► Month nine with the Cactus
► We’ve encountered another issue
► The water-guzzling screen-washer system investigated!
The Cactus’s screen-washer system has been chugging water like a Chicken Korma-cautious visitor to the 2015 World Championship Chili Cookoff – this year held in Reno, Nevada, where the inhabitants briefly forfeit racing P51s round pylons in favour of racing piecemeal for the Portaloo.
Odd. I had assumed a system which introduces water to the screen via the wiper arms themselves to be more frugal than one which takes a run-up from the bonnet.
Either, then, a notably petite camel in Day-Glo orange waterwings has furtively claimed squatter’s rights in the reservoir, or the latter has all the capacity of a blunt-eared bat’s bladder…
One litre of overpriced screen washer fluid later, I had my answer; optimistically wobbling a large watering-can over the filler nozzle, I’d barely emptied the spout alone before the pipework frothed into overflow, leaving the mixture so concentrated I wouldn’t be surprised to see the wipers melt like boiled liquorice within the week.
Logbook: Citroen C4 Cactus Blue HDi 100 manual Flair
Price: £17,990
As tested: £19,330
Miles this month: 937
Total miles: 7530
Our mpg: 56.4
Official mpg: 83.1
Fuel this month: £85.90
Extra costs: £0