My old man bought a 2002 C5 estate in July with about 57K on it. He reckons its clutch is slipping.
I can appreciate clutch wear is very much down to whos been punishing a car, but if its a ~60k miles car its been doing 20K per annum so I'd have expected it to be a motorway mileage car.
Tox O'Grady ( snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :
Might have a lot of city miles on it - 20k pa really isn't very much at all. They might not have a clue on how to drive.
Anything between "Way more than that" to "Way less than that", depending on who's been driving it and how badly.
Yep.
Ellesmere Port Clutch Centre replace Citroen Xantia hdi clutch for £220. Valeo gear and done in four hours. Honest John (Telegraph Motoring) reckons that hdi clutches have been known to break up at about thirty thousand miles. Clutch specialist says that's possibly true with the Peugeot but not Citroen units. The Peugeot has hydraulic actuator and Citroen is cable. He reckons that with the hydraulic system, because the release bearing is always in contact with the pressure release plate it can overheat-burn out the lubricant, get red hot-seize and break up with interesting results. Don't know if the C5 is hydraulic, but a slipping clutch wouldn't be a symptom of this problem. Big estate car, heavy loads, poor driver technique can see off a clutch quite quickly. Some people rest their left foot on the pedal, and sit at traffic lights with the pedal held down. My 1994 Xantia td, now with a pal- has 160,000 miles up. Still on the original clutch, including 25,000 towing a caravan all over France and Spain. DaveK.
davek ( snipped-for-privacy@brentmere53.fsnet.co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :
"Clutch specialist" is not correct. Some late Xants (inc, IIRC, all HDi) are hydraulic.
It is.
20K per annum could mean anything, for example taxi. Leaking slave = drag, not slip.
Biggles
What's the problem with the latter for the clutch? - so long as it's all the way down, it won't wear it.
(not that I do that anyway, but it's not for clutch wear reasons)
cheers, clive
Not at all. It varies enormously. I used to do around 50-55k/year just going in and out of London doing same-day courier work, and my Dad does about 2000 miles per year tops in his car, and virtually all of that's long journeys. Go figure!
It's all down to the driver? Have you been in the car much with him? Do you know him to abuse the clutch?
It will certainly wear the release bearing! The clutch will also always drag a tiny bit. Try pushing a car in gear with the clutch pedal down, compared to one in neutral - you will soon feel the drag.
The likelihood is that you will also be tempted to creep the vehicle a bit, especially if there is a slight slope where you stop. I cringe when I see drivers doing this.
Chris
My year 2000 Xantia hdi is cable-with automatic adjust. DaveK.
davek ( snipped-for-privacy@brentmere53.fsnet.co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :
OK, some late Xants, inc some HDi... (I checked the parts diagrams... There's DEFINITELY Xants with hydraulic clutches)
Vauxhall Zafira, I got through one in 25K, I do drive it like pooh though
Many years ago a friend of mine learnt to drive rather late in life - aged about 40. And being fairly well off bought a Jag E-Type. And demolished the clutch in under 3000 miles - more than once. Got scared of how fast it took off in first, so preferred to start in third. ;-)
I also have a C5 clutch problem.
Mine is that the biting point moves towards the bottom of the pedal travel. This is especially noticeable when in heavy traffic.
A few presses of the pedal and it all feels normal again, until you spend a second too long with the clutch down.
Occasionally you cannot take the car out of gear until you have lifted the clutch again.
I've been told: master cylinder, slave cylinder, air in hydraulic fluid, friction material and pressure plate.
Don't know which it is.
Any ideas?
Cheers
Symptoms are of air in fluid. Caused by one or more of: Leaking fluid from Master Cylinder and/or pipework. Defective seals in master cylinder. Defective seal in slave cylinder. Don't know much about the C5, I suppose the hydraulic clutch is activated from the main lhm reservoir for suspension, steering, braking supply. Anyone know? If it is, that'll be more complicated. Apart from that, we used to have the clutch pedal directly connected to the release bearing by a metal rod acting on a forked lever. Never gave any trouble but in wet conditions the hole for the rod through the floorboard would allow a jet of muddy road splosh to shoot up your trouser leg. And I had a Ford Pop with wooden floorboards which had removeable metal discs to fit the jack. Going through a rather deep puddle it dislodged a disc and sent a goodly jet of muddy road muck up girl friends leg. Past the stilletto heeled winkle picker, high up the nylon stocking to the chuckle band, almost attained the lower reaches of the suzzie belt. She was not amused. (I'm very old). DaveK.
Well it's probably got air in the fluid, question is which of the master or slave cylinders letting it in. If it's not losing fluid I'd guess at the master
Mr Benny,
Had a chat with my dad tonight about the car. He described a similar symptom i.e. biting point changing. He reckoned it could be a lazy pressure plate or something.
Your comment below just about covers every part of the entire clutch assembly. He's ready to pay out for a new clutch assembly, but I still think it could be a hydraulics problem....thats why I asked if anybody knew what the actuator was on a C5 I'm passing his house tomorrow ( this time in daylight ), so I might have a look under the bonnet this time.
what's one of those then?
Odds are it's the hydraulics. Still if you've got the box off change the lot.
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