The Citroën Xsara was a small family car produced by the French automaker Citroën from 1997 to 2006. The Xsara was a development of the Citroën ZX and Peugeot 306, which shared a platform and running gear. It came in three and five door hatchback and five door estate body styles; the estate was marketed as the Break and the three door as the Coupé. The styling shared cues with the larger Bertone designed Xantia, but was regarded as bland by the motoring press. The straight four engine range includes 1.4, 1.6, 1.8 and 2.0 litre petrol engines as well as 1.6, 1.9 and 2.0 litre naturally aspirated and turbochargeddiesels. In some countries, such as Portugal, the 1.5 litre TUD5diesel engine was also available. The Xsara was 1998 Semperit Irish Car of the Year in Ireland.
Chassis design
The familiar range of PSA powertrains drove the front wheels of a seemingly conventionally designed chassis. At the front was a standard MacPherson strut layout with anti-roll bar, while the rear used the PSA Peugeot-Citroën fully independent trailing arm/torsion bar set up, which was first introduced on the estate of the Peugeot 305. However, PSA's chassis engineers employed some unusual features, including passive rear wheel steering, though less than on the ZX,, and inhouse developed and constructed shock absorbers. At high mileages, this is prone to wear of the axle mounting bushes which is easily fixed. It is also prone to wear in the rear axletrailing arm bearings, which then wear the trailing arm axle tubes, requiring an expensive rebuild or a replacement axle assembly. The diesel and larger capacity petrol engines are canted as far back as possible in the engine bay, in an effort to put as much weight as possible behind the front axle line, also reducing the centre of gravity, while improving weight distribution and minimising understeer.
Overview
Pre-facelift
The original Xsara was launched in September 1997, and was available with different engine choices:
In September 2000, the Xsara was facelifted. The car was now stiffer, had a new front design and some interior modifications. The facelift also saw the introduction of multiplex wiring. However, the wiring used was too thin, resulting in multiple wires breaking with frequent use, especially in the driver's door, thereby rendering the driver's door window, central locking and interior lights unusable. Citroën do not acknowledge this as a problem, and do not issue door wiring harnesses as a spare. New 1.6i and 2.0i 16 valve engines were being introduced and 1.8L were removed. Now Xsara is offered with following engine choices:
The model of 2002 had slight interior modifications. In February 2003, there were also some exterior modifications. The Xsara hatchback was discontinued, and replaced by the C4 in November 2004. The Xsara continues to be produced for the Chinese market by Dongfeng Peugeot-Citroën Automobile, a joint venture with the PSA Group. The Xsara Picasso small MPV was continued, concurrently with its successor that was based on the C4. 'Picasso' becoming the name for MPV derivatives of any Citroën model.
