Citroen C15 Champ 1.9D 765D

Had my C15 for over a year now and done 20,000 miles. Few little bits gone wrong- new alternator, bit of welding on the exhaust but it's just basic maintenance and the best thing is everything is so cheap! Welding was £20, alternator £40 and fitted myself using two spanners.

The mpg is amazing- I get about 45mpg with mine- will go up as have just serviced it. The seats are like my Nans armchair and drining on a bumpy road is like driving on clouds due to fantastic suspension..

It looks about 50 years old as the styling was 40 years out when it was made. The panels are the thickness of three sheets of baking foil and the wheels, I think may have been off of a wheelbarrow.

These are the reasons I love it. I can imagine a lot of people having turned there noses up at the C15 but trust me, you can get well over half a ton in the back and drive it for 600 miles on a tank of diesel without the engine skipping a beat.

Paid £500 for mine- made that money back 20 times over using Sidney.

I sit in my van and it says " where you want to go? " and it just goes there. I've been to Holland, France and Spain in it. No nonsense , anti fashion and slow as hell from a standing start. But I love it and you cant break its spirit. Had a few knocks in it - but it keeps going. Try and get a red one. Once it gets going its quiet and smooth ride - comfy seats. I've moved twice in it - once with a piano in the back. Tough. Some bits will fall off - but its french.

I bought my C15 in 2005 brand new, it has now done 158,000,mls and i have to say apart from the odd thing its been fantastic, the body work remains amazing although this is due to expensive autoglym polish! mechanicly i have always taken it to citroen in leeds where i bought it, its serviced every 6 months due to the milage i do. and has always passed mots first time! common faults are brake calipres and wheel bearings, oh and rubbish stereos i changed mine after it went faulty 7 times in 12 months, bought new stereo from argos ,has been perfevt since, make sure you get cambelt done ,engines are amazing!! good van, am looking to replace it now and am going to get a berlingo!

I have owned a w reg 2000 c15 for 8 years. It has covered 211000 faultless miles but alas the gearbox is on it's last legs so I must consider changing the van - for another c15 of course. We collect and deliver horse rugs for laundering and very often the van it packed to the hilt including the passenger well but has never complained and consistently attains 50mpg. In a word brilliant!

I've had my C15 since new as a private vehicle. They are excellent value for money. It is no thrills motoring in many ways but it is fun to drive and surprisingly agile & does the job well. Most importantly it is incredibly practicle. I have moved everything from double beds to fridge freezers. It's proved amazing for camping & I tow with ease. I've even slept in it a few times! Practicle, Reliable and different.

Please read for very important tip! I have recently bought a Romahome built on the C15 and am very pleased with it, as it is small enough to use all year round. Whist reading up on them I read that they are prone to rusting, especially the front bulk head. Having spent all my life in the car body repair business, I decided to look into this. I found that rain water which enters through the air intake grill just in front of the windscreen where the wiper are fitted is meant to drain out through a drain pipe fitted behind the jack mounting plate in the engine compartment. If this drain pipe gets blocked it will hold a few gallons of water which when it gets to a certain level eventually finds its way out by travelling down the inside of the door pillows into the sills and hopefully out onto the road. This water causes corrosion from the inside out and also whilst this pond of water is inside the vehicle evaporates into the entire roof crevasse causing yet more corrosion. But don't dispair, it is easily rectified.

Remove the jack from the rear of the engine compartment, and then remove it mounting plate (black elliptical plate) (When I did gallons of water came gushing out). In the centre of the recess toward the front but behind the lip is the drain hole, poke a piece of wire down the drain hole to make sure it is free Just below this on the outside of the bulk head is a rubber pipe fitted to the other end of the drain hole. Remove the rubber pipe and make sure it is unblocked. A final check should be to pour a jug of water onto the air vent by the wiper and watch the water run freely out of the tube onto the road.

ive had my Citroen C15 Champ 9 months its done 190,000 miles . 7,000 by me mega reliable 50+ mpg . i do 50 mile round trip every day and kick its arse all the way there and back without any bother

if i can offer bit of advice re rear brakes if yours fails on rear brakes adjust new shoes up till its difficult to get drums on , then run it just long enough that they dont bind too bad . ive had couple of these and had same beef with them

I have owned 2 c15 vans my latest has done 101.561 miles on P reg been everywhere Germany Holland France Belgium must have van !! runs on anything from cooking oil to bio-diesel and some funny red coloured stuff ;-) 55 mpg all day long

It's a good van for the money. Cheap to buy, and had few problems with it other than having to change stoplight bulbs frequently. I've had mine 8yrs and done 98,000 miles at around 45mpg. It's a basic vehicle, but as a workhorse I've been more than pleased with it. I find it comfortable enough and pretty nippy about town. I can also get into parking spaces bigger vans can't. For what you pay for a new C15, you could pay the same for a three year old Escort with 60,000 miles on the clock.

Hasn't got much street cred, but who cares?

I've had the Citroen C15 Champ van for just over 4 years but have only done about 14000 miles in my job as a decorator. I've lined it out and added soundproofing so it's pretty quiet to drive. The gearbox is fairly 'agricultural' and you're not likely to be first off the lights but the vehicle has good mid-range acceleration and will happily cruise. I broke the flimsy indicator switch within weeks and, being a Citroen, the radiator packed up just out of warranty (they all do) but no other faults so far. The Blauplunk radio is rubbish to use but sounds okay. The low-speed (non-power) steering is very heavy, and I don't think this is just by comparison with my car. Apart from that don't miss all the other 'power' things that ordinary vehicles have at all, but then I started driving on a 1926 Sunbeam Talbot. However, my biggest gripe is with the driving position. No matter how I try, I can't get comfortable, and the pain in my driving leg is sometimes excruciating. I couldn't afford to get rid of it until now but although it has been a good workhorse in other respects, it's GOTTA GO! Sorry, Citroen.