1.6 HDi:
Turbo failure is not unkown on this engine, and sure enough ours let go last week. Phone: "Car's broken down, lots of horrible noise, and no power" sure enough, turbo making a racket and plenty of play in the shaft. Now, I had been reading about this, and the cause (apart from the engine being a bit prone to getting sludged up for various reasons) is that PSA / Ford in their wisdom fitted a tiny filter in the oil supply banjo bolt. This gets blocked really easily, closely followed by turbo death. I was going to strip it out in the summer, and remove the filter, but events overtook us! I would urge anyone with this engine (which is fitted in a wide variety of cars, including Ford, MINI and possibly Mazda) to get the filter removed ASAP - it might be a couple of hundred quid, as you have to remove the DPF, which possibly involves removing the radiator (it does on ours!), but it is good insurance against the turbo failing some time later. Seems that about 2011, engine was changed to an 8V unit, and this may not be so prone to the issue.
Fiat 500:
So, as the C4 is off the road whilst the turbo is re-built I have got a F500 on hire this week. Style over substance springs to mind! It's very bouncy, there's plenty of tyre noise, and it's surprisingly twitchy, needing constant correction (although that may be a bit unfair on the marque as I suspect the tracking is well out on this one). The column switches are much too large for the car, and feel really clunky. Rear visiblity is pretty poor, with a large 3/4 panel where I would normally expect to look through when reversing. The orange instrument binnacle and large FIAT symbol on the wheel with a chrome surround does very odd things to my eyes in the dark, with the disconcerting feeling of the steering wheel jumping up and down! It doesn't go of course, but then it's only 1.2 so I suppose that is to be expected.
Safe to say I won't be buying one - loooking forward to slipping the comfortable old glove that is the Xantia back on next week! Although that looks like involving re-fitting the turbo in the rain at the weekend....
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Talking of Xantias, I might be getting one this afternoon ...
For a while I have seen this one in our village - a black 2.0 petrol with tan leather interior. Very clean for its age. Then yesterday I noticed it parked in the 'to be scrapped' corner of our village garage. Head gasket failure. Garage reckons the suspension needs work too (which is not exactly difficult on these), but it is low mileage. I have fond memories of an Activa I used to own and think this might be a decent project?
If all else fails I'm sure the leather interior would sell on ebay.
Good luck with the turbo, by the way!
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How old/how many miles on the C4? Is the filter a service item?
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Citroen issue strict instructions on servicing these units - the oil change is not to be done by vacuming via the dipstick and must be a sump drain. May or may not be performed outside of the dealer network.
That said, no idea if it relates to your issue
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It's done 70k, just coming up 6 years old. Serviced according to the schedule, but outside of the dealer network. I've changed the oil once, was just about to do it again. No idea if the sump was drained properly in the earlier services, but there was no evidence of sludge in the sump when I took it off last weekend - a few bits of crud on the oil pick up strainer. The filter is not a service item - indeed I understand that new banjo bolts now come with a revised filter - the advice is still to junk it!! It will be getting 6k changes now....
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Ex wife currently runs a C Max with this engine and turbo has gone on hers too. 130,000ish on the clock, she is not bothering to get it fixed. Car effectively drives as a normally aspirated diesel at the mo, which she puts up with as she only uses it for short hops locally now. When it inevitably fails the mot it will be scrapped and replaced by a Yaris, apparently.
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Repaired turbo now fitted, and we're up and running again. Local factors where I bought oil said they no longer supply turbos for this engine - return rate was too high!
500 never grew on me, and I was glad to slip back into the lazy torque of the Xantia on Friday afternoon. I had thought I might go to a small petrol car after the Xantia, but I'm far from sure now!
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Citroen C4 Picasso 7-st - 1.6 HDi warning / Fiat 500 thoughts - Boxsterboy
