Citroen pluriel gearbox

Oscar01

Member
VIP Paid Subscriber
Tadpole
Joined
Oct 23, 2015
Messages
31
Location
Lake MacDonald 4563
I would like to buy a pluriel Can anyone advise if I should seek a manual gearbox rather than sensodrive which has been reported to be troublesome?
Does the manual box have any particular problems?
oscar01
 
Hello Oscar, most manual boxes in the Pluriel will be the "MA" series.

These have some niggles but the crux of it is, properly maintained there are no problems.

Be aware of other Pluriel issues, mainly to do with roof problems. The occasional Pug/Citroën of that ilk has fuel lines crack at the tank sender, too.

Cheers, Adam.
 
They are all 1.6 petrol Sensodrive. You don't get a choice. Sensualdrive or buy another car!

Look under the RHR seat for leakage from the tank pump/sender unit as addo mentions. The plastic splits on the return elbow and because there's a pressure regulator inside the unit, it leaks under pressure.

Sensodrive is not as bad as some make out. The issues are mainly to do with the actuators (carbon in motors, lack of lube and poor adjustment of the clutch actuator), but, being an automated MA5 manual gearbox, they can eventually suffer from the suspect release bearing, loose selector rivet, pinion bearing and input shaft bearing issues. If the gearbox is out, you deal with all of them and clean out the actuators. Best to get a sensible dealer/mechanic to look at it if there are problems and do not rush into blindly replacing actuators at vast cost. Clacking and creaking from the clutch actuator is a warning sign.

There are a few threads on buying a Pluriel and also on the gearbox, so search the posts over the past couple of years and you'll find more. Window regulators and the roof system can also be a bit iffy and costly to fix if neglected, so make sure everything works and avoid a roughie. Don't dismiss a higher mileage car (say 120K+) as it has probably had most of these issues, the timing belt and a clutch addressed already.
 
Last edited:
Wow. That is in the "alright otherwise?" category! Not a ringing endorsement.

Looks as if you'd want a car with a super good history and a ringing personal endorsement.
 
Ringing personal endorsement? As in typical sales patter "I was going to keep this one for myself"?
 
Thanks for the warning guys. No wonder PSA has such a bad reputation, they keep on making stuff that should be simple and reliable but is not necessarily so. I think the build quality of my car is good. It all comes down to regular servicing I guess.
 
Don't look past the fact these cars are mostly about 10 years old now, particularly the orange and lime green examples. It's not that they are unreliable or plagued with problems, just that at their age now you have to be wise to a few possible issues and understand what you are buying. Importantly, it's not a manual and it's not a regular automatic. You just don't want to buy a neglected example cheaply that ends up costing a lot more than buying something better to begin with. Sensodrive was also used in selected C3/C2 and anything using the MA5, especially the Berlingo, has to be viewed with these issues in mind as used cars.

I would say the 'problem factor' of an older Pluriel could be about the same as an older C5, so if you can happily live with the C5, then a Pluriel shouldn't present any more difficulty. In both cases, you are looking at 10 year old cars, so it comes down to condition and service history when buying.
 
Citroen pluriel gearbox. Thanks guys for the comments especially David S. I am clearly very ignorant about modern cars my next youngest collector car is a DS
. When one reads the "Lemon Car " reviews it all sounds alarming but it is hard to get an impression of how common these problems actually are. It sounds as though the best defence is to try and pick a good one. I take comfort from having twice leased a C5 in France and had no trouble.Yes I have looked at previous threads for the pluriel.
Perhaps I am now more open to an automatic.
Question: does sensodrive only refer to the "automatic"box ?
Some of the car adds eg uk auto trader list a car as manual 1.6 and also state it is sensodrive so I am a bit confused.
oscar01
 
No, not 'ignorant' at all, just doing some sensible research so you know what you would be buying. Don't be put off. Try driving a couple and see if you like it.

The Pluriel is not a 'lemon' and it's basically a C3/Pug with an unusual sunroof and an electro-mechanical gearbox. You want to avoid buying some other persons problems and know what to look for and ask. In 'lemon' reports and on online fora like this there will always be more about problems than no problems. Sometimes, the tales of woe are largely because the owner was too tight to maintain the car or fix the problem properly in the first place or the mechanic had no idea.

In Australia, the C3 Pluriel came only as a 1.6 petrol Sensodrive. The only variations are the colours/trim and there were a few with the special coffee Latte theme later on. I don't think any of the Charleston paint/trim variants ever arrived here. Sensodrive is simply a standard MA5 gearbox as used in countless Pug and Citroen models with electric actuators added to operate the clutch and change the gears. That's the only difference to a regular manual. It might have been described as 'automatic' to help sell it and that's true to the extent that it can change gear under it's own control, but think of it as an automated manual in the way a BVH DS operates. You can operate the gears manually via the stick or the paddles, but can also just let it do the shifting for you. In auto mode, it can be caught out in some situations, such s creeping stop/start traffic, so sometimes the driver would want to take control.

Some further light reading if interested ...
http://www.aussiefrogs.com/forum/citro%EBn-forum/112418-c3-pluriel-manual.html
http://www.aussiefrogs.com/forum/citro%EBn-forum/87983-pluriel-c3-thoughts.html
http://www.aussiefrogs.com/forum/citro%EBn-forum/101649-first-citroen.html
http://www.aussiefrogs.com/forum/citro%EBn-forum/112479-ecu-rebuilding-australia.html
http://www.aussiefrogs.com/forum/ci...6l-pluriel-5spd-auto-gearbox-locked-gear.html
http://www.aussiefrogs.com/forum/citro%EBn-forum/110556-strong-fuel-smell-inside-pluriel.html
 
Top