Ever had a height corrector in bits?

AlanS · Post by **AlanS** » Mon Apr 10, 2006 11:39 pm

A mate of mine, Cit enthusiast from way back/retired engineer asked me this question the other day. When I replied no, he proceeded to strip one he'd reconditioned a while back to show me the tricks.
Stripped down to where they normally do, but then lifts a gadget out of the drawer that is very similar to the thing used to remove the jet from an old style blowtorch in the form of a piece of brass rod about 6mm with a slot cut in it and proceeds to remove the actual valves which hide down in the body of the H/C.
When the plug is removed, inside there are a series of 8 tiny silver discs something like reed valves each seperated by a small brass spacer.
The trick is to lay out a piece of paper towel and lay out these in the order they are removed. Wipe with a tissue and check that the tiny pinhole in the centre of each is clear.
There's really nothing much in a H/C to clean out and the whole process (once you have made the gadget to remove them) is less than 5 minutes.
He was showing me, as he had seen a thread on a forum somewhere detailing the cleaning of H/Cs which it was stated "usually" fixes them and he assures me that these reed valves are the main cause of failure in H/Cs and that when they are often reconditioned, they don't remove, clean and refit which is why some fail in a short time frame whjilst others don't seem any different after the so called re-build.
It seems that when they are just pulled down and the oilways blown through without removing the valve block, it often happens that the dirt is blown out of the hole but remains in the area where the spacers are giving it a chance to reblock a hole.
This valve block IIRC he reckons was where the HP fluid progressively becomes LP and into the return as it wends its way through this maze of capilliary type holes.

Hope that's some interest to someone and if anyone has a spare H/C of "unknown condition" that they want to experiment with and take some pics of, I'm sure there's a lot who would be interested as these things can really affect the ride.

Alan S

Way2go · Post by **Way2go** » Mon Apr 10, 2006 11:55 pm

Very interesting Alan!

The front height corrector was the first mechanical repair needed by this car and I was told by the "experts" at the various Citroen establishments that they were not items that can be serviced and needed replacement.

The only problem with the corrector was that I noticed the black cap had come off and spares said these were no longer available separately and I had to buy a whole height corrector!

Viva le BXClub!

Brian · Post by **Brian** » Tue Apr 11, 2006 9:58 am

Hi Folks,

Have a look at the article I posted on the French Car Forum.

http://www.frenchcarforum.co.uk/forum/v ... hp?t=13442

Has a picture too..

Brian

sleepy0905 · Post by **sleepy0905** » Tue Apr 11, 2006 9:59 am

I have stripped and rebuilt Hight correctors which i need to fit to the car I also stripped and cleaned the Damper port (the one with the discs and spacers) and you would be amazed at what crap was collected in there but unfortunately I didnt make any pictures.
Here a picture of the valve for you to see how it goes together
But i have found that what causes the problem is that fluid cannot pass between the two chambers via the damper port because it is blocked with crap which then causes like a mechanical lockand making the suspension hard.

AlanS · Post by **AlanS** » Tue Apr 11, 2006 10:00 am

Thanks Brian, that was exactly what I was talking about.

Alan S

Vanny · Post by **Vanny** » Tue Apr 11, 2006 10:57 pm

any dimensions for alla tool? might have a play with a HC

Cavmad, did you get rid of that estate yet? Dead easy to get one off if your bored! Oh and i forgot to see if it had PAS, if it does unbolt the rack

AlanS · Post by **AlanS** » Wed Apr 12, 2006 12:36 am

Vanny wrote:any dimensions for alla tool? might have a play with a HC

At a guess, I'd say 3mm slot in a 6mm rod, but best bet is to get one apart, measure the hole and cut the slot based on the physical dimension. If I go anywhere near this guy in thenext couple of days, I'll get the measurements off him to save you any aggro.

Alan S

mnde · Post by **mnde** » Wed Apr 12, 2006 9:56 am

Hmm... I've got the old rear h/c off my GSA (blown seal) that I could play around with. Would be interesting to see how much junk I find inside! With the new h/c installed, the rear absolutely *shot* up when I selected max height!

Mark.

sleepy0905 · Post by **sleepy0905** » Wed Apr 12, 2006 9:59 am

they are easy to dismantle and it is amazing what crap you find they are fun getting back together with all those fiddly diskc but its just a jentle finger job and hey presto I have done 3 to date.