My first Citroen and DS3

[Emmie]

Well today I went to look at cars... I went to look for a mini clubman

However on the way home with several mini specifications I saw a bright yellow lushbucket and couldn't help myself

Now I'm the excited soon to be owner of a yellow DS3 DSport plus which I collect on Wednesday.
I'm already really excited

Xx

[BenS]

Woohoo! Petrol or diesel?

[Jan79]

Fingers crossed. Diesel! Diesel! Diesel!

[Emmie]

Oh erm
*cough. Petrol. *cough

Look.. over there!! A water buffalo

[Jan79]

Ah damn!
Despite this "faux pas" a warm welcome to the club.

[Emmie]

thank you very much

I'm sure my bad decision won't give you too many restless nights

[Jan79]

not a bad decision at all. Everybody as it suits him best.

I'm looking forward to the first pictures of your lushbucket.

[BenS]

I sincerely hope you avoid any of the potential faults we see regarding the THP (petrol DSport engine)! That said, any issues and you're more likely to find the solution here than at your dealer.

Worries aside, you will really enjoy it. It's a brilliant engine when it's on top form, and the seats are amazing, and the interior looks great, and the exterior looks great, and I'm sure this is why you bought it!

Also looking forward to some pics

[Emmie]

Just out of curiosity, what are the potential faults I should keep my eyes and ears out for?

[BenS]

Carbon deposits on inlet valves - your main one, and unavoidable, but totally reversible. Leaving it too long could cause misfires or even piston cracking. Car will feel down on power, and sluggish like it doesn't have any turbo. Needs cleaning every 20-30k miles depending on how bad it is. This can be done by either a walnut blast (at SP Tuning) or by taking the engine apart and manually scrubbing. Between cleans, using premium fuel and using the full rev range (redlining a few times per journey) will help slow the buildup.

High Pressure Fuel Pump (HPFP) - can fail after a while, symptoms are a rough idle and inconsistent power delivery.

Timing chain - was a bigger problem in the older THP150 engines, less so in the newer THP155 ones.

And worst case scenario...

Piston(s) shatters and mangles your engine - has happened in a few cases, we see more of it being a car forum, but still it is more prevalent than you would hope. Maintaining the car well and paying attention to the above might help, but I personally think that some are just ticking time bombs from the factory. The only sensible options here are replace the engine or scrap the car.

It's not all doom and gloom though, many THP owners have had an easy time with them. Knowing these things too will give you an idea of what to point the mechanic towards should anything start to play up. I might have missed a couple of bits but I'm sure others can pitch in.

[BenS]

I cannot stress enough that you shouldn't panic about having bought one of these supposedly horrific engines. This is just a collection of faults seen in tens of cars out of thousands. If you were to get any of them (bar the carbonisation), you would be unlucky, but it's very very unlikely you'd get all of them.

[Hyperkev]

Not forgetting the exhaust bracket.

[Jan79]

and occasionally broken springs. (other brands also suffer from this)

[BenS]

And coolant temperature sensor I guess if we're going for general things for all DS3s

[Jan79]

We should stop this now. It sounds as our DS's are crappy cars and this they aren't at all.