Citroen AX GT.......no idea what it's like!
Discussion
Cheers all 
It used to make me laugh though. There were two cars, 100kg difference in weight and not a huge amount between them. Maybe 1/2second on the 0-60mph? And then we were surrounded by other lads who were removing the rear seats from their car, and the spare wheel - all in the name of saving about 20kgs
ETA: Of course there was also the first version of the XS, which used the suitcase Simca-type engine, not the TU. Think those were about 75-80bhp too, but sounded like a tumble dryer full of spanners. And then there was the 5dr version of the XS, the GT (which I nearly bought once.....)
itcaptainslow said:
I'd rather read this than a thread about a Ferrari etc. Absorbing-keep the updates coming!
Yeah, I'm the same. I'm following a thread on a Moggie Minor, a 2006 Fiat Panda, a Metro and the 106 XSi at the moment. Not a sports car or anything 'exotic' in sight!abarber said:
Great car!
I never had the pleasure of an AX GT, but my 205 XS with the same TU lump ans Solex carb was great fun. Such a willing revvable engine too. Just as well at 5k+ on the motorway.
It maybe a cliche, but they don't build 'em like this any more!
Yeah, I had a friend with the XS. There really wasn't much in it. I heard lots of BS saying the AX had closer gear ratios, a different cam and more power etc, but personally I think the engines were actually identical. Peugeot probably up to their old tricks of talking down power figures and book times to try and get low insurance groups. Only difference was the AX was about 100kg lighter, hence it was a bit faster. Not much, but a bit.....we tried I never had the pleasure of an AX GT, but my 205 XS with the same TU lump ans Solex carb was great fun. Such a willing revvable engine too. Just as well at 5k+ on the motorway.
It maybe a cliche, but they don't build 'em like this any more!
It used to make me laugh though. There were two cars, 100kg difference in weight and not a huge amount between them. Maybe 1/2second on the 0-60mph? And then we were surrounded by other lads who were removing the rear seats from their car, and the spare wheel - all in the name of saving about 20kgs
ETA: Of course there was also the first version of the XS, which used the suitcase Simca-type engine, not the TU. Think those were about 75-80bhp too, but sounded like a tumble dryer full of spanners. And then there was the 5dr version of the XS, the GT (which I nearly bought once.....)
I am SOOOOOO going to regret not sending this recorded. Chased today, still hasn't been processed 
The little Citroen rally this weekend is out the window now. DVLA have said give it til Monday, then ring again. Sounds like they never received it all and me being a complete tit, I forgot to write a return address on the envelope
The little Citroen rally this weekend is out the window now. DVLA have said give it til Monday, then ring again. Sounds like they never received it all and me being a complete tit, I forgot to write a return address on the envelope
Time to pick up on the AX GT. While I was waiting around for the paperwork, I set about swapping the boot over with the car I'm breaking:
Would be nice to keep as much of the original bits as I can, but the bootlid is cracked right through, and the replacement is already the right colour!
Renewed little things like the slightly-less worn out boot striker:
I also sorted out one of the slightly less pressing, yet slightly more satisfying aspects of the car:
Dead happy with what The Wheel Specialist in Fareham managed with these. That's basically a full OE refurb. Originally, and for reasons not entirely known, Citroen used to enjoy stitching wheel refurb companies all over Europe up like total kippers, by subtlety using two different colours on their alloy wheels. With the AX GT, the process is paint/powder coat in black, then prep and paint the inner lip in grey, then diamond cut the whole thing and finally lacquer it. This was the first set TWS Fareham tried, and they nailed it! I bought the Dunlop tyres last year, in the correct 155/60R14 sizing. The very early AX GTs had 13in wheels, but these were upgraded to 14in when they started fitting bigger brakes at the front (238mm discs became 259mm discs).
You may remember the panicking that had set in due to my balls up on the paperwork postage? Well, I got away with it!
Came a bit later than planned (22/04/16) but it came! That's the important bit! Turns out the reason for the delay was that I'd put way more in there than they really needed, but that was on the basis that there wasn't much detail in the instructions on how to apply. The dept that was supposed to get the paperwork never did, because the dept that received it just sat on it. The guy on the phone apologised, and DVLA were very helpful in general. I also got away with the postage, as it turns out even if you don't cover the postage fully, they'll still deliver it to government buildings anyway. Result!
And that meant the first order of business was to get it out on Drive it Day (24th April). I spent most of the day in my BX 16v that day, but I made 30mins or so in the morning to get out in the AX:
New wh33lz and new pl8s! The AX GT is officially on the road! Happy days!
First thing I noticed about the car, having got it out on the road, was that it wasn't running perfectly afterall. It should be, as I rebuilt the carb and made sure it was all tip-top there, but I found it really lumpy and jerky the more you drove it, and it seemed too reliant on the choke. Then, one evening I popped over a mates a few miles away and opened it up for the first time on the motorway. The harder I drove it, the worse it got. It would only pull flat-out, or idle. Everything else was lumpy and unhappy. It felt a bit like the carb was icing up, but the AX GT never suffers from that as the inlet manifold is plumbed into the cooling system.
Then I realised I hadn't been paying much attention to the temperature gauge, which was pretty much always at rock bottom. I got to my mates, popped the bonnet, undid the rad cap.....nothing. Barely warm!
The next day, back into the workshop. I began wondering if the thermostat had been removed, it was that bad. My heart sank when I saw this:
But when I pulled it out, I began laughing with relief:
I nabbed the housing from the other car, as this one was full of silicone, and the threads that the stat spigot bolt to were damaged, and it had been bodged up with some nuts at the back. New housing cleaned, new stat fitted, no silicone in sight. Jobbed!:
I took the opportunity to fit a new rad cap, as the old one wasn't holding 15psi, and the fuel filter, as the old one wasn't holding anything except muck.
I also made a new section of coolant pipe to fit in a section above the radiator. This is not because I didn't check it wasn't fouling the cooling fan before I ran the engine up. Definitely not:
Nope, no siree. Not today. Genuine upgrade!
Would be nice to keep as much of the original bits as I can, but the bootlid is cracked right through, and the replacement is already the right colour!
Renewed little things like the slightly-less worn out boot striker:
I also sorted out one of the slightly less pressing, yet slightly more satisfying aspects of the car:
Dead happy with what The Wheel Specialist in Fareham managed with these. That's basically a full OE refurb. Originally, and for reasons not entirely known, Citroen used to enjoy stitching wheel refurb companies all over Europe up like total kippers, by subtlety using two different colours on their alloy wheels. With the AX GT, the process is paint/powder coat in black, then prep and paint the inner lip in grey, then diamond cut the whole thing and finally lacquer it. This was the first set TWS Fareham tried, and they nailed it! I bought the Dunlop tyres last year, in the correct 155/60R14 sizing. The very early AX GTs had 13in wheels, but these were upgraded to 14in when they started fitting bigger brakes at the front (238mm discs became 259mm discs).
You may remember the panicking that had set in due to my balls up on the paperwork postage? Well, I got away with it!
Came a bit later than planned (22/04/16) but it came! That's the important bit! Turns out the reason for the delay was that I'd put way more in there than they really needed, but that was on the basis that there wasn't much detail in the instructions on how to apply. The dept that was supposed to get the paperwork never did, because the dept that received it just sat on it. The guy on the phone apologised, and DVLA were very helpful in general. I also got away with the postage, as it turns out even if you don't cover the postage fully, they'll still deliver it to government buildings anyway. Result!
And that meant the first order of business was to get it out on Drive it Day (24th April). I spent most of the day in my BX 16v that day, but I made 30mins or so in the morning to get out in the AX:
New wh33lz and new pl8s! The AX GT is officially on the road! Happy days!
First thing I noticed about the car, having got it out on the road, was that it wasn't running perfectly afterall. It should be, as I rebuilt the carb and made sure it was all tip-top there, but I found it really lumpy and jerky the more you drove it, and it seemed too reliant on the choke. Then, one evening I popped over a mates a few miles away and opened it up for the first time on the motorway. The harder I drove it, the worse it got. It would only pull flat-out, or idle. Everything else was lumpy and unhappy. It felt a bit like the carb was icing up, but the AX GT never suffers from that as the inlet manifold is plumbed into the cooling system.
Then I realised I hadn't been paying much attention to the temperature gauge, which was pretty much always at rock bottom. I got to my mates, popped the bonnet, undid the rad cap.....nothing. Barely warm!
The next day, back into the workshop. I began wondering if the thermostat had been removed, it was that bad. My heart sank when I saw this:
But when I pulled it out, I began laughing with relief:
I nabbed the housing from the other car, as this one was full of silicone, and the threads that the stat spigot bolt to were damaged, and it had been bodged up with some nuts at the back. New housing cleaned, new stat fitted, no silicone in sight. Jobbed!:
I took the opportunity to fit a new rad cap, as the old one wasn't holding 15psi, and the fuel filter, as the old one wasn't holding anything except muck.
I also made a new section of coolant pipe to fit in a section above the radiator. This is not because I didn't check it wasn't fouling the cooling fan before I ran the engine up. Definitely not:
Nope, no siree. Not today. Genuine upgrade!
Edited by Kitchski on Friday 6th May 13:34
To finish off from the other day (as I bailed out to eat some tea), I'd recently been not quite 'feeling it' with the AX. Sounds mad to say it, being that I'd gone to all this effort with it, and also known them since I was about 17. But it had been ages since I'd driven one properly, and all I seemed to be experiencing piloting it to work and back was a noisy, tinny, rattly car with an irritating choke mechanism and a broken dashboard. The door clangs when you shut it, the steering is heavy when you're trying to park, and the clutch pedal/cable is really sticky, so it's hard to manoeuvre smoothly. It brought a few positives back, like the fact I put fuel in it for the first time over a week after getting it on the road, and the ride, which is as good as I remember. The brakes on this one seem pretty good too, but overall it wasn't being as fun as I remember them being. It didn't even feel quick, and before anyone says 'Well it won't, it's only got about 80bhp!', I know this. They did always feel quite quick though, relatively speaking. On paper, slow, and after 70mph, slow, but up to that I always remember them feeling really gusty and franti, even if it was just a placebo.
Problem is, I only work 4 miles away from my front door, so it never really gets much use even if I use it to commute. The kind of driving it gets is the kind of driving an AX should be good at (mostly 30mph roads, a narrow lane and a couple of roundabouts!) But it just wasn't happening, and it took me until this weekend just gone to realise it. Maybe I'd changed? Maybe what I'd consider to be fun, was actually just a bit.....s
t? Even the gearing didn't feel as short as it used to, and that was one of the stand-out things I remember front my yoof.
I popped into work yesterday on the bank holiday to sort out a couple of things. I took the AX, and while there decided to head back via a more scenic route to see if I could a feel for it again. If nothing else, it would burn off some of the carbon currently clogging the head up caused by driving around on the choke for so long - a result of the lack of a thermostat! Sure the wheel alignment isn't quite there, and the front wishbone bushes clonk a bit, but it should be up together enough now to go and see if it can raise a smirk on my normally static mug.
Was it?
Yes. Yes it was I had such a blast I stopped to take pics on my phone!
I'd forgotten what the AX GT is great at - B-road bashing! It comes alive when you start flinging it around the countryside. The feel and delicacy of the thing is something unmatched in any other hatchback I've ever driven (and I've owned a S1 106 Rallye). It doesn't talk to you, it SCREAMS at you! You can feel the weight loading and unloading on each wheel. You can feel the grip through the steering, and even in the wet I could feel when it was starting to reach the limits. The back end won't snap on you like it does with a Saxo or 106 GTi because it's no where near as stiff. The gear ratios, which felt a bit cumbersome around town suddenly seemed to physically expand, and now each burst of twin-choke full throttle was egged on to instantly be followed up by the next gear. The way it hauls out of corners in second gear is just such a laugh! Hard in, lots of squeal, boot the throttle and it just leans like a looney 2CV, makes some roarty induction noise and hooks up! Even the suspension is brilliant! So soft for a that kind of car, and with such skinny tyres, yet it all works perfectly. It's so supple, and perfectly damped. You can hit ruts mid-bend without stting your pants, and though it lurches around like a pissed maid of honour, it never loses grip and always manages to relay everything to you. They managed to make a car handle brilliantly, but with soft, high riding, bouncy suspension. I've had cars in the past where they'd been lowered and stiffened and still didn't handle properly, and yet this little crummy tinny hatchback from France is making them look ridiculous!
In standard form, I was reminded that the AX GT is one of the most fun hatchbacks you can drive, and possibly more fun than a lot of different sports cars (I've driven quite a lot of those too). It went back to being a small crap car in traffic on the way home, but for the fun it'll give you on B-roads, I can entirely forgive it!
All this from a car that has already covered nearly quarter of a million miles, and it's still delivering the smiles! I've not had a car for such a long time which I just want to go out and head to the countryside in. Just drive for the sake of driving.
Epic little car!
Problem is, I only work 4 miles away from my front door, so it never really gets much use even if I use it to commute. The kind of driving it gets is the kind of driving an AX should be good at (mostly 30mph roads, a narrow lane and a couple of roundabouts!) But it just wasn't happening, and it took me until this weekend just gone to realise it. Maybe I'd changed? Maybe what I'd consider to be fun, was actually just a bit.....s
t? Even the gearing didn't feel as short as it used to, and that was one of the stand-out things I remember front my yoof.I popped into work yesterday on the bank holiday to sort out a couple of things. I took the AX, and while there decided to head back via a more scenic route to see if I could a feel for it again. If nothing else, it would burn off some of the carbon currently clogging the head up caused by driving around on the choke for so long - a result of the lack of a thermostat! Sure the wheel alignment isn't quite there, and the front wishbone bushes clonk a bit, but it should be up together enough now to go and see if it can raise a smirk on my normally static mug.
Was it?
Yes. Yes it was
I had such a blast I stopped to take pics on my phone!I'd forgotten what the AX GT is great at - B-road bashing! It comes alive when you start flinging it around the countryside. The feel and delicacy of the thing is something unmatched in any other hatchback I've ever driven (and I've owned a S1 106 Rallye). It doesn't talk to you, it SCREAMS at you! You can feel the weight loading and unloading on each wheel. You can feel the grip through the steering, and even in the wet I could feel when it was starting to reach the limits. The back end won't snap on you like it does with a Saxo or 106 GTi because it's no where near as stiff. The gear ratios, which felt a bit cumbersome around town suddenly seemed to physically expand, and now each burst of twin-choke full throttle was egged on to instantly be followed up by the next gear. The way it hauls out of corners in second gear is just such a laugh! Hard in, lots of squeal, boot the throttle and it just leans like a looney 2CV, makes some roarty induction noise and hooks up! Even the suspension is brilliant! So soft for a that kind of car, and with such skinny tyres, yet it all works perfectly. It's so supple, and perfectly damped. You can hit ruts mid-bend without s
tting your pants, and though it lurches around like a pissed maid of honour, it never loses grip and always manages to relay everything to you. They managed to make a car handle brilliantly, but with soft, high riding, bouncy suspension. I've had cars in the past where they'd been lowered and stiffened and still didn't handle properly, and yet this little crummy tinny hatchback from France is making them look ridiculous!In standard form, I was reminded that the AX GT is one of the most fun hatchbacks you can drive, and possibly more fun than a lot of different sports cars (I've driven quite a lot of those too). It went back to being a small crap car in traffic on the way home, but for the fun it'll give you on B-roads, I can entirely forgive it!
All this from a car that has already covered nearly quarter of a million miles, and it's still delivering the smiles! I've not had a car for such a long time which I just want to go out and head to the countryside in. Just drive for the sake of driving.
Epic little car!
Edited by Kitchski on Tuesday 3rd May 21:34
Great reading about an old car still giving. I had one of those engines in an old 205XS, I'd had a Skip Brown tuned 1.9GTi a couple of years before but the XS was in many ways the better car. You could just keep your foot buried everywhere without the fear if you backed off you'd be spinning backwards through a hedge.
Great read, takes me back to my first "fast car", a 1989 AX GT in red - F864 VDD. I loved my wee pocket rocket, despite its foibles.
My first drive at night revealed that the dash lighting didn't work (even a good auto electrician couldn't get all the bulbs to illuminate, to his great annoyance), and the passenger seat rocked back and forward a few inches with acceleration and braking, much to the alarm of any passenger. I know it didn't have much power, but as it weighed about the same as a fag packet (and felt as strong), it really flew along, and the great handling really did flatter my sometimes over confident driving style.
Well done to the OP for rescuing this great wee car.
David.
My first drive at night revealed that the dash lighting didn't work (even a good auto electrician couldn't get all the bulbs to illuminate, to his great annoyance), and the passenger seat rocked back and forward a few inches with acceleration and braking, much to the alarm of any passenger. I know it didn't have much power, but as it weighed about the same as a fag packet (and felt as strong), it really flew along, and the great handling really did flatter my sometimes over confident driving style.
Well done to the OP for rescuing this great wee car.
David.
Edited by David-H on Friday 6th May 13:58
Great stuff.
I've got plenty of work to be getting on with but I've just sat reading through all 3 pages of this instead!
I had a 205 Roland Garros as my first car. Fondly remember a race - on a private racetrack, of course - against a black AX GT. We had loads of fun dicing with each other and then stopped for a chat.
Interesting what you were saying about not feeling it. I was 22 when I finally got my first car, having driven my Mum's Mk3 Astra and the 2 Corsas that followed it all the way through Uni. Needless to say, the carb/manual choke/non-PAS 205 was a bit of a shock and I remember thinking I'd made a terrible mistake on my first drive. My mate had test-driven it for me when I bought it.
Clearly something clicked though as I remember having so much fun in it for the 10 months I had it. Not even the hot-starting issues near the end, that resulted in me having to park facing down hill, could sour it in hindsight.
Look forward to more updates.
I've got plenty of work to be getting on with but I've just sat reading through all 3 pages of this instead!
I had a 205 Roland Garros as my first car. Fondly remember a race - on a private racetrack, of course - against a black AX GT. We had loads of fun dicing with each other and then stopped for a chat.
Interesting what you were saying about not feeling it. I was 22 when I finally got my first car, having driven my Mum's Mk3 Astra and the 2 Corsas that followed it all the way through Uni. Needless to say, the carb/manual choke/non-PAS 205 was a bit of a shock and I remember thinking I'd made a terrible mistake on my first drive. My mate had test-driven it for me when I bought it.
Clearly something clicked though as I remember having so much fun in it for the 10 months I had it. Not even the hot-starting issues near the end, that resulted in me having to park facing down hill, could sour it in hindsight.
Look forward to more updates.
I had one of these when i was 17, felt pretty fast back then, i loved it!
Lift off oversteer was a common factor and not always in a controllable way was my only issue with it, i found it extremely skittish on high speed corners.
Do the reg numbers of any of yours end 'TAN', for some reason every one i used to see ended in that. No idea why.
Lift off oversteer was a common factor and not always in a controllable way was my only issue with it, i found it extremely skittish on high speed corners.
Do the reg numbers of any of yours end 'TAN', for some reason every one i used to see ended in that. No idea why.
Had one as my first car back in 99, H42 OCY. Think it's long dead now though! I'd always wanted a white one but being an impatient 17 year old car nut with a licence burning a hole in my pocket I rushed out and bought the second one I saw. It was red, with the bodykit faded to pink, the quarter panel trim piece of the side skirt was missing, the central locking didn't work off the drivers door and the drivers seat was stuck in one position! But it was mine! It was way cooler and faster than the nova SR's that my mates were all running at the time. Over the course of 15 months it broke down a lot, the cooling system was a pig which failed to cool, the foglamps died and the indicators regularly went on strike. In the end it got to be too much hassle and only being a first year apprentice at the time meant I couldn't afford to keep fixing it. I borrowed a bit of money and swapped it for a series 1 106 rallye which was awesome and felt like a tank in comparison to the GT, which always felt like it was built from recycled tissue paper held together by the drool of a thousand small children.
I sometimes daydream about finding another and fixing it up just like the OP but in reality I haven't got the time, money or space and I just can't see me driving one these days when I have a 400 bhp V8 to tear around in. I think my self preservation instinct is a lot stronger at 34 than it was at 17 too and I'd be worried about what would happen in a crash. I think my E92 would go through it and not know it had hit anything!
Glad there are people keeping them alive though, have lots of happy memories of mine despite the problems! How do I bookmark this thread so I can keep following it?
I sometimes daydream about finding another and fixing it up just like the OP but in reality I haven't got the time, money or space and I just can't see me driving one these days when I have a 400 bhp V8 to tear around in. I think my self preservation instinct is a lot stronger at 34 than it was at 17 too and I'd be worried about what would happen in a crash. I think my E92 would go through it and not know it had hit anything!
Glad there are people keeping them alive though, have lots of happy memories of mine despite the problems! How do I bookmark this thread so I can keep following it?
Edited by Avus Blue on Friday 6th May 16:06
Well that's something unexpected! The AX was PH's readers car of the month! Pretty cool that something like an AX is deemed more newsworthy than some of the more obvious exotic machines!
Not much to report today on the AX GT front. I took it to vote yesterday, which normally wouldn't be newsworthy, but seeing as these cars remind me of being a teenager, it was kinda cool to go and vote in it. Looked odd in the school playground among all the German saloons and people carriers!
So tomorrow's going to be an interesting one.....rolling road! I'm digging out the dyno in a last minute attempt to see if I can diagnose a fault on the wife's S-max, and while I do that, it would be rude not to check out what kind of health the quarter-mil AX is in.
So place your bets! 85bhp is the book figure, and I've rebuilt the carb myself (I'm no carb specialist!) Engine is the original one. What do we reckon?
Closest guess wins an old piece of the car in the post!
Not much to report today on the AX GT front. I took it to vote yesterday, which normally wouldn't be newsworthy, but seeing as these cars remind me of being a teenager, it was kinda cool to go and vote in it. Looked odd in the school playground among all the German saloons and people carriers!
So tomorrow's going to be an interesting one.....rolling road! I'm digging out the dyno in a last minute attempt to see if I can diagnose a fault on the wife's S-max, and while I do that, it would be rude not to check out what kind of health the quarter-mil AX is in.
So place your bets! 85bhp is the book figure, and I've rebuilt the carb myself (I'm no carb specialist!) Engine is the original one. What do we reckon?
Closest guess wins an old piece of the car in the post!
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