Citroen XM Forum

I know nothing about autoboxes but I know condensation when I see it. This all looks like signs of storage/lack of use.

If it was mine I would clean it up as good as possible. Fill with the cheapest fluids I could find. Run for a few hundred miles, drain well and then put some good stuff in and clean/change the filters.

Just my two penneth worth.

Rob

I think you are correct but rust water drops on the filter housing suggests something steel is rusty, directly above the filter is the case sump which from above looks clean, or the oil pump.
It was the same with the engine, all internal steel components were rusty, the bearing faces were good on the crank and cams as were the bores but everthing else was bad afteryears of condensation and i wouldnt want that working its way through the oil ways and bearings, embedding in alloy parts and eating away steel parts, it makes me shudder just thinking about it.

8 or so bolts and a £12 gasket are all that stands between me and checking the pump out, the reason im going a little OTT is that if i do that then im in the box, its on the bench and its in bits so do i put new clutch piston seals in, new clutch plates, check the bearings and basically re-build it? i mean, if your going to have to re-build it nows the time!.

also if anything makes it into the valve block its going to start doing some funky things but i can sort that easily in situe.

I think im going to go with your thinking as i dont want to delay the build. i want to use the car again this year, i dont want it to die mid summer either and need the engine ripping out though.

Will sleep on it.

D

Sorry to hear about the set back Dean... as you said, your so close. Very frustrating.

I was also sorry to hear about the gearbox issues Dean and if I were you I would either rebuild the box or use a known good box to be sure. It is not much fun pulling out the lump again as I know from bitter experience! With regards, Matthew T.

Well after a couple of days of stripping and cleaning and checking normal service has resumed, the contamination was as Rob said just condense, i think the rusty bits were just rusty swarf on the magnet.
I removed the bell housing and extracted the differential, cleaned the case out and the diff output shaft that was a bit rusty, the rest of it was all rust free as was the pump which is very good news.
The inboard diff output bearing had spun in its case a bit and scuffed its shim so i recovered a slightly thicker shim from one of the spares boxes and clamped the oil seal housing on which adjusts the clearance of the taper bearings on each side, slightly less float in the Diff and seamed to stop the outer race it clamps on from turning.

Reasembled the box, fitted the valve block and torque converter, dumped 7 ltrs of dex2 in and started to turn the torque converter by hand, stopping every few minutes to select a different gear and then continue.

This took a long time but after half an hour i removed the test port plug and turned the torque converter to pump the (now filthy) fluid out to repeat again.

Not sure where all this muck was as the torque converter and case has been cleaned and rinsed so it must have been in the cutches and oil galleries.

A few rounds of the above and a lot of cheap ATF sacrificed resulted in the oil running clean.

Its interesting how hard you have to hold the torque converter in while turning it as in some gears it will blow itself out of the gearbox as the pressure builds and you cant turn it that fast by hand either, that is a very messy mistake to make too as it fires a lot of fluid out with it and its a big lump to catch

Need to get another couple of jumbo tubs of ATF to flush it once more before fitting, clean the filters out and then put it back together properly and bolt it up to the engine

XM has its MOT (and final drive as a 2.0i ) booked for the 21st of March, not long now!

D

Top work Dean.

Rob

Thank you Rob but i will save the self congratulation for when im driving down the road in a fully functional V6 XM. Any thought of success before that point will surely be bad luck!

D

I agree. But a little warm glow never hurts. It always feels good to do a good job and guilty when you have to fudge things.

Rob

That's positive news Dean. Hope it all works out.

By the time this weekend is out we should be seeing the gearbox and engine mated up and pretty much ready to go, there is more loom to build and the hydraulics to be piped up but I should be ready to fit it into the car.
HP18 by Deanxm, on Flickr
Keeping my fingers crossed.

D