamped on them.  Neither of us have ever worked on a Maserati of any sort.

[vulgalour]

Back from the MoT and I am pleased to report it is a CLEAN SHEET PASS.

The drive out was fairly uneventful apart from one of the front wheel trims flying off for no reason.  We did recover it after we got home and it's a little bit damaged, annoyingly, the one it threw off was the one I restored too.

 

The other thing it did, on a long uphill slog, was put the STOP light on and the low coolant light.  Quite alarming after so many uneventful miles so we pulled over onto the hard shoulder to investigate.  Loads of coolant, nothing too hot, and a wiggle of the coolant sensor/temp plug resulted in the lights both going out until after the MoT (phew!).  Problem here is just a corroded connection.  The lights were on most of the way home, intermittently going out, and the glowplug light kept flickering too.  Both are down to slightly crusty connections since a very quick sandpaper of them at the unit managed to get all the lights that shouldn't be lit to go out again.  I need to get some switch cleaner and sort this out properly.

 

There's few things more alarming than that angry STOP sign when you're bumbling down the motorway.  The other issue on the way back was a very sharp corner catching me out and the Michelins doing their usual trick of trying to understeer me off the road.  I don't really get the raving for Michelins, whenever I've driven a car on them they give absolutely no warning that you're past their limit.  I will concede the tyres are quite old and the roads were wet, but I was well under the speed limit so it shouldn't have happened at all.  Just as well new tyres all round are a job for as soon as I can get it booked in locally.  That was really the only drama for the entire day.  Drive out and back was otherwise uneventful and it really is a pleasant car to drive, I could easily rack up many miles in it.  Now its home I can get on with a proper deep clean once the wheather improves somewhat and I've a schedule of maintenance to work through.

 

[Broadsword]

Fantastic result! Must be very satisfying having the MOT after all that hard work. I've never had problems with Michelin tyres myself. The Xantia of impossibleness to sell on I have never understeers on a combo of Cross Climates up front and Energy Savers rear. Let's hope fresh rubber cures it!