dutch/swede The Dutchie - leak found

[Sunny Jim]

10 hours ago, tom13 said:

That back seat configuration is proper cool and all the seats have a really nice sporty style to them. I bet they made stuff from that era look very dated. Do the rear seats fold or are the fixed? Is there also much room in the boot?

Love the Citroen as well.

 

Thanks. The backs of the rear seat adjust independently with 3 positions of rake as well as folding flat over the squabs. Despite its estate/shooting brake pretensions the boot isn't that large as the spare wheel is housed in it vertically. Hubnut's Real Road Test Video explains it.

Today was slightly frustrating as I was hanging around after work until 8pm waiting for a courier to deliver a battery I'd ordered online which failed to turn up so I haven't made any progress on diagnosing the electrical problems. Instead I gave it a clean and discovered the probable cause of the electrical gremlins.

Blocked drains and a very mucky bulkhead covered in a combination of leaf mould and bird shit. I unblocked the drains and was happy to find no signs of water ingress after I washed the car.

It's a relief to hear that the dripping exhaust is probably nothing to worry about but it has dripped this much oil in 24 hours.

I'll have to jack it up and get the under tray off to get a proper look but it appears to be coming from the underside of the oil filter so if I'm lucky it might be an easy fix. At least the oil appears clean.

Closer inspection while cleaning it revealed that both the top of the centre rear panel and the left rear light are damaged - probably by somebody hoiking something heavy over the high boot lip. Possibly repairable but certainly an area to monitor for water ingress.

I then fitted the de rigueur prancing moose and took some arty shots - I love the shape of this thing.

[bunglebus]

9 hours ago, Sunny Jim said:

it has dripped this much oil in 24 hours

It's marking its spot - it likes you and wants to stay

[Sunny Jim]

I finally got round to fitting the CEM that a member of the owners club had kindly sent me last night. The instructions I'd read talked about removing the two screws and "dropping the unit down" which I was struggling to do.

I ended up removing the bonnet release mechanism to give myself more space to get the units in and out.

I'm pleased and relieved to report that it's done the trick and I now have working indicators, windows and central locking - hurray! I quickly got online to get some tax and sort some temporary insurance and was ready to hit the road for the first time.

I did a 40 mile loop around the mountains along some of my favourite twisties and was grinning from ear to ear. It's a nippy little thing for a 1.7 and very easy to hustle along. The ride is quite soft but it doesn't roll and clings on in the bends.

Whenever I pulled over to take pictures the cooling fan would kick in when I switched the engine off although the temp gauge hadn't gone above one third. I drove the eight miles into work this morning, the last quarter of mile of which is very steep and the temp gauge went up to three quarters and as I pulled into my parking space the engine temperature light came on. I immediately switched off and let the engine cool while I got on with my work.

When I'd finished I checked the level in the expansion tank and it was low so although I can see no sign off it I'm guessing I must have a coolant leak somewhere. There is no evidence of 'mayo' on the oil filler cap and the coolant appears clean so I'm hopeful that it's not a head gasket problem but at the moment it's a bit of a head scratcher - I might get a local garage to do a sniff test to rule out HG and maybe a pressure test to see if they can spot where the coolant is escaping from. I've just thought while I type this that although the coolant doesn't look bad I've no idea when it was last changed so maybe a flush and refresh wouldn't hurt.

On the plus side a good blast has cleared the condensation from the exhaust pipe and it no longer drips! I'm off to meet up with @Cord Forteener aka Tim_E tomorrow to compare Volvos - I shall carry some bottles of water just in case.

[Sunny Jim]

Great to catch up with @Cord Forteener aka Tim_Eand chat Volvos and cars in general.

I kept an eye on temps and levels during the trip too and although the temp gauge didn't raise too much I'm losing coolant at the rate of about half a litre an hour on a run but I've still no idea where from. I'm pretty sure both the temperature gauge and the fuel gauge are under reading which indicates a volt drop to both. Somebody from the owners club has told me that they're grounded through metal washers which are likely to have tarnished so I'll have to take the instrument pod apart and clean those.

I'm now fairly confident that I'm not running hot per se  and that the temp light coming on on Saturday was due to low coolant levels. Sniff test kit I've ordered should be arriving next week which I can do myself but if I haven't found the leak by then I'll pay someone to pressure test it. A coolant change and new thermostat are still on the list but the timing belt is due so I might as well get a new water pump while I'm at it. 

[Cord Fourteener]

It was great to catch up, as always. 

The Dutchie is a pretty little thing, after having a 440, which I wished I kept, its very different in its styling but very familiar. 

[Cord Fourteener]

[Zelandeth]

Natural airflow over tha rad on these isn't stellar as I recall and I'm sure my old head teacher's one had a habit of filling the space between the air dam and the radiator up with leaves in the autumn...worth making sure it's physically clear. 

[Sunny Jim]

Thanks @Zelandeth - that's a good shout given the amount of rotten leaves I cleaned out of the bulkhead.

[Sunny Jim]

It appears that I'm not out of the woods yet with my electrical problems. When parked up the passenger door locks and unlocks itself turning on the interior light every couple of minutes. It first did this last Sunday after an hours drive to visit Tim. When I drove home it didn't do it again so I naively hoped it was cured. A couple of nights later when letting the dog out I noticed the interior light was on again so I pulled the number 8 fuse which does the central locking.

I wanted to drive the car today so put the fuse back in and immediately there was a clicking noise (like the indicator warning but quicker - incidently the noise slowed down when using the indicators) and a beep when I started the car although it ran fine.  It's also displaying a couple of warning lights - door open (although I double checked they were all shut) and rear heated screen on (although it wasn't!). Disconnecting the battery and leaving it for an hour solved the problem temporarily. Later I went to Halfords to buy a few bits and the central locking worked and the car stayed locked while I was in the store. The car started fine so I drove home but when I arrived and switched off the clicking started again. Aghh! Intermittent problems are so frustrating.

I've disconnected the battery again for now and will run a diagnostic on the CEM when I get a chance.

[Sunny Jim]

I'm going to try another CEM which will hopefully let me know if it's the module or something else which is causing the electrical randomness. Got some tinkering time in this afternoon. I'd picked up some ramps off FB marketplace for a tenner so after checking they were ok got the front of the car in the air and removed the under tray.

The leak is obviously coming from the right hand side of the engine - it's also obvious I'm going to have to spend some time with a wire brush and rust cure before the winter looking at the underside of the car.

Back down off the ramps I jacked the front offside of the car and removed the wheel and inspection panel.

Bingo! It's the water pump. The timing belt was last done in 2015 at 66k (currently on 82k) so I'll do that while I'm at it.

[Zelandeth]

Excellent!  Glad you found it...

Is there anyone offering an inspection and repair service on the CEM units?  They seem to be quite a common issue on these.  Remember my old head teacher went through three in her 480 back in the mid 90s over the course of three or four years.  The used supply of them will only last so long...

[Sunny Jim]

I've seen adverts for specialists repairing CEM's for other models of Volvo so I assume they'd repair them for the 480 too but I've yet to enquire. From what I've read a lot of the problems can arise from dry solder joints so they'll hopefully be repairable - something else I should probably learn to do!