Citroen Lights Recall

[Tony427]

A mate who is unfortunate to drive one of their big people movers as a company car had the car serviced today.

He was told there was a recall notice on the lighting system which has an automatic sensor which turns them on in poor light conditions

When he collected the car he drove off but found out that he couldn't turn the headlights off unless he turned the engine off and removed the ignition key.

Returning straightaway to the dealer he complained that the recall had created a problem only to be told that Citroen had indeed informed the dealers that this would be the case.

In other words Citroen's solution to the light sensor malfunction recall was to bypass the sensor and rewire/ reconfigure the headlight system so that they are permanently on, a la Volvo.

Never mind that the sensors are standard and the car is under warranty.

My mate is now waiting for the windscreen wiper sensor to go, whereupon the Citroen recall will require the windscreen wipers to be switched on permanently. He is looking forward to months of driving about with knackered wiper blades screeching across a bone dry screen.


Cheers,

Tony

[hairyben]

Can he not turn them off manually? my van has auto lights but it's a position on the selector, ie parking-auto-off-side-main.

I don't use the silly things anyway, seem to come on if the sun so much as goes behind a cloud.

[V8mate]

hairyben said:

Can he not turn them off manually?

You can turn of all 'automatic' functions via the onboard computer.

[Tony427]

V8mate said:

hairyben said:

Can he not turn them off manually?

You can turn of all 'automatic' functions via the onboard computer.

Therein lies the rub, in the recall the computer has been reprogrammed to disable the headlight sensor, and Citroen has deemed that the headlights should be on at all times when the engine is running.

When the ignition is switched off the sidelights willl operate seperately on the normal switch but once the engine is running the car is in Volvo mode.

He and I just thought the Gallic interpretation of a recall was amusing. Imagine if BMW or Audi had this problem, I don't think their answer would be to hotwire the headlights so they are on permanently. They would probably want to fix the problem not bodge together a solution.

He's probably going to get a C5 after his C8, being a company car he laughs in the face of chronic depreciation, likes the low purchase price and resultant reduced tax liabilities and revells in the added extras that unfortunately stop working after 40k miles.......

And when I get too clever taking the Michael out of his car he reminds me how I used to call my Jag S type a clown's car 'cos after 65k it fell apart.

Cheers,

Tony