Citroen C3 1.4 Hdi oil burning - any ideas?

[minghis]

As it says really - the car seems sluggish to start and when it does it runs like a petrol car that's got the choke on when it shouldn't - a bit lumpy. Quite a lot of blueish/whiteish oil smoke (not carbon smoke) out the exhaust until you drive for a few minutes then it clears. It still performs really well though and soesn't drink oil.

Had it looked at by an independent specialist who ran it on several test machines only to be stumped - couldn't find anything wrong but saw and felt the fault by driving it. Main dealer wants £70/hour to diagnose. Ouch.

It's a well serviced and unabused 75k miles 52 plate.

Any ideas?

[megamaniac]

Could be an injector leaking over night.Try cracking the injector pipes before you leave it overnight,nip them up in the morning and see if it behaves itself.If not then possibly turbo or temp sensor(although you would think temp sensor would show up on code read)

[yewtreestar]

Possibly glazed barrels, but this wouldn't give the 'lumpy' symptons.

More likely to be an injector or a sensor somewhere..

Best thing to do is pick up the Yellowpages and look for an autotechnician who will plug it in for £20.

[Kitchski]

IIRC, the air intake passes through the rocker cover, with 4 rubber o rings (one on each port).

I've never actually looked at the engine up close so this is only a pot-shot, but could be leaking oil in from the rocker cover?
We sell alot of injector bushes and those seals at work. Very common, but I don't know why, maybe this is it?