Citroen XM Forum

My truly belowed 99 XM 2.5 TD was condemned by my technician as "lost". I love that car and have decided to salvage it and keep it as long as it is possible. Its my favourite adventure vehicle and its taken me to the far north (Vardö) as well as the alps and many places in between.

She has a few problems:
1. leaky top and loss of coolant. A litre per week approc.
2 To start in the morning I have to pump approx 20 times on the rubber bulb and use glow 2 times (What do you call the process in proper english?)
3 The Aux drive belt tensioner (the one with the spring) was bent and caused fan belt tear. I've managed to take out the tensioner and ordered belt and a new one.
I have tried to read through all available info but I am unsure about wether there is an exentric mounted tensioning wheel above my faulty tensioner? If so its against som solid body parts and almost impossible to adjust.

Can anyone out there A) tell me how to remount my belt B) recommend a workshop that can fix my car so it will last for another 400 000 km?

Ola Oskarsson

I own:
C6
C4
and my belowed XM

1. Coolant loss

a) leaking pipe / seal somewhere
b) Cracked / Faulty header tank (circa 60 Euros from cit)
c) Cracked / warped cylinder head, blown gasket (or both) - may see oil in water or water in oil.

2a. Need to pressurise fuel system to start - possibly due to air leak somewhere in joints / supply pipes
2b. Turn on twice to activate glow plugs - probably weak glow plug. Test each one in turn - remove, reattach power supply earth body to metal on block by touching glow plug side to block (not tip of glowplug). Turn on power - 6 secs tip should glow orange / red over whole length. Slow / poor / partial glow means replace. Else poor earth or weak battery.

3. Aux Drive Belt.
There is a pulley on a sprung arm - the belt adjustment is NOT here, but on an idler pulley above and to the right.

In the previous post, i mentioned tje idler pulley. It has a square hole and a large torx bolt. You will need to remove ecu /box and wheel, liners as access is needed from both above and below- bits very tight. You now need to make special tool to fit the square hole. A bit like a square ended Allan key with a long handle and short end. It neefs to be else it wont fit between body and pulley. To tension get a friend to turn the square ended tool from above and you tighten torx from below. You wont get socket in there you will need to use a spanner on the torx bit its fiddly.

The eccentric pulley bolt on mine is a 6mm hex. socket, so worth checking as a ground down 6mm allen key works well. Use a suitable tube over the long end for greater leverage if necessary. I welded a suitable "square" on to the end of a piece of flat steel suitably shaped which enabled me to do the adjustment from below without extra help.

Roy.