Family Citroën diesels on the Cricket Green run to Hackbridge
Drive down Cranmer Road past The Canons on a school morning and you will pass a fair number of Berlingos and C4 Picassos. They are practical, roomy and cheap to run, and many around Pollards Hill still have the 1.6 HDi. Those engines are well understood, and the two faults that matter most are injector seal leaks and turbo oil feed blockages.
Injector seals fail with age and heat cycles. The first you may hear of it is a puffing noise at idle, followed by a smell of diesel or exhaust in the cabin. Caught early, the seals are replaced and the injectors come out cleanly. Left for months, the carbon bakes around them and removal gets much harder. The turbo oil feed pipe on the same engine has a small internal filter that can block, so any turbo work we do includes a new pipe. A turbo that has been starved of oil will whine, then smoke, and fitting a replacement without changing the pipe simply repeats the failure.
Because Mitcham has been inside the ULEZ since August 2023, some of these older diesels now pay the daily charge. We will not push you either way. If a Euro 5 HDi is reliable and you only drive it occasionally, we can keep it well maintained. If it is costing you every day, we will give you an honest view on whether a big repair is worth it. Every repair is quoted in writing first.
From the Cricket Green it is a short run past Eagle House onto Carshalton Road, over the railway at Mitcham Junction and down to Hackbridge. Collection and delivery can be arranged if you would rather not drive a car with a smell of fumes inside. Most injector seal jobs are done in a day, depending on how freely the injectors come out.

