From the workshop
The oil strainer, the failure point nobody mentions, and the new belt going in. Elliot talks through the job that saves these engines.
31 seconds, with captions. Full transcript below.
So this was a Citroën DS3 in for a wet belt job.
As you can see in the pictures, after the oil strainer was cleaned — this is the failure point really, where the old belt breaks down and clogs the strainer, so that has to be clean, that’s vital.
Then you can see the new belt fitted.
Happy customer on their way.
Elliot is blunt about it in the clip, and it is the whole reason this job costs what it does. The belt runs inside the engine in oil, so as it breaks down it sheds material straight into the oil system. That debris collects on the oil pump pickup strainer, and a blocked strainer starves the engine of oil. Cleaning it is not an optional extra — it is the part that saves the engine.
Swapping the belt without dropping the sump leaves the rubber already shed inside the engine. It will block the new strainer within a few thousand miles. We have seen cars come to us having had a belt done elsewhere a year earlier and lose the engine anyway.
The 1.2 PureTech engine in this DS 3 is shared right across Citroën, Peugeot, Vauxhall and DS. If you drive a Corsa, a Mokka, a 208, a 2008 or a C3 of the right age, this is your engine too — whatever the badge on the front says.
The wet belt page covers which engines have one, why the intervals keep being cut, what the job costs by engine, and why the sump comes off every time.
Wet belt replacement, explained properlyEvery one filmed in the Dudley workshop, with the mechanic who did the work explaining it.
See all workshop videosSend us the registration and we will tell you what your engine actually has, what the real interval is for it, and what it would cost. No charge for the answer.