Driving an XM with little or no Fluid in the hydraulic system is not a fun thing to do. It's about the quickest way I can think of to lose your insurance bonus!

Usually, the first thing you notice is the steering getting very heavy as the power assistance disappears. Don't worry about building up arms like Popeye because the lack of brakes will ensure you won't live long enough ;>)

Running out of brake servo assistance will always make yer bum tremble, but this one will definately have it nipping the seat. You simply won't believe how useless these breaks are without the power assistance. You'll be much better off opening the doors and using them as air brakes.

While all this is keeping you busy, you probably won't have notice the suspension going hard.

I decided that it would be sensible to repair the split hose. A short length of hose and a couple of clips cost me less than a pint of beer, but make sure you get hose that will live with the LHM fluid. The normal black stuff with a hole down the middle will probably rot rather quickly when it meets the green stuff. It may even be worth visiting your local Citroen dealer for this as some of your local car spares shops won't stock the required gear. Usually, the correct tube will have a green stripe running down it's length.

Under the bonnet again

According to the manual the damaged rubber tube (part number 2 in the diagram) is the return tube from the steering rack up to the fluid reservoir mounted on the left hand inner wing. However, things get a bit cramped behind the reservoir, so I was unable to work out the exact route it took. Rather than removing the reservoir, which can be a rather messy business, I decided to just cut off the few centimetres at the damaged end of the pipe and replace it.

I pushed a short length of metal brake pipe that I had lying around into the end of the now shorter return pipe and fastened it in place with a hose clip. I then pushed a length of the new pipe onto the exposed end of the metal tube and fastened it with another clip. The new piece of pipe was now slipped over the end of the metal tube on top of the steering rack and another new clip used to fasten it.

This being the return pipe to the reservoir, on the low pressure side of things, I was rather surprised to see the precious fluid leeking from around one of the clips when the engine was started. I tightened each of them up as much as I could in the restricted space and tried again.

This time it worked.

This whole job should have been completed in about the time you just read about it, but due to the restricted space down between the engine and the bulkhead it took a little longer. But you guessed that, didn't you?

It took a little more than 2 hours in fact, and it definately rewards patience!