2001 Citroen Xantia Activa from UK and Ireland - Comments

I was young and foolish when this was written! I sold the Xantia in feburary of '04. I now drive a Mazda RX-8 220Bhp model, That's really nice, although I do miss the xantia.

The Xantia Activa is a lovely car, with excellent handling, although we should have seen the diesel, and 3.0 V6 versions that were released in the rest of Europe.

Don't dismiss the original guy's comments

My first Xantia Activa was found to be MUCH faster than a friend's Ferrari 308 quatravalve

(by him not just my opinion)

It ran out of "clock" with the needle resting on the end stop beyond 150 MPH (not kph)

Furthermore, official test figures show it to be capable of pulling 10% more "g" than the F50

Don't know who or how it'd been tweaked, but must have been pretty serious as it did around 15 MPG when "gunned hard"

Dear friend, i was glad to read that your car is so fast!i am 15 years old and my father owns a 1.8i 16V Xantia. I really love this car because its handling is beautiful and the engine quite strong. i do not want to sell this car and I am sure that I will drive it, to, when I become 18 years old!

I think that your car is one of the most powerfull xantias ever!as I said in my previous comment, my father has an 1.8 16V Xantia which after 7 years (we bought in 1999) is in perfect condition and without doubt is an extremely reliable car. It doesn't brake and it is as powerfull as the first day. the equipment is also very good and make xantia a very luxury car. For example our xantia has an auto-clima,4 electric windows, a very good hi-fi, sensors os fabulous hydractive 2.It's engine sounds beautiful (even better than a BMW),the horsepower is enough for fast trips (116 hp) and the behaviour of the car is generally fantastic. One man a year ago in a traffic light, was looking at the xantia in a strange way thinking ''what a miserable car''.In the next traffic light he and his mercedes E200 compressor was many metres back of our xantia 1.8 16V with the ''only'' 116hp!i am sure that he won't tell again bad things for this car!i think that the miserable car in this occassion was his mercedes...

Jim,15 years old

greece.

I would be quite interested to know the 'exact' speed of the mentioned cars, I can get my 96' 1.9TD up to 115mph, but at 150mph the speedo will have quite a fair whack of inaccuracy, I wouldn't be surprised if its reading more like 135mph.

And regarding the dyslexic spelling (hell I can't even spell that lol), you own the car with the manufacturers name on the log book and the back of the car, not much of an excuse it.

I must say that I wouldn't rule out 150mph: I bought an 'N' reg Activa 2.0t last November, and on the way home was appalled to find it had quietly overhauled 130mph, and everything else, with no real effort at all, and that before I had it serviced, plugs changed etc.

Why didnt we get the 2.5TD or the 3.0?

It is gaspingly thirsty though (best figs 27mpg, worst 18mpg), and doesn't accelerate hard out of the blocks, which makes you notice when the turbo kicks in...

Interesting comments about the Xantia 3.0V6 Exclusive only being available outside UK. I've acquired one which originally belonged to Citroen UK, bought by a relative at 1 year old, and has covered 47k miles, RH. How rare is this car, can I obtain information and service data for it? Needless to say it drives well, and sounds great, some electrical gremlins, but in excellent condition, any help gratefully received.

I should point out that most of the people who have made comments about this review know nothing of the Peugeot/Citroen 2.0 turbo engine. In fact, you'd be lucky to find a qualified mechanic who has even seen one.

I owned a Peugeot 406 2.0T executive for several years and sometimes when I took it to a garage for a service or modification, the engineers would come out to look at the engine purely out of curiosity.

While I only managed 130mph out of my 406 on the Santa Pod drag strip (and not a public road, er, yeah right), I am reliably informed by other 406 and Xantia Activa owners that the car can exceed 140mph in the right circumstances. Apparently if you keep the car within the boost zone of the rev range, and are driving on a flat stretch of road, the car will reach a maximum of 147mph (despite 5th gear allegedly only being tall enough to reach 143mph).

I haven't seen this done, but have heard from five or six different owners who claim to have achieved this speed.

How have you heard from 5 or 6 other owners, these cars are as rare as rocking horse doo doo.

147mph is a high speed, and 150bhp isn't going to get you there, try 127 and a very out of calibration speedometer.

I have a Citroen Xantia Activa 1997 with only 75K on the clock. It is in good condition body & interior wise. Very nice to drive and ample in performance for the UK roads.

Not as good fun as a Skoda Rapid though, which are even rarer to get hold of decent ones!

Does anyone know where I can get a straight through performance exhaust and all the other wonderful tweaks to get it 2 perform like that really fast one?

I can confirm for all British readers that the Xantia Activa is beautifully fast. I am talking about the 3.0 V6, which is as rare in the UK as reliable UFO sightings.

It has 194bhp, is not tweaked in any way, and can comfortably exceed 230kmh which works out as more than 142 mph.

The most impressive thing about it is not the lovely roar of that V6 engine, but the ride quality in the corners, where the limits of your car are very distant, and you cannot be lost by anything, even flat-to-the-ground Porsches or things like that. If you find those limits then you lose it in a big way, of course.

Hi.

I've owned 3 Xantias now among other cars. A series 1 TD SX. Lovely.

A series II 2.0 16v SX and a series II HDi 90. I intend to get an Activa and can assure the many posters here, from years of research and interest, that the 2.0 T block is capable of producing 200BHP, whether that is also tuned or not I don't know, but some of the stock UK Activas are producing 200BHP. Overall, a great car. wow.

Even my 2.0 16v with 205s fitted, and tweaked to 145 bhp, up from 137, had no problem shaking off standard Imprezas and any other non-turbo cars. Obviously not STIs or WRXs unless you were suicidally fast. That was after a top-end rebuild after timing belt snapped. Yikes! :-(

I own a 1996/7 2.0 16v. It cost me a hundred quid. I've owned a ZX, 9 Xms, 4 Ds's, A Range Rover and a BMW 7 series. My car is the most comfortable, light-footed, assured and sharp car I've owned. It's a little miracle and simply flies. I must get it serviced; I think the last time that happened was about two years ago.

I have a Xantia 3.0 with a manual gearbox. (in Spain)

It is very quick for a family hatch and the engine sounds wonderful. Its the only manual 3.0 car I have seen but I guess there must be a few around?

I had various other xantia but none of them get anywhere near this car. I love it.