restoration

Project BX: Roadtrip 2

Enough with all this 4×4 talk. It has distracted me from the shed of dread. The BX hasn’t had an awful lot of use over the winter. It started running really badly, and the power steering became all intermittent with its assisting. Believe me, this makes cornering far more interesting than it should be!

The running issues seem to have resolved themselves, though she’s still down on power. The power steering seems to have been remedied by changing the LHM and cleaning the filters. This is the lifeblood of the BX, so this is rather like refreshing the blood and clearing out the arteries. Seems to have done the trick, though some minor hydraulic issues remain.

The shambolic BX visits the car that donated its doors

I needed to get to Derbyshire to collect some replacement doors and seats for the BX. I was worried about how I’d get there, but a long run the weekend before departure renewed my faith in the BX. Yes, it has its issues, but surely it wouldn’t let me down?

Come the morning of departure and she let me down. The driver’s door latch froze open, so I couldn’t close the door. I didn’t really fancy trying to strip the mechanism down if it was cold enough to do that, so I decided to take my Ford Maverick. Mistake. While this at least got me off the driveway, after a few miles, it began misfiring and the brakes started making horrible noises. Back home I went.

By now, the BX lock had unfrozen, so I decided to go in this after all, albeit now 2hrs later than planned. That was largely due to the need to de-ice the inside. Once free of ice, I was away. The power thing isn’t too much of a problem. Sure, acceleration is laughably slow, but then even a healthy 1.9 diesel BX can be embarrassed by modern turbo diesels. It didn’t want to pull beyond 3000rpm really, but that’s ok, as there’s a good spread of torque beneath this. Progress was still swift (or as swift as it can be on truck and tractor-heavy trunk roads in Wales) and when we eventually reached Shrewsbury and the novelty of dual carriageway, the BX just about managed to clock 70mph.

I was bloody freezing though and a quick under-bonnet inspection revealed a top hose that was very much not warm. Looks like a new thermostat is needed then. At least the big climb out of Shrewsbury on the A5 got some heat into the engine – and the interior! My chilly state was not aided by door and window seals which are absolutely knackered. Ventilation was not an issue.

Yet despite being far from healthy, the BX plodded on. The ride was still comfortable, the handling still excellent and the brakes absolutely superb. Few things stop like a hydraulic Citroen. Sadly, the impressive brakes were also creating a rather irritating chirrup at speed. I suspect one of the front calipers is binding, just enough to cause a squeak, but happily not enough to cause massive heat build up. Seized calipers can be dangerous.

I arrived in Derbyshire at 2pm, five hours after I first attempted to leave the house. The capacious rear of the BX easily swallowed up a rear seat, two front seats and three doors gifted by a kindly fellow BX Club member. He’ll be putting better doors on his own Mk1 project. After (non)quality nosh from a greasy spoon (which was perfect to be honest!) I set off homeward at about half-past four. The next three hours were pretty tedious, and dark. The only dashboard illumination that actually works on the BX is, usefully, the speedometer – a rotating drum that makes me smile every time I look at it. How Citroen to have the numbers move! The main beam is operated by clicking the left-hand ‘pod’ at the side of the steering wheel. Seems odd, but works very well.

So, the shambolic BX managed another 260 miles and now has more parts to help further its own revival. There’s talk of a trip to Cornwall at some point in the next few months. Wonder if the BX will be the tool for the job…

Maintaining momentum

The trickiest thing with any project is maintaining momentum. How often do you see the immortal words “unfinished restoration” accompanying a classified advert? Keeping a positive frame of mind can be very difficult, especially when tackling bodywork. What seemed achievable when the car was complete may seem horrifically daunting once you start digging into the structure and discovering just how rampant the rot is.

BX is coming along, but a long way from finished

Mechanical overhauls can be a challenge too. You fix one thing and immediately, something else goes wrong.

I thought that tackling my Citroen BX Mk1 project as a rolling restoration was the way to go. I therefore focussed on getting it back on the road as a first step. It didn’t have significant corrosion in key areas and seemed mechanically able. It was still pleasing that it did get an MOT pass. Hoorah! However, I now wonder whether I’ve shot the gun so to speak. Yes, it may be on the road but it has so many minor issues that perhaps it shouldn’t be. Would it not have been better to work through some more of these problems first?

That’s how it feels at the moment as while I can drive the car, I get little pleasure from doing so. The engine is down on power, the hydraulics are not working entirely as they should, the windscreen wiper mechanism is so worn that the bodywork gets wiped/thumped, the front passenger door doesn’t really want to open, the heater doesn’t work apart from on its fastest setting, the indicator relay is a bit slow and ideally needs replacing, the rear wiper/HRW are not connected up and three of the tyres have slow punctures. I could go on but I won’t for fear of putting myself into a depression.

The problem is, I love driving and a properly sorted BX – even a 1.9 non-turbo diesel – is a joy to drive. Mine just isn’t and getting the problems sorted seems at this stage both difficult and expensive.

This is when project motivation can begin to stall. The end cannot be seen and it all starts to feel rather futile. With this one, there’s the added element of rarity. Sometimes that’s a pressure I don’t enjoy at all.

Oddly, I always seem to feel low just after a major milestone has been achieved. Perhaps that’s because while there’s celebration for one small task completed, there are so many more that need sorting!

BX – assessing the cost

A quick trip to my ‘local’ garage saw the somewhat iffy exhaust downpipe replaced on the BX. How pleasant it is to have car which sounds so very different! £78 well spent, especially as replacing it was a fiddly pain in the backside – how nice it was to pay for someone else to struggle with it! In fact, I was very glad I hadn’t had a go at the job myself – if it was this much of a struggle for two people with it on a ramp, I wouldn’t have fancied my chances with it sitting on axle stands and me lying on my back underneath. A good decision!

New BX project causes some sacrifice on the fleet

A restoration can be a costly business and indeed, I reckon the total expenditure on the BX (including taxing it and collecting it from Bristol) is somewhere around £700. This is why I’m so glad to have sold the Saab – this project needs funding! The Saab isn’t the only casualty on the fleet though – the Range Rover is also going to have to depart. At least I got in while values are still low. Give it another few years and I doubt there will be such thing as a cheap Range Rover Classic…

To get the BX back to nice condition is going to cost a lot more though, which makes for some tricky decisions. This is one of the rarest cars in the UK, yet I don’t expect that putting it on the market would result in a flurry of interest from people with lots of cash. I reckon that just getting it straight and rust free could take my expenditure up to £1500, but it’ll really need a complete stripdown and rebuild to look anyway decent. That could get very expensive indeed, especially when you consider that a BX topping a grand is rare indeed.

There’s also the small matter of not having endless stocks of cash. My wife and I have chosen a low-income lifestyle and cars do seem a very expensive hobby! It will be interesting to see how this all pans out.

The BX hits the road

With the BX home, I could crack on with the most important jobs. The new radiator was fitted and I managed to free off the reluctant rear seat belts. Other than that, I thought she stood a pretty good chance of passing an MOT, though not being a tester myself, you never know what might be discovered…

As she sat on the ramp and I got my first proper look at the underside, it was pleasing to see how solid she was. There was a touch of softness in the sill – not near anything critical thankfully – but it’s the nearside sill, which has a ruddy great dent in it anyway. It will be replaced at some point. However, the tester spotted what looks like a serious leak from the water pump. I’d spotted this myself at home and had hoped it was something else.

It may be battered and bruised, but the BX is now road legal!

That’s not a real biggy – if you’re changing the timing belt, it’s sensible to fit a new water pump at the same time anyway. If the pump seizes, the belt will rip and the valves of the engine will meet the pistons. Bad news indeed. Parts are on order so look forward to a report on how the change went.

Amazingly though, I got my MOT pass! Or rather the car did. Yes, she looks dreadful but as I thought, she’s actually a good, solid car beneath all the dents. As she’d been in regular use before being stored (and stored pretty well) she feels ready to go.

I’m under no illusion that this project is a long way from over. There is considerable expenditure on bodywork to occur at some point, and the to do list remains sizeable. The priority, as ever, is to get her in regular use and hopefully tackle some of the major bodywork projects next year.

Saving the unloved – Citroen BX Mk1

I have always found great joy in the cars that the wider public consider rubbish. I’ve been into Citroen 2CVs since long before they were accepted into the classic car world, and ‘desirable’ is a label that rarely attaches itself to one of my fleet. The reasons are simple – if people don’t like it, then it’ll be cheap. Best of all, a bit of bravery often leads you to discover that these ‘shite’ cars are often far better than anyone ever gives them credit for!

This is how I tried to justify my latest project – a Citroen BX Mk1 estate, with 65bhp of throbbing diesel power. The cream on the cake of shiteness was the condition. There’s barely a straight panel on it and it had been languishing in a Bristol basement garage for over three years.

You see a pile of scrap, Ian sees potential

First glance was certainly not promising. The paint is shambolic, the tyres were flat and cobwebs and dust abounded. However, it seemed solid in all the right places – if not all over – and had been in regular use prior to being parked up. That can make all the difference. Three years wasn’t too long to leave it.

A plan was hatched to collect it, using my Range Rover as a tow vehicle and a hired trailer. My biggest concern was about whether the BX would be prepared to start. Thankfully, the owner had stored the car on blocks – which meant we could get a jack under it if it refused to start. Trying to move a hydraulic Citroen with a dead engine can be a real challenge!

The owner’s Citroen Xantia was used to coax some electricity into the BX, and miraculously, it actually started! It took a few attempts, and it ran on three cylinders for quite a while, but nonetheless, the ran and the suspension began to pump up.

Getting the BX out of the garage proved a tight squeeze and once it was on the trailer, life didn’t get much easier. It really was a tight little street!

Bristol proves a tight squeeze

Somehow we escaped, and the three hour journey home proved undramatic. The Range Rover proved itself an ideal tow vehicle – it’s Italian diesel engine slogging away quite happily without having to be revved hard. Agricultural but torquey!

Getting the BX off the trailer proved a surprisingly entertaining side show for the villagers where I live. The LHM level was a bit low, and the back end of the BX was failing to rise adequately. We overcame this by unhitching the trailer and raising the nose on the jockey wheel. Off she came! I then got to drive my new purchase for the first time, if only down the driveway.

The exhaust was blowing very badly – that much was obvious – but it seemed to go well enough. The brakes even worked – not bad after so long in storage! With the car in the garage, I was able to get the wheels off and check the brakes. Yup, a little rusty but working fine. I cleaned them up a bit and left it at that.

The radiator was clearly a right mess though, so a new one was ordered and fitted. I still think the fan switch also needs replacing, and the water pump has now also proved itself leaky. New items are on order, along with a timing belt kit.

With the new rad fitted though, I could focus on getting the BX road ready. I reckoned it was close to passing an MOT, so with a replacement driver’s door mirror fitted – thanks to Tim Leech of the BX Club, and a few replacement light bulbs, it was time to take her in. Would she pass?!

To be continued…

The BX lives!

HubNut – celebrating the average!