Front Flexi Hose....

[gwoolie]

Hiya peeps,

The 03 plate 2.0 Hdi Rapier estate i now have has been in the house hold for just a week now.

The dealer did say he thought the flexible hose was starting to blow. Did a 100 miles round trip today and the thing has started to blow.

Looking on the interweb there seems to be loads of different ones.

Any one shed a light? And is this a 'do on a set of ramps at home job' or 'off to ATS' thing??

Cheers all

[gwoolie]

Ats recon it's not just a flexi hose on the rapier, it's a whole front end :0(

[davew]

the flexi pipe comes as part of the cat easy enough job to change yourself there is only a couple of clamp bolts to undo ,or you can just buy a new flexi pipe but it would need welding in.

[Welly]

The most common reason why the flexi has gone is due to a worn engine mount, this is at the rear of the engine and low down (the drive shaft on the off side becomes part of the engine mounts' housing). The engine mount will need addressing if it's worn and then fit a new flexi. The flexi pipe will come with a new CAT so can be quite pricey and coupled with the engine mount you'd be looking at the wrong side of £350.00 at a Garage.

There may be a way of getting an independent exhaust place to 'frig up' a new flexi piece by cutting/welding so worth looking at the options. Either way don't ignore the engine mount, in fact to test this; go and look at the engine whilst idling - then blip the throttle and if the engine lurched forward by any more than about 25mm then the mount is shot (it will move by up to 60mm when worn) this obviously pulls and stretches at all kinds of things connected to the engine so is not good. It'll drive like a dream with a new mount anyway; better gear changes, better throttle, less jerks/lurching.

[gwoolie]

Cheers for that Welly, i shall have a look, the car is up on ramps awaiting the arrival of the new pipe.

I did notice when i was looking about the large engine mount. Im kinda hoping its not very old, as there are new bolts holding the mount and one through the middle. But i shall 'blip' and see if it moves.

Ive not had the car long, and thankfully the previous owner seemed to have loads done to the car and the services from birth are all pug dealers, on time!! The cam was done by pug dealer at 97,000. Only 104 on the clock now.
They spent over £700 on the cam belt and service !!

Looks like original pipe, so 104 on the car isnt bad ??!!

[gwoolie]

The bottom engine mount bush does look to bad, deffo got new bolts in, which ive removed and inspected, ive seen some shot bushes over the years and this one looks non damaged and intact. Didnt think the bolts were done particularly tight tho, not torqued down. undid them with a normal ratchet cleaned and replaced.

[grasmere59]

If you are replacing the front flexi and cat as one and you say the front pipe and cat are still the original the old cat is worth good money,i ebayed a scrap original hdi cat a few months ago and got over £200.

[gwoolie]

Took it off this afternoon ready for the new one tomorrow.

The flexi hose has holes in at the top, near the flange, and blowing where it's welded to the pipe.

Cat has TR PSA K199
01/03 00200484

Stamped into it, so I'm assuming it's the original.

Plan is to eBay it once new one fitted. Then put money towards new engine mounts so I know they are pukka.

[gwoolie]

This cat ....

[grasmere59]

Yes that's an original heres a rough idea of value http://www.blackcatalyst.eu/katalizatory_offer.php as I say I got over £200 for an old K199 scrap cat on ebay.

[Doggy]

Blue-dye hell! PSA K186 is the front half of a 2.2 HDi CAT/FAP assy, if I'm not mistaken and PSA K178 is the same thing off a 607......

£220 each.

[gwoolie]

Well I had the new part come today, the old was stripped off and joints cleaned.

Was a little bit of a fiddle but all gone back together well. The clamps took some wiggling about. Then tightened down nicely.

For information. The old cat and pipe..........

Put up on Ebay at 20:30, sold for £180 at 21:00 !! Ships tomorrow !!

The new unit cost me, with a 25% discount £140 from euro car parts, £££ of ear bending from Mrs W and some scraped knuckles !! :-)

Worth it in the end :-)

Whilst i was waiting for the part to come... cleaned MAF, checked rocker gasket was tight, cleaned air filter, and pollen filter and adjusted throttle cable. cos i was bored waiting for courier !!! lol

[Doggy]

Well done you.

To think I binned the contents of my last cat - didn't seem worth fiddling the minute bit of metal out of the bucketful of sooty ceramic debris.

[gwoolie]

time to hang around out the back of exhaust shops lol

[gwoolie]

I know a few people say after they had changed the from flexi/cat they felt vibration through the peddles.
Mine did this too. So I checked underneath the car today... The new pipe was mm's from the frame, the front rubber mountings drooping. I pooped this off, added a few washers under the rubber each side and nylox strapped the rubbers up
A bit to take up slack.

Now the pipe sits about an inch above the frame, hopefully that little mod will last some time