A Brief History of Wombles PSA wheels

[Ultrawomble]

I suppose I had better say hello and tell those of you who are interested a little about myself.

Im in my 50's and work as a medical prescriber in the secure sector. My work takes me all over the north west of the UK and occasionally if I am unlucky Yorkshire. I have had PSA cars since the early 1990's when quite by accident I bought a battered 1.9D ZX as a stop gap. I cant honestly recall why I needed a car in a hurry but it belonged to a county court judge who's idea of maintainance was "its had an MOT this year".


So impressed by the workhorse I replaced the Laguna tow car ( which was rubbish as a tow car despite me rebuilding the rear suspension) with a 2.0HDi Xantia that got the Dragon Tuning box treatment...




Quite swiftly I moved the ZX onto the first of 5 BX's ( a car that I still have a lot of enthusiasm for)...


All 3 above are 1.7 Turbo Diesel flavour - and finally the 1.7 NAD ( worlds slowest car) G735BJB which is still going strong

Had a play with a 1.5D AX that I ran for 12 months on nothing but old engine oil, hydraulic oil and cooking oil and despite stinking to high heaven it never missed a beat - 12 months of almost free motoring whilst I worked on the district in Blackpool



Another daily driver BX in 1.9D flavour this time...



Then another ZX 1.9D



Then I bought my first Berlingo 2.0HDi this from the clinic I was based at to replace the Xantia - 2.0HDi with air con

& Split charger set up with a leisure battery in the boot & mains inverter to power the medical shizzle it carried around

Here it is sans medico markings and green flashing beacon doing what they do best ( this also got the tuning treatment to eek a few more HP out of the donkey)


We only kept the Bingo 2 years before trading it in for the current C8 136 as we needed more seats...



Ours is the Calipso Blue one nearest - the grey one belongs to a mate who works for Citroen.

I had gone back to running a bike full time for a while and then bought Richard Kitchens tuned Picasso HDi ( I told the missus I was just popping out to look at a car and got the train from Preston to Portsmouth - she wasnt impressed for some reason) 



Stage 1 remap, cat removed, EGR blanked off this went like a scalded cat and was pushing 130HP at the wheels, sadly the gearbox wasnt designed to take that sort of punishment and I destroyed it. Such a shame as it was ace - I replaced with another Picasso but this time I had to settle for a 1.6 Petrol.



And sometime in the next 2 months we should be going back to a Bingo for the main car as the C8 gets retired after nearly 14 years (almost) faultless service. Hopefully a 130HP Flair XL and I have feelers out at the local dealers looking for something that fits the bill - Ive also looked at that AutoEAid as they claim to be able to come in at £20K for the right spec car but the missus has a thing about never buying brand new, always get something a year old then the biggest chunk of depreciation has gone ( thats what comes from marrying a farmers daughter).

[Ultrawomble]

Hmm
Seems my Google drive doesnt like hotlinking to photos.

[GraemeT]

Ahh the joys of technology......

You're quite dedicated to the brand? Realised that my trail of broken vehicles over the years included more Citroen than any other brand (grand total of three) - C15D Van from new on a 'J' plate (1.7 diesel) that ate two engines in the first 64,000 miles. Not put off got hold of a BX 1.9 that returned 55mpg (this was back in 1996 or so) and would tow like a good 'un - amazing car, killed off by sub frame rot.
Two decades later in strolled the Berlingo for two years and I was very happy with it (other than the fact that long journeys crippled me).
Currently PSA engines live on in the shape of the lump under the bonnet of the Mini (My van is a Pug Boxer but has the Ford Puma engine).

[Ultrawomble]

Ahh the joys of technology......

You're quite dedicated to the brand? 

Ive had just over 100 cars and bikes since the 80's starting with my AD016 and then having Fords for many years. 

Citroens have just been good at being: "An Car" & I like some of the funky style. The C8 and Picasso have been super comfy to drive over distances, plus being "French rubbish" meant that they were cheap in the 90's - a whole taxed & MOT'd for 12 months could be had for less than £400 - one ot the reasons I went through a lot of cars in the late 90's and early 2000's was working on the district I was getting 43p/mile allowance - running stuff like the AX on used engine oil meant that every 6 months or so I had more than enough to buy another car, just to try something different. I had BMW's Mercs, Citroens, Nissans and even rocked about in a MR2 (totally impractical). Same with motorbikes, its rare I keep a daily rider more than 6 months. The current daily ( the CB250) has worn thin now though its very practical and very economical for town commuting. I might have a go at bobbering it in the Spring. Dont ask me to sell the Blackbird or the Grom though they are keepers & the Bird has had more money spent on it than Ill ever get back
Dont get me started on my fleet of 1960's mopeds...

[GraemeT]

Thirty two cars in my time - be much higher if I lived nearer BCA or similar as I used to take a punt on a car out of the auctions and if I liked it keep it or else chop it back in again - living out in the middle of nowhere now it's three hours to the nearest auction so we seem to be hanging onto cars nowadays for much longer - having said that the Berlingo replacement is due an MoT soon........

[Ultrawomble]

Bugger.

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