. Have experiance working on things from 1928 B14g all the way to modern C5s and anything inbetween.My first car was a 1979 Dyane6, I still have, gradually getting restored and messed around with, Ive owned a 1975 GS 1220 C-matic pallas in sh*t brown, LTW 70P if its still out there, only sold it last year, to what I know, its in a garage getting restored to its former glory, as it should really, cracking car. I just didnt have the time to sort it out myself. I also have owned an R reg Xantia 2.0i 16v Desire2 but an unfortunate incident on a roundabout with slippy conditions means that it was sent to the scrapyard. That started my fondness to the Xantias and I wanted another, the best they did!!
That brings me to my current car. Its a 1999 Xantia 2.0i 16v Exculsive, named "Black Betty". (the song 'ram jam - black betty' was on the radio, car pulled out on me, I braked hard, my ex, singing away, "woooahhh black betty" and it just stuck). Its just over 150,000miles, Ive owned it for 2 years nearly and its the best car Ive owned
Its a great car, in my oppinion, the best car Citroen made and as new as you would ever want to go. No complex BSi units, hpi to go wrong, dual mass flywheels, particulate filters or exhaust recycling or any of that crap modern Citroens are plagued with nowadays to go wrong and cost fortunes.
Its had a great deal of work done to it, recent heater matrix change, clutch done, previous history of gearbox rebuild, cambelt, head gasket. Its got a Xsara VTS inlet manifold/injectors/throttle body, thats been ported, the heads been ported to suite the manifold with no restrictions, a PTFE gasket to prevent heatsoak between alu manifold and head. Obviously the manifold had to be modified to get round the hydraulic pump, is rather a tight fit. The throttle body has been bored out too. Had to make an induction kit fot it as the standard filter wouldnt fit, sounds loud and generally, mhmm, chavvy. Would ANYDAY have a standard airbox but cant
. Got a Xsara VTS exhaust manifold that im going to have a bash at fitting sometime soon, just looks rather scary to fit. Kent Cams snuck in the head, oooh my, really does pull. A few GrpN 306 mods, gear linkages, engine mounts, decat exhaust but the rest of the exhaust is standard. Brakes I have EBC ultimax rear pads, EBC greenstuff front pads with Black Diamond drilled and slotted discs all round. To help it out, Goodrich hoses up front. I have Xantia HDi alloys, for some unknown reason they had 5.5j wheels on the petrol exclusives but 6j wheels on the HDi. I run Yokohama Parada Spec2 tyres, they arent original size but it keeps the car on the road but the speedo is a little out :/. Its estimated its around 180-200bhp, really could do with a real remapping and rolling road to get it to its max but at the moment, its good. Has been said that its quite a "sleeper" or a "Q car".
But yes, you make some valid points that certainly keep a lot of us on here running the Xantia. Between us we have not found any big show-stoppers yet that stops us fixing them...
For an oil-burner the 2.0 HDi is bloody excellent too but then you'll know all of that from your time in Marsh Citroen....
. BuWith Dave though, yes, you summed it up in one. What Dave doesnt know about Citroens isnt worth knowing. Wearing off on me too, not complaining too much mind you.
Some of the worst tyres ive driven on were 'Hero' tyres, on the car when bought. On a C5 they were shocking, there would have been more wet grip if the car was just running on its rims, very scary indeed. Needless to say they were binned with 7mm remaining. Second only to some Remoulds (Kingpin branded?) on an XM, wow, understeer at about 15mph in the dry and a really odd rhythm through the car which would usually give cause to warrant driveshaft replacements. Tyres really can make or break a car!