Fun, fun, fun on a BX near you; well me anyway.

AlanS · Post by **AlanS** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 9:54 am

The young fella's TZi started doing strange things the other day, so I eventually took a long look, tried the easy options and came to the conclusion the clutch is stuffed.

Added to this, we have a long term oil consumption problem that I've run out of ideas trying to solve. Annoying part of all this is that this car absolutely goes like the clappers and has only about 120K odd klms on the speedo and on a compression test it almost blows the needle off the end. After doing all the checks, we've come to the conclusion that it is the oil rings not the valve stem seals and it would seem that this is a common phenomena with low mileage engines in these 1.9s.
The quandry I'm in is, do we rip all the mechanicals out and do a clutch as well as a set of rings, valve stem seals etc and hope that at the end of all this, we have a car with effectively a new engine in it, because if I take it out, I'll automatically do a head plane for flatness and cut the seats and face the valves at the same time, or do we just do the clutch and put up with the oil burning of about 1 litre every 1200 klms?
Normally I'd do the lot, but this guy has bought a ripper Mi16 with 128K klms on the clock with a rebuilt motor that went wrong during the rebuild due to the valve stem seals being fitted incorrectly, so we are also in the middle of redoing that and I'm fast running out of garage space. For the record, my garage is 40ft X 30ft with a large lean to carport out the back and I'm outta space; how ceazy is that??
Once the Mi16 is finished, it has to get some paint touch up and get resold so if we start on the BX prior to finishing the Mi16, he'll be comandeering more garage space than me.
Incidentally, Brad has designed and manufactured a gadget to replace 16V valve stem seals without removing the head. We've been using it on the Mi16 and it works really well.

Alan S

jeremy · Post by **jeremy** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 11:12 am

You can't win - can you. 400 miles per pint is a heavy oil consumption and annoying especially as they always seem to suddenly drink it for no apparent reason and leave you short. Mind you we had a brand new MG Metro - carefully run in and that always used about 600 mpp or more and that constantly annoyed us (as did the feeling that if you swerved at speed it would roll over, its appetite for waterpumps until I fitted a non-genuine one, and its general slowness on twisty roads).

It all depends on the timescale doesn't it? If you are going to get the Peugeot finished soon - then its out of the shed and can be used pending sale - then you've got the opportunity to do the BX properly, but if the BX is needed - well you'll have to put a clutch in it and see if you want to do the engine at a more convenient time.

No help at all!

Jeremy

cavmad · Post by **cavmad** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 11:37 am

I`m not the world`s greatest mechanic so excuse me/ignore me if any of this makes no sense!

Is it the same engine as fitted to the Peugot 405? I had a couple of these and they are notorious oil burners and rings were always the favourite. Howver my I meekly suggest if you re-ring it that MAYBE it`s worth checking condition of bore and pistons too? I`m just thinking while you`re there and it`s in bits anyway it might be worth doing if in any doubts as to condition of bore/pistons? I know it`s extra money but would be better to do now than rebuild the rest and it knackers up again fairly soon afterwards?

I`d rebuild it if you`re happy with the car you could get rid of it, buy another and that might well `go` before long anyway.

Better the devil you know and all that?

jeremy · Post by **jeremy** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 5:00 pm

Cavmad - this estate is in fact an 8 valve GTi and in common with all petrol BX 16's and 19's has an alloy blocked engine with wet liners. One advantage of such a layout is that the liners can be made from better steel than would be used for casting cylinder blocks.

Subsequently Citroen and Peugeot engines have been revised to use iron blocks.

Interestingly the iron blocked diesels don't seem to suffer from excessive oil consumption - both our ZX 1.9D (73,000 miles) and BX TD (199,250) use negligible quantities.

Jeremy

cavmad · Post by **cavmad** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 9:16 pm

Cheers, they say you learn something every day and I didn`t know that. Hope you didn`t think I was taking the mickey with my `advice` above by the way!

AlanS · Post by **AlanS** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 9:21 pm

Yep, it's commonly known as being between a rock and a hard place.
I personally believe they had a design fault in the rings they used in the original engines.
When we redid the 16V engine due to massive consumption, it was found the rings in one cylinder were of a diferent design to those in the other 3 due to it having work done on it long before we got it and obviously due to water getting inside the bore. The one causing all the problem I can remember were of a design that didn't give the outward pressure of the others due to the expander that was in it (how anyone could only fit rings to one cylinder is beyond me.) and I have suspicions that this could also be the problem here.
This car was owned by an old guy who did bugger all miles in it and I doubt if it ever did more than 100 klms on one trip in its life. He gave it to his daughter (think taking kids to school and husband taking it to work, around 5 klms daily) as a result when we got it, there was 90K klms on the clock or around 8,000 klms a year, all short trips. It seems every low mileage one of these I've ever heard of does the same, yet big milers don't have the problem almost as though the constant stop/start either wears the oil rings out or causes the expanders to collapse.
It was also being run on 20W50 oil when we got it and again, this might explain the excess wear if it is that, due to the first start just wiping treacle off the bore, the next few dry running and then the thick goop only lubricating when it got warm, which it rarely did.
I have to get one car out before I can even think about starting, but time is becoming important as it just gets too bloody hot over here in Summer to be working under cars and at night time, although often more pleasant, there's nothing more disconcerting than having a companion under there with you who doesn't have any legs and has a long tail; all the way from his neck! With the out of season weather, we saw one only yesterday, so I suppose the deciding factor will be the time I get started; if there's time, I do engine and all, if not, a clutch will have to do.

Alan S

cavmad · Post by **cavmad** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 10:48 pm

I`ve certainly heard similar things about quite a few other cars as well. I believe as you say it`s down to short journeys, usually because they`ve been run mostly on the choke and haven`t had a chance to warm up properly and therefore clog up the engine. Then someone like me buys it, gives it a good dose of the old right foot and it`s goodnight Vienna to the engine.
I think my cars have lasted well in the recent years as I live about one mile from the motorway and I let the engine warm up gradually before going onto it (motorway) and the same on the way home. It`s mostly in top gear and kept to about 80mph which seems just about right. It pains me to hear people who rev the living hell out of their engines when they are cold and the oil hasn`t had a chance to circulate properly

jeremy · Post by **jeremy** » Wed Aug 10, 2005 11:01 pm

I've never really paid much attention to Citroen Piston rings before except to note with dismay that the oil control ring had a remarkable resemblance to the old slotted scraper which always seemed to wear the scraper bits off and cease to work. On looking closer at Haynes I see that similar rings are used on both petrol and diesel and can best be described as a slotted scraper with an expander behind.

I thought everyone used 3 piece oil control rings these days - 2 thin rings with a perforated separator/expander but those Citroen use must be made of good stuff as oil consumption doesn't seem to be a general problem even at completely excessive mileages.

You certainly seem to find them - it wasn't long ago you were wrestling with a 16 valve engine which had obviously suffered severe abuse - and now you have a bodged Peugeot engine!

After those problems I wouldn't touch the BX engine until I was ready to deal with whatever was revealed on dismantling!

jeremy

DLM · Post by **DLM** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 6:02 pm

Just a quick question Alan, is it just one pot that ends up oily - or do all the plugs end up oil-fouled?

Forgive me for repeating this tale, but I once owned a 16RS which had very similar problems at 60-80k, but almost certainly had pottered on short journeys at low revs for the first 35k. The nearmost cylinder to the passenger side was the source of the trouble. With, admittedly, a much younger car, I decided to go for a re-engine as I wasn't into hands-on oily stuff at the time, and a 90k unit with a top-end recondition (e.g. new valve stem seals etc) from a very early BX16 went in and performed faultlessly thereafter, outlasting the pipes and bodyshell.

Another 16 went very oily after a much higher mileage, but this was definitely a valve-stem seal problem, and new valve-stems put this to rights.

Also, my brief experience of the TZi is that it WILL suffer from any sustained stretch of stop-start motoring, as the one I drove needed vigourous exercise to keep it running smoothly.

AlanS · Post by **AlanS** » Fri Aug 12, 2005 1:40 am

This is the weird part of all this; none of the plugs get oily, yet it's burning oil; they all look sooty but not oily.

Without confusing the issue too much, the Mi16 which we bought as a fix up and sell proposition, is totally stuffing number 1 plug after about 500 klms due to absolutely filling it with oil and then baking it into the guts of the plug, but that one is valve stem seals we're almost 100% sure on that one. The guys who did it up, didn't properly fit the valve stem seals so as a result they were fl;apping up and down with the valve stem and acting like a big hydraulic pump, pumping oil into the cylinders via the valve stems on number one and to a lesser extent, number 2 also, but the BX is a total bloody mystery. I even gave it a brake fluid decoke and it made a difference to the performance, slightly redduced the oil consumption for a while, but then went back to where it started.

Alan S

AndersDK · Post by **AndersDK** » Fri Aug 12, 2005 8:43 pm

Does the air filter get soaked with oil on the fume inlet hose ?

AlanS · Post by **AlanS** » Fri Aug 12, 2005 9:53 pm

AndersDK wrote:Does the air filter get soaked with oil on the fume inlet hose ?

No.

Alan S

DLM · Post by **DLM** » Sat Aug 13, 2005 10:34 am

That's a weird one, alright. Is burning oil definitely visible (and smellable) in the exhaust, Alan?

AlanS · Post by **AlanS** » Sat Aug 13, 2005 11:26 am

DLM wrote:That's a weird one, alright. Is burning oil definitely visible (and smellable) in the exhaust, Alan?

No. Remember, it's also parked on a nice clean concrete floor and the engine is kept almost detailed, so no leakage either.

Alan S

(Fun hey??)

AndersDK · Post by **AndersDK** » Sat Aug 13, 2005 3:36 pm

1L oil consumption pr 1000km is not much on 15-20 year old engines. You cant even see or smell it on the exhaust.
It should still be considered as "normal" on these generation engines.
Have a look in the owners manuals printed in those days

From my own experience you will notice a consumption figure such as 1L pr 150km as a barely visible blue smoke while driving. (dont ask me why I know !). It does in fact sometimes comes as a complete surprise (shock) when you notice a dazzling red warning lamp - or a dry dipstick