DPF renewed, Paul. Thus the 833€. The guys in Lemmonier Peugeot, Torigny, having run out of ideas, wired all the downloaded data to Peugeot tech HQ. It must have been 11:59 because back came the answer I was expecting - new turbo. Why would they suggest anything else?
However, I have seen an excellent vid on YT of a guy - a pro - cleaning out the most horrendous amount of black gunk from a turbo - it was absolutely packed ridgid - leaving it clean metal and the adjustable vanes moving freely again - previously stuck fast. He did it with the turbo on the bench, for the puposes of the vid but it is usually done with the turbo still in situ.
I believe mine shows the symptoms of over-boost, which the garage agreed with in an earlier inspection.
The history of my car, in the past 3 years, is as if someone wanted to create a demonstrator of what happens when you run a car cold for short trips repeatedly - 4998/2013/2596 miles 2018/-19/-20.
So I reckon my turbo is packed solid with soot and carbon. There are a number of carbon cleaners on the market - people have had excellent results with domestic foaming oven cleaner. They must all be based on the same brew. The one in the vid is a 3 part kit. Cleaner, which reduced all the soot and carbon to a black sludge, rinser, which left all nice and shiny and a post-op preventative/lubricant.
The procedure can be carried out without removing the turbo from the car. You detach a hose, fill the turbo with carbon-eater, blank off the hole with a piece of something to keep the cleaner inside, go off for an hour, clean up and refit hose.
Happy motoring from then on, in theory. The kit costs +/- 65€. I’d have to pay to have it done - 55€. A reasonable punt if it saves 1100€.
One of the reasons that the police - certainly in urban UK - are so keen to pull cars with minor faults like a brake bulb gone is that they often find very interesting things in the boot.
Yes, I saw that you’d had it replaced but I wondered - and I your suspicions are clearly the same, whether the damage to the turbo are as a result of the problems (short trips, as you say) which lead to the old DPF clogging.
Good luck with the de-coke kit, I’ll be interested to know how you get on as a blocked DPF is said to often damage the turbo rather than just soot it up. Having had two cars with turbos which needed replacement I know it is not a cheap job - as it happens neither were due to DPF issues - but I don’t blame you for looking for a cheaper option.
To corroborate the comment about speedy QF turn-round, I submitted my form to the St. Lo office [Manche] at 12.06 yesterday [30 Nov] and at 08:15 this morning an email came to me thanking me for submitting my docs but could I please send the one [v5 p2] which shows the V.I.N. I’d sent the front page by mistake.
I sent the missing doc at 09:45 and at 10:30 my QF arrived. Impressive.
If the ANTS encounter is as straightforward I’ll be similarly chuffed.
Good luck with that. The problem I’ve had with ANTS is that I’ve never been able to have a conversation with a person - just the AI bit that seems to handle most of the form processing.
I went to the driving/vehicles pages of France-Property where all is set out very thoroughly. I had a dab at the link provided after the doleful comment by the French dept itself that the online system is pretty much useless for foreign registration.
The link opens the website of a mob who have taken up doing reg/C.G. renewals et al, used by the French with happy results.
The user comments ratings have even been ratified by a French gov dept that does this.
Before I knew where I was, I’d completed the first part - details of vehicle and details of me - and was presented with a breakdown of the costs.
Once one has paid they ask for the dossier of docs required to do the business. I haven’t picked up my new FR bank card yet, so I stopped there.
If the rest is as easy, this is a milk run. Famous last words …
PS. They provide a phone number specifically for English speakers. Check it out on France Properties because there is some wrinkle to getting the right number.