I seem to have a habit of buying Citroens that have ditch water in their cooling system. I spent quite a bit of time flushing out the system of the DS21, and now I need to do the same for the traction. The Traction currently has a habit of marking its territory after every drive with a nice dirty stain where the...
My Light 15 was awarded 2nd prize in the pre-1956 Citroen category at the 2015 French Car Day. I hadn’t planned to enter the car, but did since there were only a couple of Tractions there. 1st prize went to a nice Big 15. Without a lot of effort I should be able to do better as I was obviously marked down...
The 280CE was back today to get a radio installed. When I purchased the car, the previous owner had removed their radio, so there was a great big hole in the dash. Luckily, my brother who purchased the car from me already had a Sony radio he had removed from his previous 280CE. The W123 radio is a standard DIN fitting. Unfortunately...
The DS is back together and sporting pretty much a whole new interior. The new sill trim is complete and the seats have been refitted and carpets re-installed. I’m really happy with the results and glad I didn’t try and make a part-Pallas. The Pallas cars have carpet instead of this trim, and many non-Pallas cars have this carpet installed but not...
The project to replace the sill trim progresses well. The glue had done a good job with the passengers side trim in part 3, so I proceeded to glue down the drivers side as well. While this set, I was able to re-attach the seatbelt and then start working on re-attaching the lower stainless steel trim. The stainless steel trim is quite...
The installation of the new sill trim in the DS progresses. Today I was able to glue down the passengers side of the car after doing some final trimming to size (mostly done in part 2). I ended up using an entire can of spray adhesive, as the underside of the trim absorbs a lot of the glue. Unfortunately, I...
The DS has large box sections that run down both sides. On the DS comfort, there are various bits of vinyl trim that cover these sections. In part 1, I had replaced the outer trim and door sealing strips. Next was the inner trim. The inner trim comes mostly pre-cut to size, but it needs to be trimmed and also adapted for a...
The Citroen club held its monthly meeting at the Tesla showroom, where club members got to test drive the model S. As well as seeing the Model S, one of the members of the club brought along his electric DS to compare with the Tesla. I have to say I was very impressed with what he had done with the car. ...
The drivers door on the 450SLC had become harder and harder to close properly over the past year or so. It normally took a couple of tries before it would latch correctly. I therefore decided to try replacing the door striker, which do wear out over time. The part number of the new striker was 115 720 06 04. As can...
The Citroen Car club had its monthly meeting at the Tesla showroom this month. Tesla were offering short test drives to club members as part of the meeting. The Tesla Model S is one of the few modern cars that interest me, so I jumped at the opportunity. In my view, the Tesla is the first ‘green’ car that is a great...
The Traction Avant is the easiest car I own to do a basic service. There is no oil filter, so the oil is simply drained and topped up. The transmission is right up front, and not obscured by the ducting of the DS, so it can be done while sitting in front of the car. The downside of course is that...
The other day I had removed all the sill trim from the DS. I also re-routed the speaker wires so new trim can be fitted. Next step was to fit the silver trim that faces the outside of the car, but is only visible when the doors are open, and the inner weather strip. The trim is glued on, but needs to be...
I had originally tucked the wiring for the rear speakers in the DS under the marine carpet that was on the inside of the sills. However, I am now replacing that and gluing down the correct vinyl, so wanted a better solution. The DS wiring harness actually goes between the inner and outer sill, along with some hydraulic lines. This is not...
The sill trim on my DS was in poor condition – the rubbers were perished, the outer sill trim was cracking, and the trim on the inside sills had been replaced with Marine carpet. Most of the information I could find on the Internet referred to a DS Pallas, and I wanted to keep my car as a DS Comfort. The photo above...
I had the traction towed home a week ago as I was unable to select a gear despite the clutch being fully depressed. I didn’t think anything was seriously wrong, as I had been driving fine around that time. After doing some research on the Traction Yahoo Group, and looking carefully at the linkages, I was able to determine that they sometimes...
Today the JDCA organized a run up to St Albans, which is just north of Sydney. I hadn’t had a chance to take the E-Type on a long run, so thought it would be a good opportunity. It was one of the biggest car club runs I have been on with nearly 100 sign ups and at least 20 E-Types joining in....
There have been some rather amusing columns written over the last few weeks that the departure of Jeremy Clarkson somehow paves the way for a ‘kinder, gentler’ (read more PC) Top Gear. More reviews on affordable cars; more eco friendly; no off colour comments. What a lot of rubbish. Nobody wants to watch a programme like that. How many teenage boys have a poster...
Today I was planning to change the oil in the engine and gearbox of the Traction. I took it for a drive to heat up the oil so it would drain out nicely. It was a lovely evening and I was enjoying the drive, then all of a sudden, the Traction won’t select a gear. Despite pushing the clutch to the...
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