Interlude: Citromobile 2018

And so - Citromobile 2018: 5th and 6th of May in Haarlem in the Netherlands. 

Richard Burch and I have this off to a fine art now. This year he did the driving honours: a Friday evening dash to Harwich for the overnight ferry to the Hook of Holland (berths obligatory - so a good nights rest). Curry, chat, see who else is on board. Early night. get woken up early. Good breakfast. Disembark. Early morning drive up to Haarlem. Arrive just before the event opens. Park up. Admire a few Citroens. Pay, organise a coffee or tea and in we go.......

And so two days were spent with heads buried in boxes, dithering about whether to buy some rusty part or other, broken only by a night camping while we finally made our minds up about what to buy. 

Even if you are not buying, there is always a lot to see. One of the things that impressed me most was this example of a completely rebuilt rear end. It's all shiny new.

late Sunday afternoon we drove back down to Hook of Holland and woke up on Monday in the UK. With the roads quiet for the bank holiday, I was home by 10am!

I think I had a more successful trip than Richard. That might be because I deliberately had a long list of wants - knowing I was bound to find at least some of them. Richard had a shorter, more specific list - meaning there was more risk he would come away empty-handed. I must admit though, that with the successes each year brings, my 'wants' last is slowly turning into a list of 'nice to haves' rather than 'essential to haves'. That said, it was still very successful.

In addition to some reproduction rubber pieces and tools, purchases included a good condition bootlid (one of the traders there - Falk Lehmann - was selling brand new reproduction lids. They looked very good), a good condition pre-1970 Pallas rear wing, a single leather Pallas door cap  in 'naturel' colour, a pair of leather grab handles - also in 'natural' leather, a replacement screen washer bottle, a clutch re-engagement control unit, 123 electronic ignition.

Some of the Citromobile 2018 Haul

My best purchase was a new, old stock metal radiator air scoop with an integral 'radiator blind' closing flap to speed up engine warming on cold days. These formed part of the '-15' heating option. This is the version for the four speed gearbox and also has the correct pre-1969 right-angle end to join to the fabric section.

Radiator Blind inside the Air Scoop

Lever to operate the blind. End on RHS is right-angled

I only bought this on the Sunday. I'm surprised it hadn't been snapped up by someone else already. That is part of the problem: some of the very best bits (more desirable/ rare) get sold between traders on Friday night  - before the event is open to the public. One trader had sold a rather tired looking -15 rear heater to another trader for €600! I'm just glad I wasn't on the look out for one of those.

Rear -15 heater - sold for €600. It's upside down by the way......

With the Citroen 100 year celebrations next year, I may give Citromobile 2019 a miss. But don't hold me to that - there's still a few things I'm looking out for.