Love - Hate Relationship with my Citroen C5
78Citroen C5
I love my car but i hate the car at the sametime...I love it for its design and its quirkiness. Everything was fine and I was roaming around happily, before my french car decided to teach me a practical course on automobile engineering.
I am on a auto vacation ever since... visiting car mechanics as often as possible, that is when i have no other choice but to visit them, and many of them know me by first name. Good news is, most of the "towing" operators don't recognize me just yet.
Things which have gone wrong in last 2 years....the car's mileage is less than 100,000 km...and the timing belt is changed at 80,000 and maintained the fluid level to the requried level...Stil....
1.Gear Shift Box Jammed( A spring has to be replaced) ofcourse after towing the car to workshop
2.Fuel pump forgets how to pump the fuel ( this after a late dinner...another ow)
3.Just a small nut in the coolant line comes off...before i could react...all the coolant is gone...engine head gets overheated and warpped....ok....tow again...spend a big money to shave the engine head.....
4. Now...the car feels sluggish while accelerating from zero...Mechanic finds a loose connection in the gear control box messing up with auto gear selection..
5. Wiper rubber becomes unsuable..changed the wiper.
6. Another time....another road...the coolant problem returns....this time mechanic told me...the same "small nut" has given away because of too much tightening and it is leaking the coolant......ok..got it replaced..filled the coolant came out happily thinking about the money i have saved...
7. Windscreen fluid reservoir starts leaking...
8. Towing Again...seems the coolant problem is not solved really...now all the coolant lost at once and the engine is warped again...
9. Another Shave of engine head and thing seemed to be normal
10.. when the coolant problem returned again this time, i was at a loss to explain whats happening.....but after lot of debugging....we( now i am very much at the mechanic shop all the time) found that one of the contacts for the fan is not working intermittently...this we couldn't find earlier because the controller says the fan is working fine....and the low & high speed were working well...just the intermediate speed was not working that too intermittently...Changed the contacts...
11...for some time now, i am not seeing any coolant issues...so that really seemed to have solved the problem...But a little later, when i took the car out of my parking lot, my steering felt so tight....yep...the belt which drives the steering line is torn....atleast no towing this time...
12..Now its the time for "rear suspension sensor" to strike. the Car doesn't know how much to pump up/down the car
Now I am driving the car seemingly with less problems....the usual warnings "anti-polution" fault appears once in a while...then those occasional loud noises when you move over a small bump..(mechanic tells me i have to change the suspension bearing.)...right hand rear door cannot be opened from outside....front passenger window cannot be controlled by driver....rear view mirror controls goes on strike often.....and so on......and on...
Inspite of all the above, the car does feels good, comfortable to go around when it is in drivable condition....gives an excluvise feel, for whatever that is worth it, you will hardly see another citroen on the road....
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Hi there im looking for some advise and hope you can help
I first went into my citroen main dealer so i could have a problem fixed, my car was going into lets say (safe mode) it would still drive but it would have hardly any power as if the turbo was not working. they told me its the speed chip sensor so they replaced it, car was fine for 3 hours then the same problem happens, i lose power again, i take it back to citroen, they say its the diaphragm, so they replace that also, so now ive paid twice already.
I went in to get the car fixed so i can px for my new car, so on the way to picking up my new car my citroen coughs and dies, no power at all, will not start, nothing. so the aa come out and i tell him about the recnt repairs, so he had a look at it, he says " citroen have fitted the diaphragm the wrong way so no fuel can get through"
so i went back into citroen and they say the fuel pump has now gone but its nothing to do with the diaphragm they just fitted.
so i spoke to 5 other garages and they all agree with the aa guy that the part was fitted wrong and has caused the further problem
does this add up?,
There is no substitute for knowing enough about the car to do it youyself. I am afraid it means studying the car and the fault, doing research about the particular part and finding sourses to obtain one such as scrap yards and having the tools etc. They say "knowledge is power". Owning a C5 makes you understand this. Punters like us have to get better at the know how in order to beat the system. Or suffer hassle and end up paying through the nose.
citroen c5,s these must be one of the most expensive to maintain unreliable cars ever built,in case you think i am a disgrunteled owner,yes i am,in common with thousands of other c5 owners.citroan need taking to court,they have a built in computer fault which they will not admit to,which thier main dealerships can,t cure,(the anti pollution warning fault) along with all the myriad other faults,the crawl mode it goes into which is life threatening if you are in the process of overtaking,dont just dont take my word for it,just look up cit faults,cit electrical faults,cit bsi faults etc etc,toyota made a car which wouldnt brake but at least they put their hands up and admitted it not citroen,their computer bsi controls have electrical uncureable alseimers disease,they should stop making cars and do something within their capabilities,like make pissoirs.or onion hooks,anything but cars.
I am interested in buying the c5 citroen but Iam scared that their problems will not be easily solved
I have a C5 auto which I love driving but the onboard computer drives me nuts! Comes up with tyres deflating when they are fine. Now it is saying Unblock diesel filter. I asked a local Citroen Garage about this and they told me it would cost well in excess of 500 pounds sterling to sort this problem...can someone explain what this entails and why it cost's so much,
Wiper blades need replacing about every 3-6 months on ALL cars. Nobody seems to know this...
I was interested in buying a new c5 after reading these coments ,I donot think so !
david 2 years ago
I am a big fan of Citroen cars. My first was a BX. I have had eight citroens and am in the process of buying the new model C5. The garage I buy from are helpful and look after me pity I cant say the same for Citroens poor waranty and willingness to support their Irish customers.
David