Nice burning smell from the air vents :-S

[Mike Fishcake]

I lay myself down at your vehicular expertise...

I was driving along the motorway in my (just under 3 year old) Citroen Saxo 1.1. Took the junction, then braking at the lights, I smelt a lovely sort of burning smell that I can only describe as a combination of burning plastic and silicone. It was weird, the smell appeared instantly.

At first we thought it was from outside, but then it became obvious that it was coming from the air vents :-S

It didn't smell like oil, petrol or any other usual car fumes.

Does anyone have any idea what it may be, or what I could check, bearing in mind the only thing I know about cars is how to drive them, fill them up with petrol, and occasionally check the oil and tyres...

If it sounds like something it needs to go to a garage for, thank goodness it's still got a month under it's warranty!

Any suggestions welcome. *

* Well, when I say any, if anyone says "Drive a better car" then I'll gently introduce them to my 'encouragement stick'. :-P

[chriswood_7]

It will more than likely be the air conditioning system piping. There might be something trapped inside there. Mine is a 4 month old car and mine does it every now and again.

This may sound silly but does it smell a bit likely burning meat?

[Mike Fishcake]

Cheers for the info Chris!

I was parked under a tree, and before that journey did come back to find the windscreen covered in loads of little leaves - wonder if any of them have got stuck in it?

It doesn't actually have 'air conditioning' as in proper cooling equipment, dunno if that makes any difference to what you said. So, if I was to check the vents or whatever - any idea where I'd look?

[Howard]

If the leaves burned it wouldn't smell like plastic.

If the car didn't proceed to burn itself to a crisp due to poor wiring or similar, then I'd suggest it was some piece of stray plastic burning on the engine/exhaust... A plastic bag or something? It's one possibility.
It could be that, it could be brakes, clutch, anything. If it was something electric then I'm sure you'd know about it. Has it happened since?

Air conditioning smells different, it's usually a musty smell caused by bacteria etc growing in the evaporator.

Of course, someone more knowledable in the combustion techniques of Saxos might know something.

[kickstart 1]

If its still under warranty , must be worth getting checked out?

[Mike Fishcake]

I've not tried the car since it happened, but I'll give it a whirl this morning. TBH I might take it in anyway, the citroen garage is round the corner from where I work. I've got a 4 hour drive to do next weekend - I'd rather be sure it's fine before I make that drive :-/

[Mike Fishcake]

OK, had a nosey under the bonnet in daylight - worked out where the air vent inlet was. Loads and loads of leaves and stuff around it. Cleaned all that out and took the car for a drive for about half an hour.

Drove it a for a couple of miles around and around near my house (so I wasn't too far away from home if it did screw up ) then got a bit braver and took it for a blast down the motorway. Tried it with the air vents on and off, on hot and cold. Through all the different vents seperately, seems to be fine. No smell apparent

One thing I noticed was that when I put the air through the passenger side vent, loads of rubbish blew out of it, so I'm assuming that's what was causing the issue.

Cheers for the advice anyway though.