Fettling The Replacement Outer Sill Panels

When you use replacement parts, It's probably wise to assume that some fettling will be needed to make them fit and function as intended. On a whim, I decided to do a test fit of the pins that hold the door springs and spring mechanism in the new sills.

Old and new compared. Spot the difference?

I'm so glad I did because..... the pins didn't fit. They were too tight. I'm glad I didn't find that out after I'd welded the sills in place, as it would have been awkward to access that area.

A cradle and pin in situ under the sill

In fact it wasn't even easy to rectify with the panels still off the car. The shaped edge of the sill panel also meant that I couldn't easily get a file in the holes to make them a little bigger. In the end, I put a pin on my tower drill, spun it and used emery cloth to very slightly reduce it's diameter so that it fitted. 

But it got worse. Fitting the pin showed that the cradles that the pins sit in were too wide. This is quite significant as the cradle has grooves for the springs and for retaining circles, and shoulders the rest in the cradle.

Citroen sill and cradle: aligned to the pin shoulders

On the new parts, the cradle arms aligned to the grooves  - rather than the shoulders - and so might dislodge a circle-or door spring when in use.

The cradle is wrongly aligned to the grooves

I tried bending the two sides of the cradle together, but with the sides no longer parallel, the pin wouldn't fit again! Luckily I hadn't thrown away the old sill panels I had removed and, given these two problems, decided to salvage the original cradles and re-use those. On the old Citroen parts, I carefully drilled the spot welds out from the panel side, making sure I did not cut the cradles. And I carefully drilled out the spot welds from the cradles of the new panels - making sure i did not cut the panel beneath.

Removing the cradles

I compared cradles. The ones from the reproduction panel were so over-sized (wide) that the Citroen cradles could nestle within them! They would have taken some significant re-shaping to reduce the gap and still have the two sides parallel.

The reproduction cradles were over-sized

The spot and drill marks of old and new panels showed me where the donor cradles needed to go and they were soon welded back on to the new panels. 

Telltale marks aided the re-fitting

A test fit of the pins showed every thing was as it should be....I gave the repair areas a basic wash in thinned zinc oxide primer just to prevent fish-rusting and in the expectation that it would wick between the cradle and the panel.

A Quick Word About..........The DS Fuel Tank Filter

When I removed the fuel tank from my car earlier this, I discovered that it didn't have it's proper in-tank fuel filter fitted to the drain plug. So I started to look into it.

Fuel tank filter and fuel tank drain plug

The in-tank filter consists of a column of thin serrated discs, stacked over a cage-like plastic frame.

The discs are stacked over a plastic frame

The serrations mean that there are very small gaps maintained between the discs. That's how and where the filtering takes place.

The filter unit presses into a recess in the end of the brass fuel tank drain plug.

The recess in the fuel tank drain plug

The other, top, end of the tower has a small hole to the space in the middle of the disc stack. The fuel tank has a curved metal guide tube that the nylon fuel pick up hose fits through. The guide tube ensures that the nylon pick up hose passes down into the middle of the fuel filter stack.

The guide tube 'A' steers the pick up hose into the filter 'F'.

The tank end of the fuel pick up pipe locates within the stack of filter washers via the hole in the tower.

The filter in the tank. Note the rust!

(photo credit: Carter Willey)

All too often, when the drain plug is removed, the stack of filter washers is found to be clogged and looks like this........ 

Clogged filter
(photo credit: Enzo Round)

It's hard to even recognise it as a stack of separate discs.

Faced with this, some people choose to leave the filter out of the tank and instead use disposable in line filters. The in-tank filters can, however, be dismantled and cleaned to restore their function.

The version of the filter you are most likely to come across consists of bronze discs. Removing the 'lozenge' from the end allows the clipping end of the tower to close up slightly and the washers can be removed more easily. First of all there should be a plastic washer on the end. Next is a rubber 'O' ring.  

Fuel filter
(photo credit unknown)

It's not uncommon for the 'O' ring to perish or be completely missing.......

Perished 'O' ring.......

Under the 'O' ring are approximately 60 thin bronze discs or washers.  

Filter dismantled.
(photo credit: Colin Smith)

I can only say 'approximately' as some folk find they have 60 or 61 washers, others find just less than 60.

59 bronze discs and a plastic washer. No 'O' ring.....

Whatever the number of discs, you don't want excessive gaps between them. That's why the rubber 'O' ring is important - to take up any slack in the stack. If it needs to be replaced, the 'O' ring needs to have an inner diameter of 21mm and have a cross section of about 3mm. Thats assuming you have about 60 bronze discs.

The individual discs can be carefully cleaned. An ultrasonic cleaner is handy for this kind of thing and hanging the washers from a threaded rod means the washers don't gather up. Elbow grease works too.

Cleaning the discs in an ultrasonic cleaner

If properly maintained, the in-tank filter does exactly what it's intended to do.

Cleaned filter. Can you see the gaps?

The filter assembly should clip into the end of the drain plug and stay there - not just sit loose. Though there isn’t really anywhere it can go.

Plug and filter assembly
(photo credit unknown)

When refitting the drain plug and washer, it's wise to make sure that the end of the nylon pick up hose extends fully to the bottom of the tank  - level with the base.

Fuel pick up pipe at tank drain hole
(photo credit unknown)

The drain plug and filter assembly can then be fitted over the fuel pick hose and screwed home. It's also wise to make sure that the end of the pick up hose is cut at an angle. If it's cut square, it may block itself at the bottom of the filter stack.

Pick up pipe inside the filter. Note the angled pipe end

As the filter was missing (or removed) from my car, I got a second hand one from one of the usual parts suppliers. I was surprised to find that, instead of about 60 thin bronze discs, it was made up of 39 slightly thicker serrated plastic discs. The 39 plastic discs equated to the same length/ height as 60 bronze discs.

Serrated plastic discs

Perhaps this version is from the end of DS production or maybe from a contemporary Citroen model? It still works in the same way though.