C5 X7 Radiator burst

[Doxat]

[Doxat]

During yesterday ride, that should last some 600km, after some 20km on uphill part of road, sharp curves, second gear (automatic tourer)... stem first behind in mirror, after around good, temperature sharply started to raise, entered "in red"... I stopped a side, removed child from back seat 15m far from the car, took extinguisher in hand, stoped cabin cooling an transfered it to hearing that had effect - returned to normal working temp and removed to hot warning from board. Then I shut it down, and after short diag discovered that some 15cm of plastic is missing from top of radiator.

After we started again car, to mount it on truck, and again to download it from truck - all working fine, no errors... Now is at some local "expert" garage... I will inform you further...

[Doxat]

Sorry for typing errors - phone corrects it on its own : " steam arround hood ... turning on cabin heating had effect, and cooled it down... removed warning that temp was too high... etc"

[bobins]

That's a very unusual failure Make sure the garage looks at the air filter and air intake piping as it may have drawn water / steam into the air intake.

[Doxat]

Tnx...good point. I will send him message tomorrow...

I didn't mentioned that, as I could see (but don't look all the time at the board), there was no owerheating before water went out... also, after I turn off engine, radiator fan continued to work few minutes later... so, haven't got a clue what happened...

I noticed that in front of cracked part of the radiator, there are two sharp screws pointed towards radiator plastic. Coming from car metal part in front (beam)... is it possible, that radiator, because is a little bit loose and flexible in movement on rough road hits those two screws, and that during the time cracked plastic? Can somebody check that on his own car? Hopefully is something stupid as that..

[GiveMeABreak]

It's perfectly normal for the fans to continue to work after you have switched the engine off - in order to cool the engine - as you have seen in your case with the overheating issue due to a leak.

I'll take a photo of min for you shortly...

[GiveMeABreak]

I'm not sure which bit you want photos of, but here is my air intake 'funnel', but you have a DW10CTED4 163 engine - mine is the DW10BTED4 140.

[bobins]

I've had a look on mine and there are no screws in that area that could hit the radiator, but mine is a 140 engine like Marc's above.

[white exec]

Could one/more of those three plastic rivets (on the shroud top) have been replaced with screws?

[GiveMeABreak]

The air intake funnel should be held in place by plastic pull / push studs and even on mine, they have come away or not been put back by Citroen service personnel. Mine is now held on with a cable tie, which is a better way to prevent it coming away.

See below for the Op’s Car item 4 is the plastic stud.

[Doxat]

Tank You all for the effort... screws are some deeper under... probably one needs to raise plastic shroud cover... exactly in level of radiator plastic, toward front of the car...

When car returns, I will show You... or maybe today, if I make some visit to check progress...

[Doxat]

Hmmm... what is holding hood lock mechanism?

[Doxat]

In my first post, if You look second photo, You will see that hood lock mechanism is exactly on that spot... if there are 3 longer screws, maybe was that...

[GiveMeABreak]

This is the bonnet and bonnet catch fixings o your model if it helps - screws and fixings are in the small boxes.

[Doxat]

Don`t have car to check, but 78/79 looks suspicious ...hmmm... Because radiator is flexible, and have space for movement in all directions (mine I think also missed right upper holder), so on some road holes, and bumps, there could be a chance to hit against those two screws in front... also, as You can see on my photos, hose holder (circular spring), that fix upper hose to radiator was turned up - is there a possibility when You close the hood, that hood over air intake hit that spring, and transfer force to the radiator plastic?

By my opinion, cause of this should be some kind of mechanical impact - not high pressure in the system (hopefully..)