Electricity and jingoism

0 | June 4th, 2010 | Posted in 1990 Citroen BX TZD Turbo Break, Random car-related musings

The BX’s starting has been coming and going, better generally in the warm weather but still not 100% reliable.

I risk, at the moment, falling into the trap of having a fault with a vehicle which I very quickly get used to and therefore start to forget exists.  The issue with the earth lead is easily solved with a jump lead, like this:

If I don’t get this fixed like, right NOW, there will come a time that I forget all cars don’t need starting like this. I’m already there with this computer, which works really well when it’s up and running, but requires cycling about half a dozen times before it kicks into life.

On another note, various events have drawn my attention to Minis lately.

I saw this scene from my front window tonight, and couldn’t resist a photo.

When you run French machinery you start to get used to the average British person’s casual anti-French racism and the assumption that all French engineering is inferior and badly put together.

When I saw these two next to each other - the Mini three years younger than the BX, and wearing the same PK area code, I was stunned that we were still putting out ’50s designs into the 90s. Kids these days get bought cars from the 2000s as their first cars - when I was of the age to pass my driving test, you could still buy, brand new, the car that replaced the Austin A30.

I know Citroen were guilty of the same thing, with the 2CV carrying on way past its sell-by date. But by this point they were producing the AX, which eventually became the Saxo and Peugeot 106 - most excellent small cars of their era, produced in enormous numbers.

What were we thinking? Why did British industry think it could get away with it? What a wasted opportunity.

Tagged in:

Diesel spill

2 | April 21st, 2010 | Posted in 1990 Citroen BX TZD Turbo Break

I’ve lately been worried by occasional small patches of dirty fluid appearing beneath the car, but haven’t been able to tell what the liquid was.  It was cold, greasy and I couldn’t detect any smell so I thought it was LHM - but the level never seemed to drop, so I ignored it.

I couldn’t ignore it any more though, on a trip which encountered more traffic than usual (as a shift worker I normally miss the queues, but unusually I had to get to work at 09:00 and my 20 minute commute took over an hour) and the cabin started to fill with the smell of diesel.  Once I’d parked there was a definite trail of drips culminating in a puddle rather than the previous occasional patch.

You know how it’s often difficult to find a leak in a crowded engine bay?  Not this time.

It was a case of the usual - the pipe was split at the end, so I chopped the end off and re-fitted it further up.

I’ve applied this bodge many times to fuel systems, cooling systems and hydraulics and I’ve always considered it an acceptable repair - the end of the hose may be split where it’s been cut and then stretched by the pipe that it’s attached to, but it might be in perfectly good condition further up. I’m a bit worried this time though, as the hose wouldn’t fit back on and I had to flare it a little (using one nostril of a pair of long-nose pliers) before it would go on. It’s absolutely watertight for now, but do these hoses come from the factory with a flare on the ends? Should I replace this?

I’ve cleaned up as best I can, but there’s still a load of diesel all over the engine bay so the car will probably reek of it for some time yet. I’d love to leave all the windows and the bonnet open for a while, but I don’t have my garage any more and I’m not leaving it like that out in the street.

Update on the poor starting: My earth cable’s had it. In extremis, I successfully jump-started my car from its own battery, connecting a jump lead from the negative terminal to a good earthing point on top of the engine. I did test it at the time with the multimeter, and it had gone really high-resistance - I forget the figure now, and I didn’t have a camera on me. Of course, it’s been fine ever since, but I will replace the earth cable at some point.

Reluctance to start

0 | April 11th, 2010 | Posted in 1990 Citroen BX TZD Turbo Break

Shiny new battery terminal clamps and a shiny new battery, and still it doesn’t want to start!  It’s intermittent - mostly all right, but then sometimes it flatly refuses.  It goes like this: the glowplug light comes on much dimmer than it should (and occasionally not at all), and when you move the key to the starter position it just clicks.

Last time it happened I got a jump start from a passerby.  Putting the jump leads on my battery made no difference, but when I moved the negative jump lead to a handy earthing point on top of the engine it fired up perfectly - which leads me to believe the problem is with the earth strap on the battery.

I’ve just dug out my multimeter so that I can test it, and of course it’s behaving perfectly today.  I’ve kept the multimeter in the car though, so next time it plays up I’ll hopefully be able to figure out what’s wrong.

Lengthy update on various matters

0 | March 13th, 2010 | Posted in 1990 Citroen BX TZD Turbo Break, Random non-car related musings

Long time since the last post, I know - I have no excuses beyond laziness.

Personal matters first of all, I’ve split up with Mrs Crapoldcars and moved house yet again.  I’m very happy where I am but have lost the garage and the allotment, so the poor BX has to live outside again and there’ll be no more allotment-type posts until I reach the top of the waiting list here.  I do have a garden though, so there may still be some posts about learning to grow stuff.

We did get another dump of snow after my last post.  It came down during the night when I was supposed to be on early shifts and apparently caught the council by surprise as the roads hadn’t been gritted.  It took Mrs Crapoldcars and me half an hour to get the car out of the garage and onto the road, but I thought the main roads would be OK.  No such luck though - the A283 looked like this so I gave up, dumped the car and walked home.  It cleared overnight though.

Next up, the MoT.  Any car this age is going to need some welding, and this time it was the front of the sills.


It also needed a brake flexi, two tyres (which I knew were getting towards the end of their lives, but the abuse from the snow absolutely killed them), a brake caliper and a steering rack boot. David’s spare brake calipers were both better than the ones on my car, so he changed them both. The tyres were donated by one of David’s Peugeot 405s. They’re actually the wrong size for a 405 but right for the BX, so he was happy to give them to me.

Nothing too drastic, but at full garage prices it would have been a fortune - as always, I’m grateful to have a friend with the skills and the stock of spare parts to be able to help me out!  Thanks David.

Talking of his stock of spare parts, I couldn’t help but be amused by the spares car - the brake flexi and steering rack boot were bought new, but the calipers and a couple of other sundries came off this:

Before Christmas the car had become rather reluctant to start, which turned out to be because of bad battery terminal grips. They were the originals and had become very soft, so that they weren’t gripping onto the battery terminals any more - in fact, they fell off when you nudged them.

These were replaced in January, but the car was still unhappy about starting and I’ve just treated it to a shiny new Bosch battery. It positively springs into life now!

Since the MoT I’ve never been quite happy with the car’s handling. Nothing I could quite put my finger on, it just didn’t feel quite as sure footed as it used to. It also seemed to lose power assistance on the steering every now and then. I know the tracking’s right and I was keeping a close eye on the tyre pressures, so I had a theory that maybe the steering rack boot hadn’t gone on quite right and I was planning to take a look the next time I had access to ramps.

Then I finally found out what the problem was on the way to work last week. A metallic sound suddenly started up and I pulled into a layby to find this:

The tyre had come completely off the rim. It’s weird - with the spare on, the car now handles right again and I haven’t had any more problems with the steering. The issues were obviously being caused by that tyre but I don’t quite understand how. Any ideas?

Tagged in: , , , ,

Made it :)

0 | January 8th, 2010 | Posted in 1990 Citroen BX TZD Turbo Break

Just in case you were on the edge of your seat, I did get to work. The roads were absolutely god-awful - worse than I’ve ever seen during the day in the UK. I’d hoped that they would have been ploughed or gritted, or that the the passing of traffic would have cleared the single-carriageway A-roads I commute up.

No such luck.

All the way I was, at the very best, following the previous tyre tracks and avoiding the slow, slush and ice left on each side and in the middle. At worst, I was driving across slush or sheet ice, just barely in control of the car but making sure to keep my speed to a minimum. Just to add to the fun, the weight of snow has brought a lot of bits of tree down so there was a fair amount of avoidance to be done.

Having done that drive at midday, I had no desire to try it again on the way home after dark so when my employers offered a hotel room for the night I jumped at the chance. So here I am, in a chain hotel with the BX sitting outside, not quite sure when I’ll next be home.

In the meantime, be sensible - don’t drive unless you have to, and don’t take unnecessary risks.

Update on the crunch I had in the previous bad weather: Damage to the BX was limited to smashed indicator, broken headlamp mounting, and some slightly bent metalwork. This has all been sorted by Kind David, his stock of spares and a bit of hammerwork - all while I was asleep during my last run of night shifts.

The Merc came off less well. The boot hasn’t shut properly since I chucked a tonne of French plastic into it, and the quote for repairs comes to rather more than the smashed tail lamp I’d hoped for - so my insurance company is on the case. Regulars will know my opinion of the insurance industry in general, so here’s a cautious thumbs-up so far. I’ll name names and give congratulations and recommendations once the job’s done.

Tagged in: ,

Getting to work

0 | January 7th, 2010 | Posted in Uncategorized

Despite the dire weather warnings, I am an emergency service and have to at least make an attempt to get to work. Anyone else, I would advise to stay safely at home with the heating on!

Problem number one: I couldn’t get the garage door open. This doesn’t look like much, but it fell yesterday and froze overnight so it’s more like solid ice than fluffy snow.

Having shovelled this lot out of the way, I then get to get the BX off over a mixture of snow and ice. I pulled out of the garage OK, then gradually came to a halt as snow build up under the front tyres. Going faster would have pulled me through the snow, but then I’d have had no control if I’d slid on the ice underneath.

A bit more shovel work and I was away, bumping out of the drive across the snow and ice and onto the road. Here, I could take advantage of my neighbours’ work and park on a clear bit of road where someone else was parked while the snow was coming down - at least I know I will be able to pull away, but the rest of the journey will be a little trickier!

When predictions come to pass

0 | January 6th, 2010 | Posted in Random non-car related musings

A very short time ago, I wrote a short piece on the fibreglass Ady Gil and wondered how its construction would survive in its rough-and-tumble new role.

News is… it hasn’t. I feel slightly guilty now.

Tagged in: , ,

Let’s off-road!

0 | December 22nd, 2009 | Posted in 1990 Citroen BX TZD Turbo Break

The bad weather continues, as does the deterioration of the BX, in a manner which takes me back to the old days of driving about Europe in completely unsuitable vehicles.

This evening’s adventure should have been a simple trip to the supermarket, but the combination of ratty BX and winter decided to spice things up a bit. It went a little bit like this.

Out of the garage in the usual manner, first gear, clutch up and do not touch the accelerator, crunch across the pack ice and out onto the road. Drive to town, put diesel in car. Car fails to restart. Dammit! Knackered battery terminal clamps strike again. Fortunately the petrol station is attached to a garage, and a helpful mechanic starts us up with the assistance of one of those very useful jump-start packs.

After that I didn’t really want to risk switching it off again so I sat in the car park with the engine idling while my other half got the shopping, wondering all the while why it takes such a slam to shut the passenger door all of a sudden.

Home again and into our road, where I have to come to a halt on sheet ice because the car ahead of me has come to a stop. We live in a close off a side road, so I have a ninety degree left turn to perform on the ice. I’ve managed it without problems every time until today, but unfortunately the driver of the car in front ran out of courage and stopped, and is now stuck. Her husband and a load of neighbours appear out of nowhere and push her out of the way. I am then equally stuck, wheels turning uselessly on the sheet ice. The group of blokes re-appear and get stuck into pushing us - advising me that there is more grip across the pavement than there is on the road, so that’s where I go - suspension into intermediate, up a ramp onto the pavement, across a verge, bump down the other kerb and into the access road that leads to the garages. Great fun, but more than slightly stressful as the car slides sideways across the ice under its five manpower while the steering has as much control as a dinghy rudder would on a supertanker.

Ice. Slide. Crump!

0 | December 21st, 2009 | Posted in 1990 Citroen BX TZD Turbo Break

It’s amazing how quickly an otherwise very good car can start to become quite shabby.  Right now, the BX is filthy because of the weather (which is either foggy, snowing, sleet, or splashing through muddy standing water), struggles to start because of corroded battery terminals, smells of diesel, loses water and just to add insult to injury I’ve decided to punt it into a parked Mercedes.

The recent snow has made my home town very pretty and the local kids have thoroughly enjoyed the Christmas holidays starting early but unfortunately it has frozen to a sheet of solid ice covering my road.  Saturday and yesterday were fine - I just drove very gently, without using the accelerator at all, and made it out onto the main road without any issues.  This morning though, the car decided to just head straight on and plough straight into the little A-class parked opposite the end of my road.  I wasn’t going any faster than I had before - it was just one of those unfortunate things.

It all happened so slowly I reckon I had a good five seconds when I knew exactly what was going to happen and was powerless to stop it.  A gentle slide across the road and straight into the parked Merc.

The indicator is smashed and the mounting brackets for the headlamp are broken. Fortunately, it’s the brackets on the headlamp itself that are broken rather than part of the car, so it’s a straight swap for those. Unfortunately, the wing is slightly bent and there’s a scrape on the bumper - those will be a little more expensive to fix.

I’d thought the other car got away with a smashed tail-lamp lens, but after talking with the owner it seems there’s a ripple in the bumper too. Fortunately she was extremely understanding!

Tremendous fun day out

0 | November 16th, 2009 | Posted in Random car-related musings

Well, here’s a new experience! I’ve wanted to have a go at off-roading for a long time, and yesterday I unexpectedly got the chance, straight out of the blue.

Some friends of mine are into military vehicles, and members of the Invicta Military Vehicle Preservation Society, and I’ve occasionally gone along to meets with them. This one was something a bit special, though, being at Brooklands which just happens to be the site of Mercedes Benz World’s off-road course.

My friends brought along a couple of Austin Champs today, one of which I have driven before on the road. Off-roading is completely new to me though so I jumped at the chance of a go on the off-road course, with an experienced driver yelling instructions and advice!

Despite my total lack of experience, the Champ is such a capable little off-roader that it flatters even a total n00b like me. Obstacles like this one, which had a Land Rover ambulance really fighting to cover, I managed to successfully tackle on the second try.

Champs are also designed for wading, so the water courses were no problem! All in all it was one of the most enjoyable things I’ve ever done behind a steering wheel and I desperately want another go.

The variety of vehicles that the military types are into is huge, such as this armoured scout car. Must save hard…

We had an unexpected bonus, late in the day. Brooklands own the Vickers Vimy replica which has been flying about celebrating those pioneering flights of 90 years ago, and the decision has been made to retire it for all sorts of terribly sensible reasons pertaining to aircraft registration, airworthiness certificates, and having somewhere to fly the thing from.

Brooklands doesn’t have a permanent runway, but it does have a strip of grass suitable for a First World War Bomber and we were privileged to see the Vimy come in for a final landing.

It was a truly impressive sight, this mighty old aeroplane at once big and square yet light and graceful, coming in almost silently to touch down with a featherlight touch. It’s hard to imagine what it must have been like for Alcock and Brown flying what is effectively a powered box kite into completely unknown new territory.

Here’s Brooklands’ own video. The fruity engine sounds you can hear in the background are the Mercedes Benz World customers learning to do powerslides on the skid pan, just on the other side of the grass runway from where we were standing!

Tagged in: , , ,
RSS for Posts RSS for Comments