Citroën 2CV
James craves the Atlantic. There’s only one car for the job.
1985 Citroën 2CV6 Spécial
Engine 602cc/2-cyl/ohv Power 29bhp@5750rpm Torque 31lb ft@3500rpm Gearbox 4-speed manual 0-60mph 32.7sec
Top speed 71mph
Weight 574.3kg
Work done
Fan replaced; oil change; epic road trip to the west coast.
Also James’s garage 1985 CITROËN CX GTI
Preparing for a journey to Scotland in June.
1987 CITROËN AX 11 TRE
Still awaiting inspection.
2002 CITROËN C5 2.2 HDI
Warnings lights banished!
2004 SMART ROADSTER
Service due – plus rear brakes.
During the lockdown of Spring 2020, with little else to do on those rather desolate weekends, I thought I’d be really cunning and book a range of cheap UK getaways for the end of the year and into 2021. In the end though, virtually all were cancelled, but for a couple of postponed bookings. One of them – a small holiday let near Penzance – would see me reunited with friends and family in the South West for the first time in more than a year.
From where I currently live, on the Northantscambs border, Cornwall is a fair old trek. Sure, it made good sense to travel the distance in one of the ‘moderns’ on my fleet, but this trip felt bigger somehow. It marked the end of lockdown and a new chapter in this new post-vaccine phase of the pandemic. After being stuck at home for so long, I needed to feel the invigoration of a proper adventure. For that… I needed my 2CV.
Bird strike
I packed everything I’d require – from clothing (both sunny and wet weather gear, obviously) to an assortment of spare parts and essential tools – and set off via the workshop for an oil change and routine greasing of the kingpins. Just a mile from the yard, at around 50mph, I had a disagreement with a pheasant. Extracting what was left of it, plucking feathers and all, I found the blighter had smashed through the 2CV’S grille, and pushed the metal meshing of the fan guard into the fan itself, damaging a couple of the blades. Not the end of the world, but it seemed sensible to replace the fan ahead of such a long trip. I always carry a ‘get-me-home’ spare in the boot, but it’s in a similarly battered condition, so my pal Barry (former owner of this car) popped over with a much better one. He arrived with son Pete, for whom this 2CV means a lot, as it was the family car during his childhood.
Biggest fans
Fan removal involves releasing the 14mm securing nut, then jarring the fan pulley from its taper by inserting a socket (or any other long lump of metal you can find) and giving it a disconcertingly sharp sideways smack with a hammer. New fan fitted, you lock the engine with a flat bladed screwdriver in the flywheel and pop the 14mm retaining nut back on.
With a helpful reminder from Barry and Pete that they’d driven the family all over Europe many times in the car and that ‘popping to Cornwall’ would be no bother at all, the pair waved me off. My trip down to Cornwall was made in three stages. The first leg took me down
‘Sat nav is handy as the needle often disappears off the dial at 70mph…’
my usual scenic route across the Cotswolds to see my parents, followed by a more frenetic shriek down the M5. While the 2CV isn’t a serene motorway cruiser, it can very much hold its own at 65mph – and quite a bit more on the downhills, so a sat nav device is vital as the speedo needle often disappears off the dial (which stops at 70mph). These precision-engineered flattwins were designed to be absolutely thrashed and so your right foot is rarely anywhere but flat to the floor. It’s not what you’d call refined, granted. At more than 50mph, you can see daylight through the gaps in the doors.
Things didn’t get any easier after Exeter as the A30 dual carriageway to Bodmin is notoriously hilly but, as with any old car, anticipation is everything. Taking advantage of each downhill stretch through mid-devon led to sluggish progress on the inclines in third gear – albeit at no less than 55mph. It was on these inclines
I began to notice a whiff of oil, which later
manifested itself as a fifty-pence sized drip on the ground when parked. Further investigation revealed excess oil sloshing around in the bottom of the air filter housing. It was most likely due to a faulty breather valve – a common issue associated with the age of the 2CV’S oil inlet. This cylinder-shaped unit (probably the original on this car) contains the breather valve which in turn controls the pressure inside the crankcase. It’s a tall thing at the front of the engine, resembling a metallic thermos flask.
Deep breath
Normally, when the engine breathes out, it takes a little fog of oil with it and up a small pipe into the air cleaner. The carburettor then sucks the oil droplets in and it gets burnt, leaving a healthy little amount of oil residue beneath the air filter. The breather valve itself is just a flat bit of rubber inside the oil inlet that, over time, becomes brittle and allows pressure to escape, as well as a whole lot more of those oil droplets. You’ll therefore end up with an oily swimming pool in the air cleaner housing, such as the one I now had.
Repairs to the oil inlet cylinder are largely unheard of, so I placed an order for a replacement (a piffling £94), mopped out the air cleaner housing, added a small drop of fresh oil to the engine and drove onward. I checked it again on arrival in St Ives and confident it wasn’t going to particularly trouble me on the trip, I headed down the extraordinary Atlantic Highway to St Just in Penwith for the customary pasty from
Mcfaddens butchers and a seat on the wall of the old Botallack mine – part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. More than 20,000 tonnes of copper and 14,000 tonnes of tin and was hoiked out of the ground at Botallack from around 1500 to 1895, when it closed. The 2CV will need some new tin of its own soon. It’s looking a little crusty in places so I could sense the distant spark of a welding torch edging ever closer.
There followed a stunning few sunny days staying near Porthcurno and the Minack Theatre, from where I was able to roll back the roof and chug around, meeting friends near my old home in Falmouth. Later in the week, I headed for home up the A39 to Bude, then on to the craggy and scarily narrow coastal lanes from Ilfracombe to Lynmouth. Many a 1-in-4 hill challenged the 2CV but onward it went without complaint, joyfully shrieking as I yanked the gearstick into first up the majestic Countisbury Hill, down perilous Porlock and eventually home.
Being on the coast was a real thrill and
I hope that despite the difficulties still facing many of us in our pursuit of a holiday in 2021, you get to feel something similarly fulfilling. I also hope you get to do it in a car that makes you feel as happy as I do in my 2CV.
‘Sunny days, roof rolled back and the chance to catch up with old friends…’