Had this car a few weeks now and still sorting it and bringing it up to my standard...

Here's a couple of pictures.





This was the set of problems on first inspection.

Cruise control not working. It's not the brake switch...

Starter is occasionally intermittent. Common and known ES9 problem. Fix may involver installing a starter 'helper' relay.

Climate not working correctly. Blower stuck on half speed and uncontrollable. It's not the regulator but the signal to it. Lexia reports a fan control fault. Swapped ECUs and it remains...

Tailgate central locking not working and lock barrel seized. WD40 fixed it a treat.

Gearbox display flashing. Lexia unable to access gearbox ECU and yet it works perfectly :? I think I know the cause and it's deep...

The bulb behind the climate display blew this afternoon...

Wrong size tyres fitted. Have now been replaced..

Exhaust blowing at the 2 into 1 by the transverse box. Unobtainable so in the local dealers at the moment for repairs to extend its life until inevitably a new custon system will be needed...

Apart from that, she's lovely

So there we go... A few jobs to keep me amused...

My XM has been in our local garage these past couple of days receiving attention to the exhaust. It cost £81 but now I have a lovely quiet exhaust - so quiet I can barely hear the engine... Worth every penny

That and the new tyres has made one heck of a difference to the car. It's truly lovely... So utterly, utterly refined. Like driving oiled silk and I'm sure with new spheres it'll be even better

There's one thing missing from the XM. And it annoys me. It really needs a proper footrest for your left foot. Perhaps it's me but I can't get my left foot as comfy as it should be. It does nothing so it should be permitted to do nothing in comfort.

Anyone made a footrest?

This thread will not always be entirely about XMs. I hope that's OK Noz?

before we get to the XM, we firstly must speak of Xantias and Mazda RX-8 engines...

James (Hellrazor from the FCF) came up to see me today as both he and I needed to adjust ride heights, he on his Xantia and me on the XM. We discovered it is possible with care to drive either car up a pair of Halfrauds ramps. Ride heights were successfully adjusted in both cases and both of us noted what a difference having correct ride height makes to the ride...

We then freed off the disc retaining screws on the rear brakes of James's car so he can replace the badly worn discs. These screws had previously defeated him but a touch of heat did the job.

Chris570 (fellow ES9 XM V6 owner) and Liam (RX-8 owner) made an appearance clutching a massive impact gun to make an attack on the previously unmovable crank bolt on the RX-8 engine. They are tight and solidly loctited in and need strong measures to remove them.

It did nothing. The bolt remained unmovable. We tried heating it with propane until smoke issued from the crankcase. Still no go. Then I cracked out the oxy-acetylene gear and did as we had seen advised in some forum posts on this very problem - heat the bolt cherry-red.

This we did and it came off without a fight Then we attacked the flywheel and it saw sense and it too gave up easily enough.

Twenty minutes later the engine was entirely in bits.

Here it is:



The news is not good. The engine is basically scrap. One of the main bearings on the e-shaft (crankshaft analogue) failed catastrophically. You can see the scores on the journal quite plainly and this allowed the shaft and rotors to flail around. Apex seals broke and worst of all the front rotor crashed into the side plate and has ruined it. In fact all side plates are badly worn.

This is the worst one:



In fact the only serviceable items are the things we thought would be wrecked - the rotor housings. Although not perfect they might just do another tour of duty but there's no way anything else in the engine will..

We're not sure what caused the failure. Possibly it ran out of oil..

Parts to rebuild would be more than a new engine... Liam is now wondering what best to do. Tomorrow we're going to measure up an ES9 engine as a possible transplant candidate...

To round off the day I investigated why the cruise control on the XM is not working. Good news is the bellows and vacuum system is fine as I've had the vacuum pump working. All supplies are present and correct so why it's not playing remains open to speculation. The ECU may be dead or the speed signal may be missing...

Which may account for why the gearbox is apparently unhappy...

More to follow...