Dodgy indicators

Dannii75

The indicators on my Citroen C1 have an attitude! Some days they work as normal, other days I can only get them to work if I flick the lever up/ down (as normal) then bring them slightly towards me. 
Any ideas why this might be happening? Do you think it can be fixed without a trip to the garage? 
I've done some car maintenance, like changing the battery but not electrics. 

Cheers
D

Jenni_D

Either the stalk itself has a problem, or there's a connection problem between the stalk and the wiring. Whether or not it is something you could do yourself .... nobody here knows anything about you, nor your mechanical and/or electrical competence. I know it's not something I'd likely try myself.

(I don't know if the C1 uses mechanical contacts and wiring directly, or uses a "control by wire" mechanism).

Dannii75

Yeah, that's fair. 
I've changed the battery on the car before, & it's a noddy car, but I've never done anything with the electrics. I might see if there's a YouTube about replacing the stalk. 
Cheers! 

Freecall

Hopefully you can get it sorted without too much trouble.  You are lucky the original owner paid for the indicator option, many round here appear not to have them fitted at all.

  

The_Fat_Controller

It's a common problem with the C1 and it's siblings, the Toyota Aygo and Peugeot 108.

Have a "google"

Nobbie1967

I’m on my second 107 (basically the same car as C1) and have had to fix this on both. The contacts get corroded/dirty over time. On my first one I removed the indicator and cleaned up the contacts as new ones were quite expensive. Tried that on my current one and it only lasted two years. Looked on EBay and a new unit was only £6.35 so bought that and fitted it. You do have to remove the steering wheel and airbag to get to it to clean it any way and it’s a bit fiddly. This is the video I followed. https://youtu.be/czOYDNvv8NI 

Dannii75

Freecall said:

Hopefully you can get it sorted without too much trouble.  You are lucky the original owner paid for the indicator option, many round here appear not to have them fitted at all.

  

hahaha! that made me really laugh!

Dannii75

Nobbie1967 said:

I’m on my second 107 (basically the same car as C1) and have had to fix this on both. The contacts get corroded/dirty over time. On my first one I removed the indicator and cleaned up the contacts as new ones were quite expensive. Tried that on my current one and it only lasted two years. Looked on EBay and a new unit was only £6.35 so bought that and fitted it. You do have to remove the steering wheel and airbag to get to it to clean it any way and it’s a bit fiddly. This is the video I followed. https://youtu.be/czOYDNvv8NI 

Awesome info! thanks for that! 

Grumpy_chap

Lots of cars have indicators with intermittent fault - mine does, on-off, on-off, on-off, on-off, on-off, on-off for a few minutes every now and then.  Sometimes just three cycles, sometimes more.

The only car that seems to have properly resolved this weird operation is BMW.

   

oldagetraveller1

Yes, I've just read about one of the biggest safety recalls in history.

It looks to be mostly targeted at BMWs and Mercedes Benz vehicles with which there is an inbuilt fault of non working direction indicators!

Grumpy_chap

I think some Audi cars must use the same software or computer chip.