Update: DS Steering wheel wrap and rear trim

A few weeks ago, I wrapped the steering wheel on the DS and used a 3M adhesive. On the whole, this worked well for the main part of the steering wheel, but the ends were lifting up. I re-glued the ends with some araldite and covered them in black electrical tape. Lets see how well that works.

I also had the rear trim between the new lights fall down again. I used some 3M double sided ‘Velcro’ type product as well as the clips and it was looking very good – but about 3/4 of the way through a 2 […]

DS Transmission service

Today I changed the transmission fluid on the DS. I’m glad I did as the colour was a bit more like coffee than a nice clean red. A lot of the members of the aussiefrogs forum swear by Nulon G70 (additive) so I also added some of that to the fluid too. I used a Penrite gear oil, which turned out to be a blue/green colour.

Draining the fluid is easy, there is a hole in the undertray just where the drain bolt is, it is the filling that is harder – you have two options, there is a fill […]

New Beru HT leads for the 450SLC

The 450SLC had been idling rather roughly and stumbling when taking off from stop. This got a bit better when I changed the coil, cap and rotor – and at that time I noticed that the leads were not in great shape, especially the one to the coil.

There are a lot of leads for sale, many of them inferior quality. The Beru HT leads are the ones to get as they are original to the car and are higher quality. Bosch is original for the cap, coil and rotor, but not leads.

You can buy the Beru HT leads […]

Keeping the 450SLC cool in summer with HyChill

Lets face it, R134A is rubbish when it comes to cooling older cars. It is significantly less efficient than R12. Systems that are not designed for it struggle to keep the car tepid in the Australian summer.

Added to that, the air conditioning on the 107 models from Mercedes was never their strong point either, so when you couple a marginal system, that is now 40 years old and a less efficient refrigerant, you’re not going to get a good outcome.

If this is all meaningless to you, it refers to the refrigerant found in automotive air conditioning units. Up […]

560SEC European headlight upgrade

This post is a flashback to 2009 when I upgraded the lights on my 1988 560SEC I owned while living in Michigan.

When I moved to Michigan in 2007, I bought a 560SEC. The car was a bit rough, but Detroit is not a city you can really live in without a car, and it wasn’t expensive. Being a midwest car, it was already a little rusty, but had been upgraded to the European headlights. A 560SEC European headlight upgrade is not difficult, but the headlights are expensive. It was great to get a car with these lights.

After two […]

Citroen DS seat cover replacement part 4

In part 3, I was halfway through installing the covers on the upper part of the rear seat. Today I was able to complete the job – the rear seat is finished, in the car and looking great.

To finish the job, I had to insert the final hog rings on the upper part of the seat. The foam and springs were quite delicate from age, so I had to be quite careful. In an ideal world I would have replaced them, but that isn’t possible at the moment.

I also had to fit the rear arm rest. My rear […]

Wrapping the Citroen DS steering wheel

The Citroen DS is known for its single spoke steering wheel. It is one of the many things that make this car so unique.

The steering wheels up to the 1971 model year were thin wheels wrapped in black plastic tape. (I understand some very early cars had a different system). Later cars had the soft ‘safety’ steering wheel. My car, being a 1970 model, has this steering wheel. At some point the tape had been removed and some rubber coating added. The rubber coating didn’t feel right, so I had wanted to restore the wheel to how it is […]

Citroen DS rear interior lights part 2

Regular readers may recall that I started installing the missing rear interior lights for my DS21. These interior lights are only found in the DS Comfort – they do not exist in the Pallas model, nor the ID models such as D Special, D Super etc.

After a few questions on the Aussiefrogs forum, and a lot of adjusting in the car I finally got them installed and working in the car – and the rear trim re-installed! I had to bend the existing trim a little to make it all fit in, and even though it looked like somebody […]

1999 BMW E39 523i Review

In my opinion, the BMW E39 is still hands down the best looking 5 series BMW have produced. It significantly sharpened up the looks of the fairly boxy E34. It was later replaced by the bulbous looking E60. The current model still follows on too much from the E60 aberration.

The BMW E39 has now depreciated to the point where they are an entry level way of getting into BMW ownership. It gives you a bit more room than a 3 series, and a more capable car. It also offers a better alternative to the W210 Mercedes E Class both […]