Ok, let's get one thing straight. This car was not a choice, it was a lack of options. The white Panda killed it's clutch, I had less then two hundred quid left in the bank, and I needed a car to get to work now. A brief perusal of the "for the love of God, take it away" sections of the local car dealers turned up a Peugeot 405 with a smashed window, a pinto-engined Ford Sierra in dysentry biege, and this. The Citroën had the longest MOT, the cheapest insurance, and was still taxed, so it got the nod. Someone had part-exed it about an hour earlier, and a wodge of cash secured it as mine, on the oh-so-traditional proviso that I drove it away immediately and didn't bring it back. Fair enough.

  Although it was slow, and had bodyroll like Jabba the Hutt on a waterbed, it wasn't so bad. Got killer MPG (about fifty to the gallon...), and was fairly comfy - helped by seats which appeared to have been made from nothing but sponge. The rear seats don't even get inertia-reel seatbelts, instead being lumbered with buckles that you have tio adjust manually. Though cornering at anything above walking pace meant desperately trying not to fall across the other side of the cabin, and the driver's window refused to wind down (this is actually not so bad - I get the distinct impression that the only alternative would be for the driver's window not to wind up, so it's really the lesser of two evils), it was certainly tolerable.

  I even made it down to London in it, but a second attempt at this was to prove too much. About two miles down the M1, the car lost power and the temperature light came on. Yes, the temperature light, you don't get a guage, as this would have cost too much, it seems. Anyway, it was about this time that an interesting facet of the car's design revealed itself to me: That warning light isn't designed to let you know you're overheating the engine, it's to tell you that you have overheated the engine, and it is now terminal. Nice. When I pulled over and switched off, the temperature in the cylinders was high enough that it kept running for about twenty seconds with no ignition, until I deliberately stalled it to get the thing to stop.

  Popping the bonnet revealed what I already knew: Oil and water everywhere? Overheated? French? That'll be a blown head gasket, then. The RAC bloke didn't even bother to have a look when I told him, the car went straight onto a towing dolly and we dragged it's carcass back to Leicester. Once the head was off, the diagnosis was confirmed. I had to scrape the head gasket up off the block and head in tiny pieces (which took an unbelievable amount of time). The only bit of it that was vaguely intact was the set of steel fire rings around the bores. The rest had bonded itself, with great determination, to whatever metal surfaces were in range. Ugh.

  Anyway, a new headgasket (and lots of Cap'n Bodgit's Intant Gasket Goo) was lobbed in the general direction of the engine, and the thing got nailed back together. Jesus Christ, it actually ran! Badly, but running's running. An oil & filter change, along with a mild fettle, saw it settle down a bit, and it was back on the road. Almost certainly suffering low compression due to a warped head, the car felt like it was making about twenty bhp (that's brake hamster power...), and had a top speed of about 40mph - more if you're going downhill. But for urban transport, it'd do.

  The car stayed as transport for a few more months while I worked out what to replace it with, leading to my purchasing the Suzuki. Then, in early June 2005, with a couple of weeks left on it's MOT, the Citroën was towed down to a local car breakers and left to it's fate - most likely chopped up for what little value it's metal had. I can't say I was sorry to see it go.

Current Status
  Scrapped.

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