BXProject

But I don't need anywhere to hide

You've already got your workshop to hide from the missus, haven't you?

mnde wrote:Hmmmm....

It's starting to look like a bit of a project to keep this car on the road, what with the prospect of swapping the rack and FDV, sorting out the rusty B Pillar...

... and at the weekend I found some very soggy cardboard boxes and a soaking wet boot carpet caused, predictably, by a hole in the ns corner of the inner wing hidden behind the side panel - where it joins the floor. Back in 2006 when the exhaust hanger fell off, I asked the garage to make a repair, which they did by fashioning a piece of metal with a hook on it, and screwing it in place through some "good metal".

Mark.

Rack swoppage isn't too bad a job on an XU5 lumped BX really Mark.
Same for FDV swoppage, piece of piss that.
Welding on the B pillar. Well, it'd be a bit of an arse to do it REALLY well, but not too hard to do a suitable patch that doesn't look that scruffy if you're not arsed about concourse and all that shit.

Boot floor, yeah, they all do that! Citroen's own fault actually.
They hung the exhaust from a bit of bent rod welded to a piece of timfoil, even when new the inner wings were fucking tin foil, and not up to taking the weight of the exhaust. So the inner wing flexes, causing the god awful crapite underbody seal Citroen insisted on using to crack, ergo, lots of rusty shit!
Easy enough to patch if you aint knackered, have arc eye and are genrally pissed off. And at the time I was buried in Smiffy's boot, I was all of the above.

I posted about making yourself a little hand screen for getting in those places where no headscreen has ever gone. Easy to make and saves you much grief

yeah, I know, but, ya know.. I hadn't initially intended to spend 10 hours at it, and as ever, there was more than expected..

I was the same for ages, kept leaving it till I got some time

yeah , time, I remember that....

Right, trackrod ends.

Car up in the air on stands, remove the nut, put suspension on low, lift the wheel up and the joint should come apart without recourse to a splitter?

Then undo the locking nut, count the turns, fit new track rod outer, reverse procedure?

The car made a clonk noise this morning on the way to work after which the steering felt strange... Given that the rack is "fucked", to quote Jay, I think I ought to bring the GSA back into action forthwith...

Mark.

Oh, and wedding photos coming soon

mnde wrote:Car up in the air on stands, remove the nut, put suspension on low, lift the wheel up and the joint should come apart without recourse to a splitter?

Never tried this, but to my understanding the car will only lift a wheel if the wheel on the opposite side is on the ground and is pushed up with the weight of the car, the anti roll bar meaning that both wheels go up. Plus I think the trackrod would just pivot around the inner joint rather than the end popping out. If you don't have a splitter than you may be lucky by slackening off the nut, and putting a jack under the threaded part of the TRE (IIRC the taper points down from the top on the BX) to apply force to it, then tapping it with a hammer to try and shock it apart. Others might have better ideas though...

mnde wrote:Then undo the locking nut, count the turns, fit new track rod outer, reverse procedure?

Depending on how rusty it is you *may* need heat to get it undone.

Why did you change the TRE? I said check them out, only change them if you find play.
The biggest culprits for loud clonks are the ARB bushes. I usually use the strongarm as a prybar, ARB against the chassis, to determine the amount of play.

Changing the TRE. Mat's method is right if no splitter, that's why I took my screw type one to Stratford. If you clean the threads with a wire brush, soak in easing oil for an hour, then wipe clean and mark behind the nut with french chalk, it's a better guide than counting turns and I always get it re tracked afterwards anyway

undo the nut on the TRE, but dont wind it all the way off, just enough so that the nut covers the entirety of the thread sticking out the bottom.
Then get a big hammer and welt it upwards.
That'll pop the fucker off.

But before you do this, make sure that the nut is off the nyloc part, and will come off the taper with fingers ony - otherwise you end up having the saw the bloody bolt off anyway....

Hi chaps,

I've not had time to do anything to the BX, so I've just been driving it and it's been fine.

Looking ahead to the new year though - has anyone got a spare PAS rack, in known good condition, that they wouldn't mind parting with?

If DR still has the front end chopped off my old BX at Nyland, then there is one available there still attached - but I'm going on five-six year old memories of whether it's any good or not, plus it's been lying around outside.

At the next opportunity I'll take it to get the tracking checked and ask if the misalignment is due to wear, and where from. The steering wheel is off centre again at straight ahead.

If it does indeed need a new rack, then I'll be after some assistance - I'm willing to travel and bring beer and stuff! Other things that need sorting in order of severity: patch on B pillar/sill, patch in corner of boot (exhaust hanger), swap teh FDV over.

Merry Christmas one and all! Off to SWales tomorrow in Lucy's new Fabilarse 1.2 TSI DSG Estate.





Cheers,

Mark.

You're going to s***h Wales? By car? Tomorrow?
Are you fucking insane?!
ALL of s***h Wales is closed mate, the driving conditions are beyond shite.

Take some snow chains, plenty of warm clothes and food / drink etc, you may need it.

In answer to your question.
I've run out of racks right now, or at least good ones, HOWEVER, I do have a rack with fucked axial joints but good bushes, and a rack with good axial joints and fucked bushes. So I could make a decent one from the two, new gaitors and wotnot..
Fitting a rack is a days job for me, or at least, it doesn't take all day, but I'm fucked by the time it's done, but rack / welding / FDV is easy enough over a weekend say..
I'm going to need a few weeks to get the new shed in a position where there's room in it to do the job mind, and at the moment it has no leccy in there, so, how quick fo you need it done?

I actually arrived over here last night at 11-45pm, after starting out at Manchester airport at 7 am.
The bloody plane was 5 hours late due to a fault on one of the elevators, which turned out to be a computer fault, not an actual one.
The trains were all running a bit late over here but of course my tickets were out of date. The guard was very nice (actually she was very nice)and I wasn`t charged any extra.
The train on the last leg was 45 minutes late, the reason was it had hit a moose, which was plastered all over the front of the train!!!! I have a pic of it and will put on when I have sorted how.
We have about a meter of snö here and everything is carrying on as normal
It's now 6pm and we are off for a walk after tea, the temp now being down to -19 very cool.

at Doc: All of s***h Wales is closed! Almost. Main roads are ok (now) but ickle roads are icy. Went out on me bike to take the dog for a run and came a right old croper!

Be careful Mindy! Errrr, is Fabilarse it's real name

Loucky sods. We we're forecast 6 hours of heavy snow last night, we got nothing, at all! !0 minutes north and s***h everythings ground to a halt, but here in GreyVille the roads are damp and little more

Right, I think I have some pics ready, but don`t hold your breath



Bollocks to it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

God you make computers hard work phil!

errrrrrrrrrr