Citroen XM Forum

The alternator was also in catastrophic condition,I replaced the bearings, brushes and the rotor collet, and of course I washed it of excess oil.

The alternator was also in catastrophic condition,I replaced the bearings, brushes and the rotor collet, and of course I washed it of excess oil.

...after replacing all the parts it looks like this.

That's great work! I do like to see parts refurbished rather than thrown away.

That looks a lot better and as you have replaced all the wearing components it is effectively reconditioned to new condition.

I guess there has been a leak from the hydraulic pump, probably just the pipe union O rings, common issue on those later type pumps.

Don't be put off Hydractive, it isn't complicated, or difficult to fix: once any existing issues have been sorted it is very reliable. The difference in handling and driving compared to a non-hydractive system is vast.

Is your original regulator sphere (amortiser) a "multicouche", if so they either maintain pretty well full pressure, or rupture and are flat.

..I think the original valve is on the pressure regulator, I took it off and checked the pressure, it was 45 bar, later I will fill it to 65 bar.

Is there a picture showing all the relays on the XM that have a function for what.
I'm interested in whether, after installing the alternator, I noticed that when I turn off the engine, the battery symbol stays on, while the engine is running, nothing lights up, and it happened twice that after some time after the engine was turned off, I heard a relay switch off and the battery symbol came on. , so some relay is the real problem that shuts off the battery sign.


...the battery does not light up during operation.
..turned off the engine and removed the key from the lock.

The charge lamp is controlled by the alternator shunting the nagative side to Gnd, but it passes through the fuseboard to pick up the same feed to the Engine running Relay.
If this wasn't an issue prior to refurbishing the alternator, the fault is likely to be the regulator pack is slow to disconnect the Gnd feed.

The engine runnning relay and battery lamp are fed from the Ign switch and F3, so should switch off immediately the Ign is switched off. Possibly the Ign switch is still feeding power.

Refer to page 50/116 of the circuit diagrams for S2 cars.

..thanks for the explanation, I'll look into what the problem is, the battery warning light didn't light up before, I mentioned that after some time you could hear a relay tripping and the light went off immediately, it means that some relay is not responding well or there is a problem in the alternator regulator.

You've done a great job there with the alternator, mine could do with the same treatment.

For what it's worth, if you haven't already done so, I would recommend cleaning all the relays and their sockets on the slam panel.