Revelation

Menorca - August 2014

The family summer holiday to Menorca in August 2014 was a memorable one. On a day trip out to a local water park on the edge of the main town - Ciutadella - I climbed the metal steps to the top of the water slide. Reaching the top, I waited my turn and looked out across all the whitewashed houses with their teracotta roof tiles. I was suddenly struck by a vivid - a VERY vivid -  memory of the joy of driving my DS through towns and villages of peeling whitewash, shuttered windows and terracotta roofs in the south of France in 1996 or 1997. I wanted that feeling again!!

Back at our resort and lying on a sunbed by the pool, that yearning wouldn't go away. I REALLY wanted to be out driving my DS again. I began to think and dream.........What if I could get my DS back on the road again? It wasn't as mad as it seemed. Was it? What would it take? I still had all the bits. In fact I also had a good number of spares. Even though I had been without a drivable DS since 1999, I had continued to go to the rallies and collect parts for a few more years - before parenthood meant I no longer had the time or money for such things. My CCC membership lapsed in 2004 I think - the year my son was born.

Over all the years that the car had been laid up at the barn, I was also paying for a lock up garage in Bedford: shortly after returning to Bedford from Winslow, the Council had finally offered me the lock-up I had always wanted. The irony was that it was less than 50 yards from my old house where I used to park the DS outside!

As we were decorating our house, the lock up was quickly filled with housey stuff: old floorboards and window frames, offcuts of timber, an old radiator, a pine bed, louvre doors and old bags of plaster and cement. I'd also squeezed in some DS parts. There wasn't any room in the garage for a DS and the double rent-paying with the barn had long been a source of friction at home - but I'd always refused to give up on the DS and the barn.

Lock Up - 9 September 2014

Returning from holiday I went to the lock up and looked with fresh eyes - seeing once again what I had gradually become blind to: the eaves were stuffed with my leather interior and spare front wings, and spare rear wings hung on the walls like hunting trophies. Four '5J' wheels were stacked in one corner and two bvh gearboxes in another. A Continental Edison 'Hi-Fi' FM radio sat on a shelf and a new, old stock front valance hung on a nail along with a selection of bumpers and the cars air scoop.

What if I could get the DS back to Bedford? I lived on the other side of town to the lock up now, but less than 15 minutes away. Working on it there would be easier than travelling to the barn AND and then I wouldn't have to pay the farmer. That would also help with the cost of DS repairs!

Now back in the UK from Menorca, it was clear that this was no 'holiday romance': the DS bug had hit me hard. I was a man obsessed. I started planning and plotting: drawing up lists of jobs and questions. I set to work on Google and discovered that things had moved on since 2000! There were several well established and organised DS suppliers represented on line. The Citroenclassics site was a real eye-opener. 

Top of the 'to do' list was trying to remember where the farm and car were! Yes - it had been that long! I was too embarrassed to call my old friend Richard and had I had no contact details for the farm, so the first thing I had to do was use Google maps to work out where it was and it's name!

I'd gradually lost touch with my old friend Richard - served badly once I'd moved from Winslow. As Richard also had several Citroens stored at the farm, I had paid for the barn through him on a quarterly basis. Sometimes, for many months on end, it all just slipped my mind and I would get a terse note from Richard telling me he'd had to pay on my behalf, and I owed him six months rent. Had it really been that long since I'd last paid him?.....The years slipped by and our friendship degenerated into a series of payment reminders and queries. Having not seen each other for too many years,  before I could repair my car, I would need to repair a friendship.

I bit the bullet and gave Richard a call. With little contact between us in over a decade he listened cautiously to my plotting but, over several phone calls began to realise that I just might be serious, and started to warm to my plans.  Richard did his best to tell me about the location and condition of my car, but he didn't have a lot of detail. Like me he'd got on with his own life over the years and I can see that, to him, my DS had begun to look like a lost cause. We made tentative arrangement to meet to go to the farm in mid September and try to start the car. 

The bug REALLY had bitten me hard. The days dragged by and I just couldn't wait until mid September to see it again. As my mind struggled endlessly to come up with a workable restoration plan, I realised that I needed to see the car first. I had to know if it really was still in the barn and what condition it was in. If mid September was to be an attempt to start it, what would I need to take with me? A spare distributor? HT leads? LHM?

For the past few years I'd been working in Milton Keynes and was now only 15 minutes from the barn and my DS. On the pretext of assuming responsibilities for paying my barn rent (which was an important step in rebuilding my friendship with Richard), I called the farmer one day to reintroduce myself. On the back of that conversation I used a lunchtime to go over to the farm. The drive through the rolling countryside of Buckinghamshire on that hot summer day was a pleasure and, with my new obsession, I imagined how much more pleasurable it would be if I was driving a DS.........

Remembering how to get to the farm was bad enough but, once I'd arrived, I had to be reminded where the barn and the car were. It had been that long since I was last there. The barn was draughty and gloomy and I entered with a beating heart.  A race car builder and driver had use of one end, building MG track cars from road cars. Other cars and caravans were stored there. In addition to a couple of old tractors and modern cars, a Rolls Royce and and Aston Martin sat under covers and a long glider trailer took up most of one wall.  At least one of these looked like a long-forgotten project and I suppose my DS was no different. My DS sat forlornly sulking in a corner, completely boxed-in, with it's face turned away and with old cushions and blankets draped over the top and odd bits and pieces of other cars dumped on the bonnet. Where had I been all this time?' it seemed to ask accusingly

Rat Damage......

I cleared a few things off and lifted the bonnet. Underneath I could hardly make out any details. Everything was a uniform mouldy black grey colour. The wiring loom was corroding away and rats had gnawed the HT leads as well as holes in the cardboard ventilation tubes. Rat shit covered everything else. Mercifully the inside of the car was unscathed. Clearly not to the rats liking. Apart from some minor gnawing on one of the levers for adjusting the seat backs - which looked more like the work of mice -  there was no shit and there were no rats nests.

Distributor Cap - Early September 2014

I took some reference photos of what remained of the wiring loom and ignition circuit. I stood back and assessed what I was seeing and made a mental note of the spares and replacements to bring next time. This was going to be an uphilll battle and there was no point in starting to get my hopes up if the engine was seized. The decision on how to proceed was going to rest on whether or not the car would start. 

I wanted to stay and tinker, but this barn was no place for me in my collar and tie and it was time to leave. I had to content myself with having achieved my first goal: I had at least found and seen my car!

The Lay Up (Part 2)

The lay Up Continues......

Moving back to Bedford, my car parts and possessions went into temporary storage in a lock up in Winslow, and the car went out to be stored at a nearby farm a few miles from Little Horwood. The journey from Bedford to the farm was about an hour each way and my visits were infrequent. Initially, and during the winter months, the car lived in the big, dry, vermin-free barn, along with a number of other classics and caravans. However towards the end of each summer they all had to vacate as the barn was used to store grain.

When that happened my DS had to be coaxed to life and moved to a secondary small barn: dry but cold and draughty and with plenty of vermin. The car made the move between barns for the first couple of years. On one occasion I noticed a dribble of water from the water pump bearing. On another I noticed a hydraulic fluid leak from the clutch cylinder. I probably last saw it in May 2004. 

"Big Barn" - 11 May 2004

Later that summer the car refused to start and had to be towed to the secondary barn, where it ended up stuck  in a corner. And there it stayed, boxed in by other cars and machinery.  I didn't see it again  until September 2014.

"Big Barn" - Cars and Grain, 14 September 2014

"Big Bar" - Cars And Grain: 14 September 2014

The Lay Up (Part 1)

The Lay Up

After driving the car for a couple of years, I'd noticed that the gear change was becoming 'snatchy' and I'd failed to correct this to my satisfaction - despite much tinkering with the centrifugal regulator and CRC unit. On 1 November 1998 I set out in the car. I changed gear. There was a lurch and then a 'bang'. The car rolled to a halt. Although the engine ran, there was no power to the gearbox.

Doctor Chevrons - 1999

Although I only lived around the corner, I elected to have the nice RAC man recover the car to Doctor Chevrons garage over near Soham in Cambridgehire: a hidden world of rusting donor Ds and buried treasure. Mick Groombridge diagnosed (see what I did there?) that the drive shaft to the gearbox had sheared because of the excessive clutch snatch. Apparently it's a sacrificial part and is designed to shear in favour of other more catastrophic damage. The bottom line was that the engine would have to come out..... That kind of work and mechanical understanding was beyond me and couldn't be undertaken on the highway outside my house anyway. That's why I'd had it recovered to Mick's in the first place. And so my car joined a long line of Citroens waiting for attention at Doctor Chevrons.

I drew up a list of other things to be done while the engine was out. Timing chain replacement new clutch, that kind of thing. I waited for ages for the work to get underway. The debate about the use of unleaded fuel was raging with uncertainty over whether a DS could cope, or would need hardened valve seats fitting. If Ds needed to be modified in some way - then this was the time for my car. This delayed any start to the work my car until there was a consensus that Ds had 'lead memory'. I visited my D occasionally and noted how grubby and run down the engine looked. I had a half-hearted go at cleaning the engine bay while the engine was out.

Engine And Gearbox Out: Doctor Chevrons - 1999

The Car ended up being with Doctor Chevron for several years before it was finally worked on and repaired. As well as a timing belt change and re-cored radiator, Mick dropped in a different low mileage gearbox - but it hadn't been fully road-tested. He still wasn't happy with the clutch take up - despite fitting a refurbished CRC unit from Pleiades over in nearby Sawtry. To this day the CRC unit remains suspect and joins the list of things to be investigated as part of this restoration.

A lot had gone on while the car was with Doctor Chevron. I'd moved house - and town. Moving from Bedford I was now living in Winslow and was lucky enough to have a 25ft garage, 1 1/2 cars wide. I set the garage up with a long sturdy workbench at the far end and loose car parts stored underneath it. With the luxury of this new garage space, and the car already having been off the road so long, I decided that I needed to do a fuller restoration on the car before I put it back on the road - starting with roof removal as part of a planned body respray. The car was trailered back to Winslow (with a couple of spare gearboxes as compensation for the delay and as insurance in case the one fitted was duff) on 16 June 2001 and I pulled the roof. Being a 1968 car, it had the bolt-on roof and while the crimped edge on the fibreglass showed a few signs of rust, overall it was very, very good. Progress was slow. I removed the aluminium air scoop and gave it a clean. by 2002 had I got as far as stripping and priming the cant rail, 'C' pillars and roof edge before events took a turn. The bits I removed were stored in boxes, ready for the expected rebuild. A change of circumstances early in the year saw me leaving Winslow and returning to my native Bedford.

WELCOME

So what's the story?

Okay. This is the story of a 1968 model year Citroen DS21bvh Pallas. A 'proper' one - left hand drive.

Sold between September 1967 and August 1968, the 1968 cars are the first of the 'cats eyes' cars. Why 'cats eyes'? Well, because the cars have headlights that turn with the steering and so the car can 'see' in the dark. Now - I thought headlights enabled you to do that anyway, but I don't work in the marketing department of a quirky french motor manufacturer - so am probably missing something here.

Second Style DS Dash: 1962 to 1968

Anyway, as well as being the first cars with swivelling lights, the 1968 cars were the last with sweeping 'wave' dashboard in grey ('gris rose') and black - first introduced in 1962 and fitted with large, chunky switches and knobs like toothpaste tube tops. That thing sticking out of the top of the steering wheel? It's the gear lever. Yes - I know: how cool is that!

True, the 1969 cars also had the swept dash, but all in black and altogether more austere. From 1970 onwards and to the end of production in 1975, the DS range was homogenised - particularly in terms of the dashboard.  And so viewed from todays perspective, and that of the last style of Ds, the design notes of the 1968 cars hark back to earlier and simpler times - whilst still offering the refinements and comforts of the later cars in terms of use of LHM fluid in the hydraulics, swivelling lights and the more-refined five bearing engines. I told you that marketing and ads was not my thing.

So what about this particular car?

I'm getting to that. I'd owned a DS before this one - well a black 1969 ID19b Luxe to be exact. I had the DS bug before I even knew it, owning at one time, as I did, a Saab 96. In hindsight my 'poor mans DS'. On holiday in Europe, whenever I saw DS I was thrilled. And if it was parked up, would have to be dragged away from it as I soaked up every curve and detail. Then in 1991 the Design Museum in London held a DS exhibition and I persuaded some friends to go along with me. I was fascinated, but thought that the exhibition would be as close as I would get to a DS.

The Very Copy of that Fateful Mag....

In September 1993 I sold my Saab 96 down in London. With a rusty chassis, no garage or facilities and no skill or confidence even if I had the tools and space, repairs were not viable for me. Having driven it down there, I had to catch the train home. At St. Pancras station my eye was caught by a magazine on the rack at the kiosk: 'Practical Classics' of October 1993. It wasn't the shiny red TR4 on the cover that got my attention, , it was the tantalising coverline next to it : "Buying A Citroen DS"........

With my glossy purchase under my arm, I settled down for the train journey home. Inside, the magazine included a good six page buyers guide, featuring photos (c/o Mick Groombridge - Doctor Chevron) of all the problems (rust traps) to look out for when buying a DS and top tips for how to tell if things like your accumulator sphere are dead. What was an accumulator sphere I wondered? While I'd long coveted the looks of a DS, I'd never previously considered myself as the kind of person who could own a DS. On that train journey back from London, all that began to change as the DS bug bit deeper.......

The following week I took a trip to the Aladdin's cave that was the 'Retromobile' showroom on the Battersea Bridge, and was given a test drive along The Embankment. My first ride in a DS!  I loved what Retromobile were doing, but I couldn't afford those London prices.

Retromobile Brochure

Using the phone number provided in Practical Classics, I phoned Mick Groombridge - aka 'Doctor Chevron'.  'No' he said: he didn't sell cars but, by chance, he'd just received a letter from someone in London asking if he wanted to buy his fathers old DS. He could put me in touch?

The V5 tells me that by 11 October 1993 the car was mine! I was a DS owner! The rainy night I first  drove it back up the A1 from London was one of my most memorable and enjoyable DS experiences. Arriving home very late, I parked the black beauty out on the street a little down the road. Boy! How the neighbours were going to be surprised when they woke up in the morning!

My ID19b

Dashboard Of My 1969 ID19b in 1994

Good advice for the DS novice is to start with something simple. And it didn't get much simpler than my ID19b Luxe. No hydraulic steering, no swivelling and dipping lights. The modest hydraulics - powered by a simple cam-operated pump bolted onto the engine block - controlled the suspension and brakes only.  I loved it, and lost track of time when I drove it. That's right - didn't even have a clock. On the plus side, it was a genuine black DS (ID) and, being a 1969 model, had an interesting dash not found on the later cars. Most importantly, it was rust-free. The car had been bought in Paris in 1969 by a Welsh school teacher who then drove it to Egypt where he worked. That explains the absence of a heater, the lizard skeletons under the carpet and sand in the dashboard but I'm not sure I'd have have chosen black.......

I joined the Citroen Car Club and went to some of the early DS rallies over in Ely, getting to know a few fellow enthusiasts. Generally, I just got on with enjoying the car.

Just Goofing - November 1993

It was at the fourth annual DS rally in 1995 that I first saw the 1968 DS21 I currently own. 

A four speed bvh ('boîte voiture hydraulique' - hydraulically operated gearbox) car, with the  'Pallas' level of trim, comfort and refinement. To cap it all, of the dozen cars at that rally (yes - that many back then!), it was the only one with a pre-1970 dash and I loved everything about it. It was worlds away from my humble little ID19b and my head was turned. At that time the car was owned by Dominic Raffo. As it drove away into the distance I told Mick Groombridge how I coveted it - only to be told that Dominic was selling it!

Anyway, Mick put me in touch with Dominic and after an agonising couple of weeks wait, Dominic agreed to sell the car to me and a test drive was arranged at Barry Lowdell's garage in Welwyn Garden City. Or was it Hatfield? Having only driven a column change ID19 with standard clutch and brake pedals, I was warned that the quirky hydraulic clutch and gearchange of a bvh car and fearsomely sharp brake 'mushroom' took some getting used to. "Drive one for less than 15 mins" Barry said, "and you'll never drive one again". "Drive one for more than 15 minutes, and you won't want to drive anything else". He wasn't wrong. The deal was sealed and £1474.25 changed hands.

We haggled over the 25 pence.....

For a few short weeks I owned two Ds! Both street parked. Boy! The neighbours were going to be really surprised when they woke up in the morning!

An Ordinary suburban Street Scene - August 1995

The black ID19b had to go. It had always been the plan. I couldn't afford the upkeep and depreciation on two street-parked cars. I'd already put my name down for a Council garage but they were in short supply and it was going to be a long wait. I advertised the ID19 nationally and it sold to someone the other side of town to me - barely three miles away!

The sale of the ID left me to enjoy my one true love which, if I'm honest, was a bit tatty. But that didn't matter - as this was a 'keeper'. A long term project. Although originally painted 'Gris Palladium" - a metallic grey colour reserved for 'Pallas' spec cars and with either a black or 'gris argent' roof (more on that later), it was now badly sprayed in metallic silver. Possibly a Citroen BX colour. The respray generously included many of the rubber seals and fringes around the wings and doors.

Typical DS Rot.......

The car had been a South of France car but, despite this, was showing it's age: the wheel arches of the front wings were bubbly and crunchy. Worst of all, the boot was full of water and the rear wheel inner arches had great big holes. Opening the boot, I could see the wheels!..... Sound familiar?

As is common with a DS, the source of the problem was poor maintenance. Just like a house, Ds suffer from blocked gutters. Leaves and debris get caught in the narrow gaps in and around the boot hinges and  the channels at the sides of the boot. These channels then rot out - often unseen under a closed boot lid. 

'Pallas' cars also have a sponge seal around the boot lid. These soak up water and - when the boot is closed - squeeze all their moisture out and into the boot where it soaks under the carpet and behind the torsion suspension bar closing panel. Not a pretty sight.

Complete replacement rear inner wings were sourced from Andyspares, a Citroen specialist down in Reading, and the car was despatched to Geoff Rothon (owner of this car before Dominic) over in South Wales for the transplant. 

Inner Rear Wings and Boot Floor Removed - 1995

Planning ahead - or so I thought I was - I also got Geoff to paint the roof in an off-white colour in anticipation of having the other body panels resprayed the correct colour at some time.

When the car was ready, Geoff generously offered to drive it across country from Newport.  Getting a lift there from a friend of mine, we rendezvoused at a service station on the A1 just outside London. Setting off for home I followed my friend back up the A1 in convoy, driving my beloved DS21 once again. Suddenly I began to feel a strong 'bumping' sensation from the front wheels. was it a rut in the road? The sensation got stronger and I started to lift my foot off the accelerator. As I did so, there was a terrific bang and a silver flash out of the corner of my eye. The car lurched but kept a straight line as I reduced the speed and crawled over to the hard shoulder. I'd had a 'De Gaulle" moment! the car had suffered a high speed front tyre blow out at about 60 mph, possibly more. A quick inspection revealed that one of the ancient tyres had cracked and broken up, before completely disintegrating. The wheel rim had been flat-spotted, there was minor damage to the Pallas rubbing strip and there was a suspicion stain on the drivers seat. After a quick tyre change and retrieval of the Pallas hub cap from the verge( the 'silver flash'), I carried merrily on my way.

Minor adventure over, I got on with the pleasure of driving my DS21. Thoughts of a body respray  were never far away, but I secretly knew that I'd need to repair or replace the panels before a respray could happen - and money simply didn't allow.  Although I'd have liked it to be pristine, the fact it was tatty was also kind of cool. "Shabby chic" is the phrase I think. I could afford to be carefree and not worry about leaving it in the street.

12th "Club IdealeDS" rally - Normandy, July 1996

I've now owned this gorgeous car for 19 years. However, as it turned out,  I only had the pleasure of driving it for three. During that time it was my daily drive - and I loved every second of it. I also took it to France a couple of times - including a 'IdealeDS' rally in 1996. However for 16 years of my ownership it was laid-up and, for long spells, simply forgotten-about.

Then in 2014 - late August to be exact - the DS bug bit me again.....

This is the story of my ongoing efforts to get my car back on the road after it's long, long sleep.