My bodged Citroen BX 16v
Discussion
Cheers! Glad to hear it's encouraged someone to get their old car out!
Not a huge amount to report on the BX front, however the plans have changed slightly. I was going to leave it off the road until I resolve all the issues underneath, and for the most part I'm still doing that.
However, I miss driving it and there are a couple of things I can do with it in July, so it's going back on the road for one month in July. The MoT is up on 27th July, and that's when it will actually come off the road this time!
July should be a good month with it
Not a huge amount to report on the BX front, however the plans have changed slightly. I was going to leave it off the road until I resolve all the issues underneath, and for the most part I'm still doing that.
However, I miss driving it and there are a couple of things I can do with it in July, so it's going back on the road for one month in July. The MoT is up on 27th July, and that's when it will actually come off the road this time!
July should be a good month with it
Well, a slight change to the order of proceeding. I mean, how often does that happen with this car, right?!
Initially, the plan was to remove it from hibernation, and run it for one more month until the 27th, when the MoT expires. There was a Citroen show to try and make it to (which was the weekend just gone), but as we got closer I realised that there was also a TVR meet on the Sunday, and ideally I would go to that. Equally ideal, would be to go to the Citroen meet on the Sunday, as the Saturday can be sleepy.
Then an opportunity arose to use the BX for something interesting in August, which is after the MoT expires. So, it seems I'll need to attend to the issues that would prevent the MoT certificate from being issued afterall, if only to drive it to something interesting in August. It also means I can make one or two of the other Citroen meets in it, and it's actually a BX-themed year, being the 35th anniversary of the model, and the 30th anniversary of the 16v variant. Would be a shame for 'BAH' not to be there.
Currently I'm running it around as a daily! Taking the kids to school in it, using it to pick up takeaways etc. It's no big deal; It's great at general work. It just happens to be quite fun too!
August should be good though. I can't say too much at the moment, but it involves a trip to Donnington circuit with S10GTA and I. We'll try and find interesting things to take pictures of or visit along the way. Or take pictures at any landmarks anyone reading this suggests!
Initially, the plan was to remove it from hibernation, and run it for one more month until the 27th, when the MoT expires. There was a Citroen show to try and make it to (which was the weekend just gone), but as we got closer I realised that there was also a TVR meet on the Sunday, and ideally I would go to that. Equally ideal, would be to go to the Citroen meet on the Sunday, as the Saturday can be sleepy.
Then an opportunity arose to use the BX for something interesting in August, which is after the MoT expires. So, it seems I'll need to attend to the issues that would prevent the MoT certificate from being issued afterall, if only to drive it to something interesting in August. It also means I can make one or two of the other Citroen meets in it, and it's actually a BX-themed year, being the 35th anniversary of the model, and the 30th anniversary of the 16v variant. Would be a shame for 'BAH' not to be there.
Currently I'm running it around as a daily! Taking the kids to school in it, using it to pick up takeaways etc. It's no big deal; It's great at general work. It just happens to be quite fun too!
August should be good though. I can't say too much at the moment, but it involves a trip to Donnington circuit with S10GTA and I. We'll try and find interesting things to take pictures of or visit along the way. Or take pictures at any landmarks anyone reading this suggests!
Spinakerr said:
'Take My Breath Away' on the video for the 80s beginning, Berlin were the one-hit wonder.
Off topic but I do enjoy compiling car-specific playlists for their era/year of manufacture. Apologies for the oblique reference.
Ohh I see! I had no idea who did that song! You learn something new every day...Off topic but I do enjoy compiling car-specific playlists for their era/year of manufacture. Apologies for the oblique reference.
I love seeing updates on this thread.
I grew up with BXs - my dad's first was in '84 when he traded in his Renault 30 for a red BX 16TS. 5yr old me balled my eyes out because I utterly loved that R30.
In '86 he traded that in for a silver BX 19GT Digit - the rare one with the Pioneer pull out HU and digital dash. He had that car for about 8-9yrs I think and covered considerably north of 100k in it. Probably one of my favourite cars he had.
My mum had a red BX 17DTR Estate in '89 which in '95/'96 became my first car. Only had 90bhp IIRC but felt like a rocketship, when it wasn't blowing core plugs or coolant hoses!
I grew up with BXs - my dad's first was in '84 when he traded in his Renault 30 for a red BX 16TS. 5yr old me balled my eyes out because I utterly loved that R30.
In '86 he traded that in for a silver BX 19GT Digit - the rare one with the Pioneer pull out HU and digital dash. He had that car for about 8-9yrs I think and covered considerably north of 100k in it. Probably one of my favourite cars he had.
My mum had a red BX 17DTR Estate in '89 which in '95/'96 became my first car. Only had 90bhp IIRC but felt like a rocketship, when it wasn't blowing core plugs or coolant hoses!
Swervin_Mervin said:
I love seeing updates on this thread.
I grew up with BXs - my dad's first was in '84 when he traded in his Renault 30 for a red BX 16TS. 5yr old me balled my eyes out because I utterly loved that R30.
In '86 he traded that in for a silver BX 19GT Digit - the rare one with the Pioneer pull out HU and digital dash. He had that car for about 8-9yrs I think and covered considerably north of 100k in it. Probably one of my favourite cars he had.
My mum had a red BX 17DTR Estate in '89 which in '95/'96 became my first car. Only had 90bhp IIRC but felt like a rocketship, when it wasn't blowing core plugs or coolant hoses!
Be a BX 16RS or 16TRS model there, but sounds the same as the other one I have (and the same model I too grew up with). If it had the little black windows in the C-pillar, and electric rear windows, it was a TRS. If it was electric front windows only, it was an RS.I grew up with BXs - my dad's first was in '84 when he traded in his Renault 30 for a red BX 16TS. 5yr old me balled my eyes out because I utterly loved that R30.
In '86 he traded that in for a silver BX 19GT Digit - the rare one with the Pioneer pull out HU and digital dash. He had that car for about 8-9yrs I think and covered considerably north of 100k in it. Probably one of my favourite cars he had.
My mum had a red BX 17DTR Estate in '89 which in '95/'96 became my first car. Only had 90bhp IIRC but felt like a rocketship, when it wasn't blowing core plugs or coolant hoses!
A Digit though?! Now you're talking! Drove one once, and could help but think that Lamborghini might have seen one when they did the dash in the Reventon....
DTR would have been a DTR Turbo estate, rare car now (but then so are all BXs I guess!) The DTR was actually the diesel version of the TRS trim, and in Europe was badged the TRD. It wasn't in the UK, for obvious reasons....
Another good day out with the BX yesterday. Hampered by the fact I had Simon - S10.....or whatever he is now. S100HP, or Sb3ll3nd? - in the passenger seat!
Took it up to Donington race track, for reasons I can't fully go into yet. All I can say is that it was a chance to be part of something very cool, and that next month's Practical Classics magazine will yield all answers.
I set about cleaning it up (a bit) late Friday afternoon. It had gone very pink, sat in the sunshine for, oh, I don't know....5 days?
I only had a drop of polish left, which was just enough to do the roof and bonnet. On one hand, this was annoying, as the whole car needed doing. On the other hand, it was a blessing, as I really don't like cleaning cars any more! The weather was also scheduled to be s
te for 8th August, so I was hoping the rain would make it look more red than it normally is. Imagine that, planning to go to some kind of car-based event, and hoping for rain!
The sky duly delivered, as evidenced here at Watford Gap services:
I also had my first ever drink from a Costa! I didn't pay for it, Simon bought it for me (probably thinking I can't talk/whinge/moan if I'm drinking, ergo he gets some P&Q). At £3 or whatever it was, I remember thinking it really had better be the best bd hot chocolate I'd ever had!:
Costa got lucky.
Then, we both enjoyed a game of 'Hot precariously-placed drink in old 80's car with hard-to-find trim' roulette:
Simon even did a bonus round, where he not only slumped into the passenger seat while the game was in play, but also shut the door! He didn't go for the hatrick of 'shuffling around in the seat to get comfy', but I can't judge as I didn't have the balls to partake in extra-point scoring. In any case, I can't physically kick my own arse in the event the cups fell, but I was in striking range of Simon.
My wife once lost a similar game in that BX too. It was the other version, with cold drinks. Took ages to get the Tango out of the cubby hole in front of the gearlever. I didn't even realise she was playing, but with the size and taper of the cup, it was a game she was destined to lose.
Budget tyres aren't always rubbish. I have a set on another one of my cars, and hand on heart it drives better on those than it did the Michelins before it. You can get good budget tyres, and you can get crap premium tyres. Of course, it's completely possible to get crap budget tyres, and that's exactly what the BX is wearing. As I've probably mentioned a million times already, I'm planning to take it off the road for some extensive work underneath. Whether that ever happens (as it was supposed to be off the road now, but was put back on for yesterday's event) remains to be seen, but I haven't fitted new tyres just for the car to then sit around on them while they go hard. As a result, I'm still running on the ancient, rock hard, cracking and only-just-legal rubber than the car has sat on for three years or so. Dry grip is bad, and wet grip is appalling. The understeer on wet roundabouts would be hilarious, if it weren't see tragically alarming. A good job a BX is good on its brakes, because those tyres needed all the hand-holding they could get!
Dodgy tyres not withstanding, we arrived at 'Donny' at about half 12:
Huge great big soaking-wet paddock could be the location for a huge amount of fun in most cars. In the BX, strangely, the appeal of driving around in straight lines with the steering on full lock while bouncing off the rev limiter in second gear didn't appeal as much. Weird.
A opportunity for a photo with another BX I met up with. It's a GT; the same model I'm doing up for my Dad in one of the other threads in these here forums....somewhere:
We were at Donny for a couple of hours, and contemplated what we could do on the way home to make the journey more interesting. I had ideas of stopping at interesting sites, or villages with stupid names (Cumnor and Kingston Bagpuize may well have received visits from the red Wedged One), but to be honest the weather put paid to any plans, as the traffic was really bad and we'd have been been home too late with no decent excuse (Hamstead Gay is not an excuse).
We set about leaving Donny:
....saw a Vulcan bomber we couldn't get anywhere near:
...and headed home.
The run home was uneventful, though Simon had another attack of I'msuchahelmetitus (he had one previously in this thread back when we ended up in Paris). It wasn't quite as bad a case as he suffered with in France, but it was still a fairly bad bout, compounded by the awful weather. The attack struck when he set up a diversion to avoid traffic on the A34, and took us through fkING OXFORD IN fkING RUSHHOUR, THE tt! The illness passed shortly after Abingdon, and he was back to regular nobhead Simon.
Only other events of note were that it turns out a BX 16v can push a brand new Mercedes A200 turbodiesel something-or-other down the sliproad onto the M40, and that the rear end of the new Discovery troubled us:
I genuinely felt worse for seeing that car. My day definitely took a downward turn upon catching sight of that rear end. I started getting all deep, and asking myself really meaningful, yet negatively-tainted questions. Was life really worth it? I mean, honestly? All the way to the end? 70-80 odd years, and then what? Death. Seems a bit pointless.
I felt all sense of drive and enthusiasm to live each day to the full just completely dissipate when I saw the back of the new Discovery. Simon didn't talk for 17mins afterwards. He just looked.....grey. And that was before his illness.
I've not spoken to Simon since yesterday, but I know I'm still not feeling right. I just can't be positive. I mean, what's the point? Everything just looks.....I mean......meh, I can't be bothered to finish this now.
Took it up to Donington race track, for reasons I can't fully go into yet. All I can say is that it was a chance to be part of something very cool, and that next month's Practical Classics magazine will yield all answers.
I set about cleaning it up (a bit) late Friday afternoon. It had gone very pink, sat in the sunshine for, oh, I don't know....5 days?
I only had a drop of polish left, which was just enough to do the roof and bonnet. On one hand, this was annoying, as the whole car needed doing. On the other hand, it was a blessing, as I really don't like cleaning cars any more! The weather was also scheduled to be s
te for 8th August, so I was hoping the rain would make it look more red than it normally is. Imagine that, planning to go to some kind of car-based event, and hoping for rain!The sky duly delivered, as evidenced here at Watford Gap services:
I also had my first ever drink from a Costa! I didn't pay for it, Simon bought it for me (probably thinking I can't talk/whinge/moan if I'm drinking, ergo he gets some P&Q). At £3 or whatever it was, I remember thinking it really had better be the best b
d hot chocolate I'd ever had!:Costa got lucky.
Then, we both enjoyed a game of 'Hot precariously-placed drink in old 80's car with hard-to-find trim' roulette:
Simon even did a bonus round, where he not only slumped into the passenger seat while the game was in play, but also shut the door! He didn't go for the hatrick of 'shuffling around in the seat to get comfy', but I can't judge as I didn't have the balls to partake in extra-point scoring. In any case, I can't physically kick my own arse in the event the cups fell, but I was in striking range of Simon.
My wife once lost a similar game in that BX too. It was the other version, with cold drinks. Took ages to get the Tango out of the cubby hole in front of the gearlever. I didn't even realise she was playing, but with the size and taper of the cup, it was a game she was destined to lose.
Budget tyres aren't always rubbish. I have a set on another one of my cars, and hand on heart it drives better on those than it did the Michelins before it. You can get good budget tyres, and you can get crap premium tyres. Of course, it's completely possible to get crap budget tyres, and that's exactly what the BX is wearing. As I've probably mentioned a million times already, I'm planning to take it off the road for some extensive work underneath. Whether that ever happens (as it was supposed to be off the road now, but was put back on for yesterday's event) remains to be seen, but I haven't fitted new tyres just for the car to then sit around on them while they go hard. As a result, I'm still running on the ancient, rock hard, cracking and only-just-legal rubber than the car has sat on for three years or so. Dry grip is bad, and wet grip is appalling. The understeer on wet roundabouts would be hilarious, if it weren't see tragically alarming. A good job a BX is good on its brakes, because those tyres needed all the hand-holding they could get!
Dodgy tyres not withstanding, we arrived at 'Donny' at about half 12:
Huge great big soaking-wet paddock could be the location for a huge amount of fun in most cars. In the BX, strangely, the appeal of driving around in straight lines with the steering on full lock while bouncing off the rev limiter in second gear didn't appeal as much. Weird.
A opportunity for a photo with another BX I met up with. It's a GT; the same model I'm doing up for my Dad in one of the other threads in these here forums....somewhere:
We were at Donny for a couple of hours, and contemplated what we could do on the way home to make the journey more interesting. I had ideas of stopping at interesting sites, or villages with stupid names (Cumnor and Kingston Bagpuize may well have received visits from the red Wedged One), but to be honest the weather put paid to any plans, as the traffic was really bad and we'd have been been home too late with no decent excuse (Hamstead Gay is not an excuse).
We set about leaving Donny:
....saw a Vulcan bomber we couldn't get anywhere near:
...and headed home.
The run home was uneventful, though Simon had another attack of I'msuchahelmetitus (he had one previously in this thread back when we ended up in Paris). It wasn't quite as bad a case as he suffered with in France, but it was still a fairly bad bout, compounded by the awful weather. The attack struck when he set up a diversion to avoid traffic on the A34, and took us through f
kING OXFORD IN fkING RUSHHOUR, THE tt! The illness passed shortly after Abingdon, and he was back to regular nobhead Simon.Only other events of note were that it turns out a BX 16v can push a brand new Mercedes A200 turbodiesel something-or-other down the sliproad onto the M40, and that the rear end of the new Discovery troubled us:
I genuinely felt worse for seeing that car. My day definitely took a downward turn upon catching sight of that rear end. I started getting all deep, and asking myself really meaningful, yet negatively-tainted questions. Was life really worth it? I mean, honestly? All the way to the end? 70-80 odd years, and then what? Death. Seems a bit pointless.
I felt all sense of drive and enthusiasm to live each day to the full just completely dissipate when I saw the back of the new Discovery. Simon didn't talk for 17mins afterwards. He just looked.....grey. And that was before his illness.
I've not spoken to Simon since yesterday, but I know I'm still not feeling right. I just can't be positive. I mean, what's the point? Everything just looks.....I mean......meh, I can't be bothered to finish this now.
Oh I meant to say, the car performed brilliantly, and all that. No problems. 380 miles done, and was probably knocking on 38mpg, which is...........I mean why is the number plate not in the middle? WHY?!
And it's just......like.......fat. And blobby. And why would anyone.....I mean......
Why is it off-centre?!?!
And it's just......like.......fat. And blobby. And why would anyone.....I mean......
Why is it off-centre?!?!
It's not even properly off-centre. It's not like an Alfa 156 or something. It's just a 'bit' off-centre, like one of those tiny little Japanese cars, who position it slightly off-centre to help with airflow to their minuscule little radiators.
The new Disco doesn't have radiators in the back. It's just got LOTS of car and LOTS of chitz and LOTS of everything (except radiators). And yet the numberplate is slightly off-centre, for no good reason.
It's a design without conviction. It's like stating an opinion about something, before adding in 'Just saying' at the end, or even worse, saying 'Each to their own', which is just the meekest, most feeble way of saying "I've got an opinion, and I'm going to state it, but I'm leaving some wiggle room to sidestep out of it incase others don't follow it."
Well I've got an opinion, and I'm sticking to it; It's probably possible to get eye cancer from looking at the back of the new Discovery for too long.
Yeah.
The new Disco doesn't have radiators in the back. It's just got LOTS of car and LOTS of chitz and LOTS of everything (except radiators). And yet the numberplate is slightly off-centre, for no good reason.
It's a design without conviction. It's like stating an opinion about something, before adding in 'Just saying' at the end, or even worse, saying 'Each to their own', which is just the meekest, most feeble way of saying "I've got an opinion, and I'm going to state it, but I'm leaving some wiggle room to sidestep out of it incase others don't follow it."
Well I've got an opinion, and I'm sticking to it; It's probably possible to get eye cancer from looking at the back of the new Discovery for too long.
Yeah.
Edited by Kitchski on Wednesday 9th August 16:00
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