The Xantia of Not Many Shitters

[somewhatfoolish]

I doubt even Peter Sellers had bespoke headliners made from his old suits.

[Stinkwheel]

On 8/5/2023 at 9:17 PM, Mad Cyril said:

That rev counter thing is almost normal when a Xantia is jump started.
It's really not difficult to whip the instruments out, pop the front off, flick the needle back, and all will be fine.

I just drilled a 2mm hole in the face perspex in a suitable place and poked a paper clip in every time it did it 🤣

[purplebargeken]

I don't possess a suit. Black T shirts instead?

I have a 2mm drill bit... sorted!

[purplebargeken]

The light issue will be interesting. Gotta be a furred up earth....

[RoverFolkUs]

It's French m9 so it's terminal, just scrap it m11 😄

[Rust Collector]

Happily enough, when I bought my ZX it came with a Xantia Haynes manual. Annoying at the time as it meant I had* to buy a ZX manual, but handy now as I'm armed with the circuit diagrams for the lighting. As @Zelandeth said it's a simple circuit with no relays so should be straightforward to test. I'll aim to move the car up to the stables tonight or tomorrow evening (depending on what exciting tasks my mrs has prepared for me) so I can work on it more easily.

[Zelandeth]

Also regarding the rev counter, if memory serves the trip reset button just pulls off on the S2 cars so you can reach in through there with a suitably shaped bit of wire to flick the rev counter needle back round.  I remember having to do that on my first one once when the battery died.  I definitely didn't drill holes in anything or dismantle the cluster.

[Stinkwheel]

10 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

Also regarding the rev counter, if memory serves the trip reset button just pulls off on the S2 cars so you can reach in through there with a suitably shaped bit of wire to flick the rev counter needle back round.  I remember having to do that on my first one once when the battery died.  I definitely didn't drill holes in anything or dismantle the cluster.

Now you tell me 

[purplebargeken]

Oh Jesus. He has stables for storing chod. 100 percent not jealous.

Bloody Nora, it's almost like they knew the Rev counter needle would do a French. That's intelligent design for you.

[purplebargeken]

Looks like a replacement stalk is probably required. 

[purplebargeken]

Nothing to watch for here tonight folks. Move along....

[Rust Collector]

I think you need to call this one Christine…

Just got back from the farm after a call from my parents; ‘we’ve noticed that on one of the cars, the headlights have turned on’.

My mrs was teaching a singing lesson this eve so I was on baby duty today, but tomorrow after work I’ll take my multimeter and some tools up and find out what’s what so that we can move on to sending it in for MOT and an exorcism.

[purplebargeken]

If it was Christine it would have fixed itself by now and slaughtered a few fuckwits too.

At least the headlight bulbs work.

[Rust Collector]

Stuff is happening:

But like a tosser I left the wiring diagrams at home.

A part of Christine will come back with me:

I’ll test it on the bench at home.

[Rust Collector]

Testing complete:

The stalk appears to be the culprit. Regardless of position, the sidelight switch is always closed and the dipped beam switch is always open.

I’ll use a jumper wire as a simulated* switch tomorrow on the car to confirm, but I’m fairly certain a replacement stalk is the way forward.

[barrett]

That stalk is a known weak point on Xants. I remember having some issues with lamps on one of mine and going as far as buying a replacement stalk, which was all that was needed for the problem to just solve itself the next day and never reappear. That 'fix' lasted long enough for some terminal hydaulic problem to manifest itself and cause a good old-fashioned scrapping.

[purplebargeken]

Yay and boo all in one post...

[purplebargeken]

New stalk has cured the lighting issue, just a couple of bulbs required. However, the indicators aren't indicating. Xantia wisdom merchant's suspect the hazard switch...

[Rust Collector]

Allow me to provide a visual update!

Battery leads on:

So far so good:

Switch set to sidelights:

Perfect.

Switch set to dipped beams:

Perfectish... Will be ok with a new bulb in, I'm sure*.

Switch set to full beams:

Perfect.

The front fogs aren't working (suspect bulbs) but aren't testable. The testable rear fogs are working, thankfully.

The indicators stopped working on the journey to the farm (nothing more bum clenching than turning off of a busy main road with no working indicators, I could've done with @Weird Car's hand signal sign in the back window 😅) and I just assumed this was stalk related also.

However, the indicators have not come back to life with the addition of the brand new stalk, and a brief browse online points to the hazard switch potentially as it looks like this provides power to the indicator circuit when in the 'off' position and then cuts power to the indicator switch in the 'on' position in order to override the input from the stalk. As best I can tell, they use the same relay but I could be wrong as I don't have the circuit diagram 'key' with me here so I'm making educated guesses on some of the parts. The indicators flash correctly with the hazard switch in the 'on' position so my uneducated guess is that the relay is fine but the contacts supplying power to the indicator circuit are fouled up. I can potentially check this by removing the plug from the stalk and checking if I'm getting power to the stalk's indicator circuit, so I'll check this tonight hopefully. Fingers crossed that it's something as simple as cleaning up some switch contacts and we're done with chasing electrical faults! 😅

[omegod]

Great progress Mr Rust, when you've finished with that you can work out why my Saab 9-3 is getting 12 v to one front fog light and just 5 v to the other  

 

[purplebargeken]

I understood...... the fingers crossed bit...

[Rust Collector]

I had some competent help this evening:

And we* got the indicators working.

Hazards:

Indicators:

For anyone who has a similar problem, the approved repair procedure is just press the hazard switch repetitively until the indicators function again. The contacts in the hazard switch that feed the indicators were obviously fouled up. Would probably benefit a strip and clean but I only had one hand free this eve 😅

Better get it washed, get a headlight bulb stuck in and then get an MOT booked quick!!

[Tickman]

Outstanding work.

Hope the hourly rate is reasonable especially with two people on the indicator repair!

[Asimo]

Is that a 9500 rpm tickover?

[Rust Collector]

5 minutes ago, Asimo said:

Is that a 9500 rpm tickover?

Apparently I need to pull the trip computer reset button out and encourage the needle back to where it should be with a bit of wire. That’s not a photo of me doing a racing start 😅

[purplebargeken]

Oooooh. Nice cheap repair, we like that! It was obviously your shorter chief mechanic that found the fix.  This is exciting stuff for sure and satisfying too. Yay for a new bulb and a wash...

Bit of full fat pez and a bottle of Cataclean and then emm oh tee time hopefully.

Bloody marvelous.

[High Jetter]

3 hours ago, Rust Collector said:

I had some competent help this evening:

And we* got the indicators working.

Hazards:

Indicators:

For anyone who has a similar problem, the approved repair procedure is just press the hazard switch repetitively until the indicators function again. The contacts in the hazard switch that feed the indicators were obviously fouled up. Would probably benefit a strip and clean but I only had one hand free this eve 😅

Better get it washed, get a headlight bulb stuck in and then get an MOT booked quick!!

Revs are - off the scale.

[Rust Collector]

MOT booked for 11:30 Monday morning - the earliest slot I could get. I'll sort the headlight bulb out tonight and between now and the test I'll give it a quick wash and tidy up so as not to offend the man from the ministry too much. Fingers crossed that she goes through without anything too traumatic arising!

[purplebargeken]

Oooooh, oooooh, ooooooh. 

 

 

[RichardK]

This is very exciting!