Petition to PSA against dropping hydropneumatic suspension

[kingp]

The only car that comes close for me is my Rangie and thats far beyond the reaches of citroen to start demanding similar or close money for a soft riding car.

Dont get me wrong, if they did it right they could get near double the money of a base level C5 if they instigated ARCS again and actually made it softer but most modern cars i have driven have been either soft on surfaces and useless in corners or decent on surfaces and then rubbish over poor roads. Its a lose lose where as the XM/Xantia/Rangie/C5(exclusive) are much better.

If the C5 was available as above and then marketed correctly with some good engine options and say chucked in a 5-7yr warranty the price increase would warrant it and they would get more people back but they are going more and more to standardised eurobox to the point that i reckon in 20-30yrs time citroen will be no more and it will just be pug as a maker. Look what happened to alfa and they even tried a little! Citroen have the ability to try and succeed much better but are playing safe instead and hoping to come out of it and the truth is they are just digging their hole deeper.

[White Exec]

. . . to the point that I reckon in 20-30yrs' time Citroen will be no more and it will just be Pug . . .

More than likely. At the moment, the name sells vehicles (huge market share here in Spain), but I suspect the name will simply become a label for marketing purposes. We're pretty close to that point now, I guess.

Presumably too much to hope that someone might wake up and realize just what potential is there - as in the case of Land Rover and Jaguar, who are enjoying a well-deserved renaissance. Trouble is, Citroen is too big to flog off, and still too large a part of PSA.

Maybe the suspension technology will be taken up by someone else (under licence) we haven't thought of yet. It's ripe for further electronic control and refinement, which is relatively easy these days. Someone phone Tesla . . . ?

[xmexclusive]

I am afraid I think this petition will turn out to be little more than a waste of time.
That does not mean we should not be doing it.
Unfortunately Citroen reached the point where they failed to sell cars and make a profit.
That quickly put them and their future policy in the hands of the financial world and politicians.
It turned out expedient to place Citroen under the control of a slightly less unsuccessful EU car maker.
No doubt with financial and political instructions to asset strip and slim down both companies.
Cutting out Hydraulic suspension development would have been an obvious cherry to pick in the first round of finance cuts and closures.
Cutting its use model by model over the next 20 years further improved the finances with minimum damage to sales.

The petition is 20 years too late.
It is going to those without delegated authority to change.
Time, skills and expertise are already gone.

John

[russ92xmsed]

I agree John, once the powers that be have made their minds up, it will happen. But it is definitely a good idea to get them to realise it is a stupid mistake. What I cannot understand is, why don't they just go back to a simpler hydraulic system like a GS, but with conventional brakes.

I know the power brakes are superior to conventional brakes!!!

What is frustrating is that Toyota and JCB are still using hydractive. Still at least that means the technology is still being used. We'll just have to buy Landcruisers in future....ugh!

[mds141]

Are Rolls Royce cars still hydraulically suspended?

[russ92xmsed]

Might be a BMW air suspension system they use now. Not sure really.

[White Exec]

Are Rolls Royce cars still hydraulically suspended?
I think not. But they still have to be serviceable, and for the next 50++ years!

Realistically, though, I have to agree with John.
Yes, we should sign the petition and have our say, but it will almost certainly have no effect. PSA must already know that Citroenistas will protest.

I once organised a run of 50 P6 Rovers through Central London, to join up with 350 more at Alexandra Palace, and with many of those who had designed and built the car at Solihull. That did catch some slight media attention.

Perhaps we should have a deluge of hydraulic Citroens descend on Coventry, London . . . Paris . . . Media presence essential.

That probably would do no good either. Could be enjoyable, though. Put me down for a place.

[Dean]

I will sign it but it will be a waste of time, to be fair the whole arguement is a little pointless, the latest C5 was offered with springs or Hydraulics and guess which one prooved more desireable?...............thats right, so the paying customer has made the decision to stop production of hydraulic suspension.
We can argue all we want but the other fact is, How many of us have bought a brand new Citroen in the last 5 years? very few thats for sure, not many of us are new car people.
Another point to make is that Citroen is probably enjoying one of the most successfull periods in its history, certainly in recent times, and certainly have vastly improved the company image, the DS range is desireable and holding values well, the range of mother movers are also very popular and held in high regard by the motoring press.
I do love my hydraulic Citroen, but with todays suspension technology there just isnt really the need to implement it in a modern vehicle, especialy when it is no longer allowed to have one pump supplying brake, steering and suspension power.

Spare parts wise i think Citroen have indeed made the right call here too, the lack of dealer specific parts will probably accelerate the price rise on older cleaner cars and weed out the bangers run for economic reasons. At the same time it will save the company a massive pile of dosh and free up dealer's time to deal with high income customers.
Even if you dont agree and you think Citroen should keep peddling parts for the older cars, would we buy them? nope, me neither. On a recent trip to Audi i was told that a throttle arm and throttle cable cam were indeed available for the M reg Coupe (prob a £30 part), it only came with the throttle body though, at £684.04 plus the Vodka And Tonic, these are the prices you must pay to keep parts on the shelf and i dont think the Citroen community did.

D

[casalingua]

"Spare parts wise i think Citroen have indeed made the right call here too, the lack of dealer specific parts will probably accelerate the price rise on older cleaner cars and weed out the bangers run for economic reasons. At the same time it will save the company a massive pile of dosh and free up dealer's time to deal with high income customers." The last part doesn´t chime with me. It´s not the income of the customer that matters but what they spend and how. One set of customers buy new cars, have full-price servicing and sell the car before it needs fussy special care. Another set of customers want to keep their car running and detailed maintenance and repairs and miscellaneous spares. They aren´t competing with each other.

Also, as I argued before, making it simple and affordable to keep an older car running has the effect on keeping prices firm from the day the product is delivered to the showroom for sale. Why do Citroen have to sell at a discount? Because it´s common knowledge the cars cost a lot to maintain and are troublesome. And that view affects the prices people are willing to pay from day one. But if it was known that the used Citroen was a good prospect then the first buyer would buy in confidence and pay a higher price. The new value of the car is related in part to the possible value at the time it next changes hands.

By underserving their older cars, Citroen just undermine their business for short term gain. Creative accountancy could even be used to classify the support of older cars as a form of marketing. "Look at that old Citroen....aren´t they lovely? Let´s buy a new one. They must be good if they last so long." That´s what people think when they see an old Mercedes.

[White Exec]

Apart from running (maintenance) costs, when it comes to depreciation - by far the biggest 'running cost' - the Citroen XM and Peugeot 605 were way ahead of much of the competition. At my London-based UK company (with a car fleet of 250 vehicles for us, and a further 600 for our Berkshire parent company), many of our managers opted for S1 XM's and 605's in the early 1990s. Depreciation for both ran at about 65% in the first year, and pretty much the same for the following year, at the end of which the cars had hit their 60k/80k mileage, and were sold off. Both vehicles were put on the No-No list, purely on grounds of poor resale value.

The drivers generally liked the them. The 605 was never pretty, but ok. The XM's (diesel 2.1 in the main) were regarded as great fun, provided you were very careful not to stove in the front nose (which you couldn't see), and didn't mind the back end bobbing about at traffic lights. My own manager had a brand new 2.1 in Silver, which he managed to pile into the rear end of a truck in central London on Day 3 of ownership. Tw*t.

The staggering depreciation, of course, has been our good fortune. They were never easy to sell from new: ours was reduced in price by £9000 from a 1998 list of £29,500, with just 1000 miles on the clock. Some e-Bay prices today are less than the cost of a new spare part.

Would be interesting to know just how many of us bought our XM from new. My guess is that the number must be very, very tiny.