Vauxhall/Opel Insignia 2011 SRI CDTI Service
Vauxhall/Opel Insignia 2011 SRI CDTI Service
3/11/22
Hello there Vauxhall/Opel car admirers and owners from around the world.
Welcome to my humble Insignia blog, where I will be recording the servicing and repairs of my recently purchased 2011 Vauxhall Insignia. It has a 2 litre, 16 valve, turbo charged engine and runs on heavy oil or as it is know to many as diesel fuel. When I purchased the car it had just under 102,000 miles with very little service history. Therefore, I want to service the car very soon to give myself peace of mind and ensure the car is fully checked with no outstanding issues. However, my funds are ultra limited, and we all know that most garages charge a lot of money per hour for their labour as well as a service charge on each part. I also want to use genuine or specified parts were I need to, and you never know what cheap parts they may use. That being said, the car will also need a timing belt and water pump replacement very soon and I will use a good garage for that work. That work will be in the region of £430 to £500, so not cheap by any stretch of the imagination.
The Car
The car is a 2011 Vauxhall Insignia SRI, 5 door family hatchback and is finished in metallic black. It is a standard diesel model from the range. I had been looking for a good example of this particular type of car for more than a year. During that time I viewed many bad examples and some cars that looked good but had internal engine problems. The second hand car market is also very demanding at the moment, increasing prices daily it seems. After a long time of searching, I finally found a car worthy of not only buying, but to also bring it back some of it's former glory.
I took the car for quite the test drive and I paid £2300 for the car and came with 364 days of MOT. During the test drive, I noticed some minor issues, but I will be addressing those in future posts. Joyfully, all the major faults I was looking for, were not there and I was happy to pay what I paid with that sizeable mileage. However, if these engines are properly maintained, they can easily attain the 200,000 miles marker and maybe more. The interior is of a patterned cloth finish and is very clean with no rips, tears, burns or sagging but would benefit from a full internal valet. It also does have a little bit of an odour, but I will also get to that very soon.
Above is a picture of the car after a decent clean and a ceramic coating that will last 6 months and will look like this after every wash until April. No more waxing for me.
A view for the the rear of the car after cleaning.
As you can see, the car is equipped with satellite navigation and climate control.
The DVD was second hand and cost £19.90 including delivery. However, the disc looks brand new in condition and worked perfectly to replace the maps and update the operating system of the Navigation 500 system. Although I had initially messed up, I'm more than happy with the solution and I always have an installation disc whatever happens in the future.
A view across the front seats and the cloth seat material.
Pollen Filter Replacement.
The pollen filter or cab filter as is commonly known, will be the first filter I change. This will give me a general idea of the history of the car. I will be using the Vauxhall specified filter to replace the old one. The OEM specification is a Bosch filter. Yes, they are a little more expensive than other manufacturers but, I have found (over many, many years and lots of tears), Vauxhall cars will rarely cooperate with cheap import parts. The old saying is, "Buy cheap, buy twice". To be fair the price I paid for the genuine part was only a few pounds more. The filter is also in an awkward place, so I only want to do this job once. Whilst the car was being washed, water vapour was forming on the inside of the passenger side windows but only on that side. This led me to believe there was a water ingress somewhere in that vicinity/area. However after researching where the filter was located, it soon became clear why moisture was building up only on that side. My theory was because the pollen filter was blocked and damp.
Above is a picture of the model type pollen filter I have ordered. As I said, it's an OEM Bosch M 2004 cabin filter and cost £10.38 including delivery. These filters are designed to keep particles out of the cabin such as pollen, dust, diesel particles and many other pollutants. As you can imagine, these cabin filters are used daily whenever you are using the heating, drawing in fresh air and using your air conditioning. They also filter the air circulation in the car. They are constantly collecting pollutants, moisture and possibly viruses. If these filters are not changed on a regular basis, these contaminants will start to cause a odour like I have found with this car. As I stated earlier, the car has a odour that smells like someone has been baking cakes in it for the last 11 years but hopefully a new cabin filter will clear the air.
As I stated earlier, the cabin filter is in an awkward place. It is located behind the glove box, which needs to be removed for access. It is held in place by four 8mm bolts that are indicated above. The arrow closest, is indicating to a panel that needs to be pulled back to reveal one of the four bolts. Once the bolts are clear, carefully pull the box out and disconnect the wires for the glove box illumination bulb. Once the wires are disconnected, the glove box and be safely removed and stored. However, I am going to give this glove box a good clean and sanitisation. The glove box is very close to the cabin filter, so could have possibly contaminated it therefore a good clean is in order. Again I hope this rids me of the odour.
Whilst removing the glove box, I noticed there was a rattling sound coming from the top and when fully removed, I found it was the glove box illumination bulb rolling around. I then removed the actual light house and can be seen above. The yellow arrow indicates where a piece of plastic is missing and that's why the bulb was unsecured. I replaced the candescent bulb with an LED type for a test, but I did not like the bright white illumination and I will replace it with a 43mm candescent festoon bulb and hold fully to the OEM replacement part schedule.
A brand new 43mm candescent festoon bulb replacement for the glove box illumination. I do believe I will also replace the whole bulb fitting, if I can find a new OEM example. It seems stupid not to replace it while I am here and fully complete this area.
With the glovebox removed and the old cabin filter removed, this is what it looks like. The yellow arrows indicate where the four fastening bolts for the glovebox are located.
The green arrow in the picture above is pointing to the place where the cabin filter is placed. The red arrow is pointing a the lid to seal in the cabin filter.
As you can see, the cabin filter holder also needs to be cleaned and sanitised.
As the pollen filter is in close proximity to the glove box, I gave the glove box a deep clean and then sanitised both inside and out. The above picture shows the back of the glovebox.
In the above picture above, there is a antiseptic/sanitising wipe is really dirty and that was from the inside of the glovebox. But in reality, who cleans out there glove box on a regular basis.
With the glovebox and the old pollen filter removed, I also sanitised the inside of cabin filter housing as that was also quite dirty. The immediate area was also sanitised, washed and cleaned and you will see why in the picture below.
Although the quality of the picture is poor, there is no denying the old cabin filter is rotten to the core. It's damp, stinking and very heavy. I would also imagine it may have carried the Covid virus at some point in history. The old cabin filter (on the right (if you were in any doubt)), has a date stamp of August 2011, the year the car was manufactured and has never been changed. I find that fact rather disgusting as the filter is not expensive and the replacement is very easy as it's only secured with four 8mm bolts. It is also a potential health hazard not to replace these filters regularly. As I had cleaned and sanitised the cabin filter holder, I placed the brand new Bosch filter into the housing, making sure it was in the correct orientation and then closing the housing via the three plastic clips on the lid of the housing.
I then reassembled the glovebox courtesy light back into the main glovebox and tested the operation and is was working perfectly. Now the glovebox was reassembled, sanitised and cleaned, it was time to refit it to the car.
When replacing the glovebox, it is advisable to locate the bottom of the glovebox on the lower locating clips, then offer up the top of the glovebox. The problem when fastening the top in first means the lower locators are not visible to ensure the correct positioning of the glovebox. As you can see from the picture above, the glovebox is now reinstalled with a fully operational courtesy light. Happy days.
I can now happily report that any nasty odours have been successfully removed and the car is starting to feel a little more comfortable, homely and smells lovely and clean. Now that the odours are clear and the cabin filter renewed, I can happily say this part of the service is complete. I can now move onto the next part of the service.
Air Filter
I had always intended to fully service the car as soon as funds allowed, yet after looking at the plight/state of the air and cabin filter I decided that idea was foolish. I quite easily deducted the oil, oil filter and fuel filter would be in the same state of repair, so I quickly ordered them. The invoice is below...
As you can see I have adhered to the OEM filter requirements. I have also gone above and beyond specification on my choice of engine oil. I have chosen, Shell (Helix Ultra Professional) oil for the task ahead. The oil itself was almost £56 alone, yet for an engine of this mileage and age, it was a simple equation to solve and will give me another 10,000 miles of problem free and service free driving. On the invoice, the parts I received include, a genuine Bosch fuel filter, costing £20.99 and a genuine Bosch oil filter costing £18.99. This give a total of £95.97 for three simple service items.
The cost, so far, for the essential service parts, comes to a total of £140.62. Yes, it's an expensive bill to pay, but it makes sense as it will prolong the life of the engine, save me money and prolong the life of the car. Again, although I have spent £140.62, all the parts are specified as an OEM part or above, therefore I do not think this is a bad price, considering the higher cost's for cheaper import alternatives. Obviously, I am doing the work myself so I will be saving massive amounts of money on labour charges.
I have now spent a total of £2440.62 on the car.
That is as far as I can go for today my friends, but please stay tuned for my next update.
This post will grow very quickly it seems and will be very long.
Take care
3/11/22
vauxhallinsignia2@gmail.com
2022
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