2.5 Exclusive Ebay

[onthecut]

Hi Guys

Is it just my suspicious mind, or has the 2.5 Exclusive on Ebay had an awful lot of work done to it for a low mileage car? All mine have run to double that mileage, minimum, with far fewer bits required.

Mike.

[xmexclusive]

Hi Mike and All

I was looking at the ad for that silver exclusive on ebay yesterday, not to buy I should hasten to add as I think I got a green one by default yesterday anyway. Did wonder if the seller was a Club-XM car owner as I recall postings for a similar car and move down country. Must take a look and check.

Having looked through the detailed service records that have came with the 20 odd XM's I have owned the Stealers bills give a lot away. It does seem that in the early years of the typical XM's life the average owner stumped up around £1500 per year for servicing and minor repairs no matter what annual mileage the car did. Ultra low mileage cars still did not seem to escape the standard bonnet lifting charge. If anything the limited use cars seem to suffer more from faults needing repairs.

John

[XMX]

Hi Mike and All

I was looking at the ad for that silver exclusive on ebay yesterday, not to buy I should hasten to add as I think I got a green one by default yesterday anyway. Did wonder if the seller was a Club-XM car owner as I recall postings for a similar car and move down country. Must take a look and check.

Having looked through the detailed service records that have came with the 20 odd XM's I have owned the Stealers bills give a lot away. It does seem that in the early years of the typical XM's life the average owner stumped up around £1500 per year for servicing and minor repairs no matter what annual mileage the car did. Ultra low mileage cars still did not seem to escape the standard bonnet lifting charge. If anything the limited use cars seem to suffer more from faults needing repairs.

John

Hi John,
I only joined today so I could not give you an update on this one !
But a bit of a story on this, yes you were correct it belonged to 'Jackyboy' who moved down from Scotland to Clacton on Sea.
The biggest shock we had on arrival after asking various questions and offering a decent/reasonable offer prior to collection , was the fact that having had all the spheres recharged/changed at Westroen in April/May of 2008 and being MOT'd in November 2008 how could have any decent/observant Car Technician/Mot Inspector to have missed the condition of the top strut mounts !

As IMHO I would not expect the deterioration rate (If they where sound, but I doubt it very much) to be such that the nearside one had broke thro' on the top side such that the weight and support of the nearside of the car was being supported by the top outer surface of the sphere and the underside of the flanged edge of the engine bay bulkhead
Also the strut piston/rod top was causing an approx. 6 mm bowing of the bonnet proud of the nearside wing when the bonnet was closed (Lucky this has caused no lasting damage to the bonnet as it aligns up perfectly with the wing top edge after changing the strut mountings).

When this was pointed out to 'Jackyboy' he seemed to be surprised and this was the first he knew of it he'd reckoned
Any how we made a decision to still go head with the purchase and drive it home as we'd already got the insurance on it and as the roads which we used to get to Clacton from Derby were all fairly smooth being mainly motorway it was driven home.
But when we got it home, on inspection why had someone placed a pull tie around the N/S strut gaiter as we all know that when the rubber bonding starts to let go, that it goes oval and then it releases the gaiter from the underside of the strut mount which was hanging down even with the pull tie still around the top perimeter of the gaiter, I think 'Jackyboy' had been VERY economic with the truth

I managed to source/locate a pair of good decent second hand units (And these are the harder to find 25mm sized strut piston/rod type being the 2.5 TD) so after a week or two the car was repaired to a good standard and it has turned out to be quite a decent buy now and my friend who purchased it is extremely pleased with it now and is very happy with it
I may still have the photos of the old struts top, if i find time to look/find them I'll get them posted up in the Technical section where there is a current thread on the deterioration of strut tops.

This quote taken from the 'Tailblazer' THREAD :-

Great to see someone else who likes manuals! You're in a minority here it seems!

Andrew

So Andrew I'm not in such a minority in this part of the wood as, my friend lives just two miles down the road and brother is just two miles up the road and hes has a 2.5 TD and my friends old 2.1 TD which is also a manual, plus my two makes five manual XM's within a radius of four miles

[xmexclusive]

Hi XMX

Thanks for the update. Very useful to see loose ends tied up.
On strut failures. There is no real MOT inspection guidance specific to the XM.
The tester makes his own judgment on what he sees and movement while testing.
It is quite common for front strut gaiters to be cable tied up without a thought as to why they have not stayed in place.
Push it back the first time, cable tie it the second time it comes down.
Citroen actually changed the design (different plastic) because the earlier ones had a habit of deforming and coming adrift.
So garages and owners were cable tying up long before strut failures started.

John