I'm back! (And looking for a Citroen...)

[Mandrake]

Hey Kenny,

That's great. I had to top up again today and sure enough I couldn't get the cap off without a pair of pliers to pull on it... luckily I planned ahead and left a small pair of pliers in the car for just such an eventuality I'll send you a PM...

[Mandrake]

So today I finally got some time to take the front left wheel off to search for a rattling noise that's been getting a lot worse in the last few weeks, and I found this:

Yep, a completely snapped handbrake cable that has been flapping about against the suspension... Truth is its probably been like that for a while, I noticed the handbrake pulled up further than it should but otherwise seemed to work ok (plus its an automatic with park mode) so I assumed it was just out of adjustment, I certainly wasn't expecting to find it snapped on one side. Doh. Shows how good the handbrakes on a Xantia are when a single side can hold the car on a steep hill! As a bodge until I can get it fixed I've removed whats left of the cable at the calliper end and also cut it short not far from the loop where it comes through from the engine bay to stop the end poking out from touching the wheel on full lock.

Problem is my mum is coming over to visit from NZ at the start of July and we were planning a bit of touring around Scotland and also venturing down to England so I really ought to get it fixed this month before all that driving...and as well as feeling like I'm not really equipped to tackle such a job at the moment I simply have no time to do it before then due to shift work patterns, other commitments etc, so I might have to swallow my pride and take it to a garage to do the job.

Is it likely to be one of those long fiddly jobs that a garage would charge through the roof for, or is it not too bad for a competent garage with a hoist ? Does anyone have any suggestions of nearby independent Citroen garages ? As you can all probably relate to I'd be quite reluctant to take it somewhere that doesn't have Citroen experience...(I'm reluctant as it is to ever let garages get their hands on my cars let alone non Citroen ones )

While I had the wheels off I checked for other problems and found the right hand outer track rod balljoint is shot (easily 1mm of visible slack when rocking the hub) but I wasn't able to find any slack in the left track rod, or any of the other joints on either side, at least not by hand. Is a badly worn track rod joint enough to upset wheel tracking enough to significantly increase fuel consumption ?

Despite not finding any other loose joints, and removing the loose bits of the handbrake cable, there is still a clatter on the left hand front which sounds like droplinks or maybe the lower balljoint.

There is also a LOT of rust to the point that I'm worrying about getting the next MOT, as I don't know how much rust is acceptable on suspension components over here, the amount of rust I see would be a definite fail in NZ where car underneaths don't rust nearly as much. (My previous Xantia had basically no rust on the suspension components, or anywhere for that matter)

I've attached a few pics of the rust for comment, also pics of the lower arm donut bushes which look a bit dodgy, perhaps after market as they look quite soft compared to what I remember on my last Xanita.

(More in next post)

[Mandrake]

[DickieG]

I'd say bushes may have a problem at the next MOT but the metal components should be OK, that'd be classed as surface rust, especially in Scotland

[CitroJim]

Yes, the rust looks a lot worse than it really is. MOT testers are looking for structural strength, not prettiness

Remarkably, replacing a handbrake cable on a Xantia is one of those jobs that look a right 'mare but is actually very simple and easy

There's been a few threads about it in the past...

[KennyW]

Simon,

PM sent

Kenny

[Mandrake]

Yes, the rust looks a lot worse than it really is. MOT testers are looking for structural strength, not prettiness

Well that puts me a little bit more at ease, but the rust still is unnerving, especially the right hand end of the roll bar which looks pretty bad.

Remarkably, replacing a handbrake cable on a Xantia is one of those jobs that look a right 'mare but is actually very simple and easy

There's been a few threads about it in the past...

I've been looking on GSF for handbrake cables and I'm a little bit confused about whether I have the correct part numbers or not. I did a search on the forum but didn't turn up any part numbers, only a couple of threads with general advise on how to change them...

The ones I'm looking at on GSF claim to be for a "CITROEN XANTIA 3.0 V6 Petrol (01/98 - 04/03)" and there are two different ones:

PART NO : 731PC0080, which says "Fitting position right, Fitting position 2 front, Length 1333mm"

and

PART NO : 731PC0090, which says "Fitting position, left rear, Length 1262mm".

I'm assuming that the left and right handbrake cables are separate cables and one of these is the left and one is the right, but the "fitting position, Left rear" is throwing me a bit...also I'm sure the thread that I was reading here was saying the left cable is longer than the right one

Does anyone know for sure if these are the right length/part numbers for a V6 auto before I buy them ?

[Mandrake]

One other question, the rear brake calliper bolts whose part number was posted earlier in the thread, are they a dealer only part, or can I get them elsewhere ? I've contacted the nearest Citroen dealer twice now to try and get some, and they don't seem to be bothered to get back to me. Not interested in small parts purchases no doubt. I'm trying to gather together what I need to get the rear brakes done soon.

[RichardW]

Simon,

Rear is a typo by GSF I suspect- all Xantia h/b cables are on the front of course! The bit about the cable being longer relates to the V6 / 2.1TD / 2.0T / HDi 110 using a longer cable on the LHS than 'lesser' cars. The RH cable is longer than the LH, since the equaliser is located on the LH side of the tunnel (hand brake not moved for RHD conversions...!). The cables you want are 1295 long on the LHS and 1335 on the RHS (same on all RHD cars).

You could get the caliper bolts elsewhere probably, but they are 10.9 (?) not 8.8 and you would need to know the threaded / unthreaded length, but this would be easy to estimate by measuring the clipers. I could measure the estate ones, but that's not much help to you! I've always found the Armadale Cit dealer parts OK - even if it is Arnold Clark.... not a million miles from you.

[Mandrake]

Yeah I thought rear must be a typo. Both GSF and AEP have enough typos and inaccuracies on their parts listings to make me always question and double check everything, especially when there are different versions of the same part for different model variants...I've several times seen part listings that say "also fits model xyz" when I know for certain that variant of the Xantia doesn't use the same part

So if the left cable should be 1295 and GSF lists 1262mm, that's not the right cable for the V6 and is actually for the smaller engine models ? Or is the shorter version of the cable much shorter and a 30mm difference is within tolerance for the long version of the cable ?

Regarding the bolts, in that case I think I'll just try another Citroen dealer (or two) until I find one that is helpful...

[RichardW]

Correct, Simon, 1265 is the length for LH cable for BE3 'boxed cars.

Edit, re the bolts, the hatch are M9 which is a non-standard size, so might be difficult aftermarket. Be aware though, that they are £4.28 from Citroen. And that's EACH

[Mandrake]

Just phoned a local citroen agent and ordered the 4x caliper bolts, they were £3.57 +vat each, should have them on friday. Success

Just for laughs I asked for a quote on the handbrake cables as well - £31.45+vat for one and £48.65+vat for the other This compared to £13.80 each from GSF.

Problem is, how do I get the correct length left cable out of GSF if their own system lists the wrong length cable ? Ideas anyone ? For some reason their website won't let me do a general parts search it insists on taking my number plate before giving me any results, thus shows what they believe (wrongly) is the correct cable for my car...rather than letting me search all Xantia handbrake cables and finding the right one by length.

Guess I'll just have to phone them, or try somewhere else as I'm not willing to pay the Citroen price for them.

[addo]

It's already rogered - why not remove the old one and measure it? That's the old school approach.

[Mandrake]

It's already rogered - why not remove the old one and measure it? That's the old school approach.

You misunderstand the problem.

We already know what length the cable should be - if RichardW says its 1295mm for the V6 then that's good enough for me, I'd rather believe forum regulars who know what they're talking about than GSF's dodgy parts system which I have already found several other obvious errors on. Particularly when I've read in other threads of people often being supplied the wrong length cable for the "big engine" Xantia's causing the handbrake to bind when turning on full lock... The problem is getting the right length cable despite their stock list having it wrong.

Besides, here's some of what's left of the original cable:

[Xantidote]

Would some kind person please enlighten me as to exactly where the cable length measurement is made from/to. I assume it's the inner we are talking about, and that the outer is appropriately shorter.

Thank you