Under Car Rattle 2ltr Turbo Series 1 2 Litre, Help?

Hi folks

Can anyone offer any thoughts

My XM series 1 2ltr turbo petrol has developed a annoying rattle underneath the car , the engine is running wonderfully but i can hear this rattle and it's driving me nuts !! The car has done only 60000 miles and as stated is running well , could this be the turbo /or the cat converter? or something else I can't see anything obviously loose ? or am I up for a trip to citroen ££££ ?

Hi Xmarcel

There are a few posts on the site about badly fitted exhausts rubbing on the heat shield causing an annoying rattle.

Regards

John

Check the cross member halfway along the car held by two big bolts
- these do get bent into the exhaust!

Andrew

My 2.0 turbo has an annoying rattle.
It's at it worst with the engine running in park or nuetral, it doesn't do it in drive or reverse.
I've been under the car and found exactly what Andrew described........the exhaust touches the cross member.
There's a dip in one of the roads I use regularly and the underside of the car hits the road if I'm travelling a bit quick, so I guess that's where the damage was done.
Not sure how to fix it, I don't know if the cross member will bend back easily or if I'll need to stuff something between the exhaust and cross member to stop it rattling.

My 2.1 td exhaust also rattles (possibly due to the same dip in the road), but it's the rear pipe that knocks against the sill at the back of the car, it does it all the time now and it's a pain in the neck.

Many thanks all I will check the exhaust system again once again see if I can find anything loose, also the heat sheild and the cross member.

I will post again if I can't fix

fingers crossed

I've got exactly the same problem, usually when in gear, but stationary and with the brake applied. Started about a month ago and getting worse.

I can see exactly where the pipe is banging -- on what look like two protector bars almost directly beneath the front seats. Other than stuffing something between the pipe and bars to dampen it I'm not sure what to do. And given I have no jacks I'm not risking getting under the car with engine running!

Anyone successfully solved this?

Matt

I think I mean crossmember, not protector bars....

If you've being going off roading reliving scenes from Ronin, there are bars that protect the fuel
tank that can be bent too but I'm sure you mean the main exhaust brace bar midway along the
length of the car!!

You can remove the two big 17mm (IIRC but may be 13mm) head bolts and remove the 18" long
cross brace altogether, remove the bar and bend it straight in a vice, or shim the cross bar with
some chunkier washers to bear onto the bar. This may require longer bolts; but I guess it depends
how carried away you are with the washers...

The bar is a square section about 2" x 1" deep. I've found it handy to support an exhaust mid
fitment but it will require removal to get the system off/on.

Andrew

This post has been edited by Andmcit on September 02, 2008 11:23 pm

on the cross-brace, aren't there a couple of rubber bushes that the front prongs fitted to the exhaust rest on to help keep it stable...? Certainly are on teh S1's I've looked at (2.0SEI and V6).

re the comment on the bars in the tunnel alongside the exhaust - could be the height corrector linkage rods, or the tunnel heat-shield you are referring to? If they are correctly set, then likely the exhaust isn't and is too close to them. Some pattern units do not seem to align quite right and can give this result, or if the system has been bent either on the car or in storage prior to fitting up. You could try a persuader-bar and see if you can improve the alignment....

regards
Dave

This is the reason my exhaust was rattling





I assume the washers were put in by a previous owner to act as spacers to keep the cross member from touching the exhaust.

I found a lump hammer more effective.........there's no rattling now (I forgot to get a pic after I'd fixed the problem, sorry)

Also, the height adjuster lever was very stiff and had started to make a bit of a grating noise when it was moved. It's working perfectly now though .

One other thing........is this the cat?



It's a bit rusty and blowing a bit at the joints, so it may need to be changed soon........are they expensive?

wonder if that got cought on some obstruction to cause the bend in it?
There should be rubber buffers attached to where the extra holes, either side of the pipe, that would support the metal out-riggers on the front box. At least the ones I've seen on my S1 cars did have.


Yes that's the cat, and yes expensive if you go to Cit, but might be able to find a pattern replacement a lot cheaper on-line. Might want to change the Lambda sensor at the same time if it's old....


regards
Dave

Nearly every cross bar I've seen has had some extra activity along the way - very likely the
lowest point on the car and at amidships easy to ground on the long wheelbase, if someone
doesn't wait for the car to lift on driving off a kerb...!

The CAT doesn't look totally knackered and toast just yet! Mind, the cat prices I've just checked
out just now are quite a lot more than I recall so like everything else, supply and demand
(especially with China sucking all precious metals supply into its vortex) is playing hell with values.

http://www.cats-direct-shop.co.uk/citroen-...s_Recordset1=67

I've a load of other bookmarks I'm going through to see if the prices here can be bettered!

Andrew

http://www.bodyshopwarehouse.co.uk/category/xm-20i-0193-01

still not cheap - but not OMG price either...


Andrew

Thanks for the reply Dave,

I'll try to get the rubber buffers. The pipe moves about quite a lot. There's about 6 foot or more of the exhaust that doesn't seem to have any support what so ever, so theres a lot of play, which must be weakening the joints.

Thanks again,

Paul.

Andrew,

thanks for finding the cat prices.

Actually not as bad as I thought they might be.

I'm going to take it in to the local garage to get it looked at, see if they can tighten up the joints a bit, as I think they may have worked loose, due to the movement (well that's what I'm hoping ).

Thanks again,

Paul.