So after 6 months of ownership, 17,000 miles travelled and a gradual process of making the car how I wanted it I thought it would be nice to put together a little diary/project thing as I have read other peoples with great interest before!
So here he is as I picked him up on the 2nd Oct 2008; an 04 registered BG 182 with both cup packs and a full Renault service history just run in with 35,000 miles on the clock.
Initially I viewed the car with the intention of being a bit of a test pilot
as it was a walking distance from work, and I was playng with the idea to potentially get one later in the year. However as these things always go I test drove it on some cracking local roads and that evening I had it bought and on my drive. I was blown away by the pin sharp handling, power and the perfect mix between balls out madness, occasional practicality and the cars unassuming presence.
The first month of owning the car was completely problem free and my initial worries of build quality, reliability and electrical problems were removed, so I got on with enjoying it and getting used to a hugely fast car in my eyes. Apart from the daily commuting I found myself going for late night/early morning blasts, sometimes 50 mile round trips just for the hell of it. That gut wrenching feeling of filling the old polo with poverty spec fuel was gone and in its place a willing Vpower addiction had taken hold.
A 1500 mile trip through France saw the miles piling on and I was growing ever more fond of my little hot hatch as I stretched its legs across europe.
When I first picked up the car it had already had some bits and pieces done, including a remap, stainless steel catback and a set of new PE2s, so there were some savings in place from the word go. However ahead loomed the cambelt & aux belt service so I had this done early by those legends Mike & Dave at Rentech portsmouth for a very keen price!
After working with JamesStone on his track car thread link, watching his road car project develop & attending meets etc I began to catch the “modding” (hate that expression) bug. I had always consciously avoided this with my previous cars as I have never found one that deserved my hard earnt cash improving it, purely as it can become a money pit overnight with very little gains in the morning!
However I found the clio more than deserving, and decided due to plummeting car prices I would stick with him for the long run, possibly becoming an all out track toy in the distant future.... A direction for the car was formed: too make it faster, sharper, harder without loosing refinement and comfort, so with James’ guidance & never ending patience the process began. At this stage I was lucky to be able to experience James’ 172 that had had all the work done to it before with a proven RR figure. I found it extremely sharp and interactive, even raw at times. The changes made throughout his car made my car feel decidedly soft & mellow in comparison and I wanted to capture a bit of the character distilled in his 172 and implant it into my 182.
The first early steps where to sort the breathability of the engine at both ends. Out went the viper, in went the standard box/ITG and had a silenced decat made up for the catback system for which I saw I reasonable improvement in performance and a nice sound without being too loud.
Unfortunately I also caught/was distracted by the cleaning bug, however PCing was not something I was willing to try on my own car, so I got an excellent price from Driven’shine in surrey for the full works Link for DW project
before:
after:
The clio had probably been washed by an army of poles ever since it left the factory as the paint work was in a terrible nick, however the price was well worth the results and bought the paint work up wonderfully, ready for proper washing techniques.
So now I found myself with a totally mint 182, both mechanically & appearance speaking. more Staines meets came and went and in January 2009 I decided to start making the real upgrades I had always intended too.
The first change, and one of the best ones to date were the seats. I toyed with the idea of getting Trophy recaros, but simply could not swallow the silly asking price! I also considered fixed buckets but decided they were a little hardcore for me and removed what shades of occasional practicality I had with the rear seats being accessible. After much umming and ahhing a fellow member, now an ex-clio owner but a legend non the less made it know to me that you can pick up Recaros much cheaper in other forums, so I bided my time until I pair of mint evo8 MR Recaros came up for sale for a very good price so I snapped them up. My seats thread
With a bit of tinkering I got them in the car and was overt the moon with the results, they made a massive difference to the feel of the car whilst retaining the element of practicality I would have lost with fixed buckets.
Another month flew by in which the car was treated to a 6,000 mile oil change and a wheels off clean up, my spotless license also took a kick in the nads with a SP40 one day when I was late for work, I put it down to being inevitable with the miles I do
February saw the camberly rolling road meet and a sense of nervousness as my car was put on the rollers, as the RR in surrey is renowned for blunt accuracy as they do not aim to please with there own product range.
With so many local CS members attending and with my inherent competitiveness it was a big moment for the car and he did well at 180.2 bhp ATF calculated (with the respectable ATW dyno graph shown), a good result in my books as there were some distinctly underpowered cars already causing some head scratching that day with various VVT problems.
Although obtaining a good peak power the dyno graphs were showing a sharp drop in output quite early in the rev range, causing my optimum shift point to be surprisingly low in the 5.5k region. After checking the map and the base software version on the car Mr Stone updated both the software & the map with the newest fastchip 98Ron map, and boy what a difference, the map applied previously was around a year and half old and made beyond 6k a long old slog; something that only became apparent with the new map that took the power right up to the limiter. For a number of weeks after that I would find myself hitting the limiter every so often without being ready for it as I was totally unused to it surging all the way to the line!
February flew by and I found myself cursing my dirty black car, never clean for more than a day, but when cleaned it was all worth it.
With more meets under the cars belt and having been in other cars I made the decision that suspension was next on the wish list. Again JamesStone was a great help as he had been in cars with Eibach springs, owned Aphex springs and ran FK collies. I was able to grasp the pros and cons of the options and decided to tread the collie path at a later date instead of going half way with springs and sacrificing the fine balance between comfort and performance.
The next stage was a bit unexpected but circumstances arouse and I had the chance too obtain all my long term plans for the car in a single swoop!
These came in the form of AST coil-overs, Original Trophy Turinis and brembo max discs, all were in absolute mint condition so represented a real bargain second hand. The replacement parts could not have been better timed as two of my standard shocks were leaking anyway and would require attention shortly regardless & my standard discs were nearly done for.
Mr Stone and I fitted the coillies in a couple of hours one evening and left the setup as they came. It sat VERY low, the tops of tyres were hidden and some, so had the inevitable problems of light scrubbing and a very bouncy ride as the shock stroke was so short, but even with this initial setup I found the change in handling astonishing. I left it like this for a couple of days biding my time until an afternoon free showed itself and then set about winding the height up and tinkering with the once piece damping/rebound adjustment. After adjusting the rears disaster struck one of the front shocks when the threaded ring split after possibly being molested in a previous life!
This grounded the car until the next day as the shock was unfit to bear weight, so a 5 hour journey to powerstation and a shock rebuild in the kitchen later and we were back in business.
I am lucky to have a little experience with suspension settings from DH mtb racing where a well setup shock can make a winning time. The ASTs with their one piece front and rear coils & easily adjusted damping are basically identical to mtb shocks, just scaled up. So the processes of adjusting the settings and what to look for response wise were very easy to carry out.
This combined with James knowledge of coilover adjustment and a bit of testing on a range of road surfaces and corner types has left me with a good stance, excellent comfort day to day and plenty of shock stroke and rebound to deal with the rougher roads/corners, preventing the sideways movement of a car on over-stiff suspension as the tyre looses contact with the ground. On top of all of this I can get over speed bumps!
So until last week thats about it, the story of my RS clio ownership so far!
Here he is as he currently stands, I’d like to think (nearly) the finished article:
The plan now takes two routes, the first is driver training and track days, these being something that I have always wanted to get into. With the car as it is now it is extremely forgiving and should be able to handle anything I can throw at it so will be a great training tool with the proper instruction.
The second is JMS tuning which has now become a reality as a partnership between JamesStone and I, brains and beauty as they say
Take a look here for more info JMS TUNING
Thanks for taking the time to have a little read :approve:
So here he is as I picked him up on the 2nd Oct 2008; an 04 registered BG 182 with both cup packs and a full Renault service history just run in with 35,000 miles on the clock.
Initially I viewed the car with the intention of being a bit of a test pilot
as it was a walking distance from work, and I was playng with the idea to potentially get one later in the year. However as these things always go I test drove it on some cracking local roads and that evening I had it bought and on my drive. I was blown away by the pin sharp handling, power and the perfect mix between balls out madness, occasional practicality and the cars unassuming presence.The first month of owning the car was completely problem free and my initial worries of build quality, reliability and electrical problems were removed, so I got on with enjoying it and getting used to a hugely fast car in my eyes. Apart from the daily commuting I found myself going for late night/early morning blasts, sometimes 50 mile round trips just for the hell of it. That gut wrenching feeling of filling the old polo with poverty spec fuel was gone and in its place a willing Vpower addiction had taken hold.
A 1500 mile trip through France saw the miles piling on and I was growing ever more fond of my little hot hatch as I stretched its legs across europe.
When I first picked up the car it had already had some bits and pieces done, including a remap, stainless steel catback and a set of new PE2s, so there were some savings in place from the word go. However ahead loomed the cambelt & aux belt service so I had this done early by those legends Mike & Dave at Rentech portsmouth for a very keen price!
After working with JamesStone on his track car thread link, watching his road car project develop & attending meets etc I began to catch the “modding” (hate that expression) bug. I had always consciously avoided this with my previous cars as I have never found one that deserved my hard earnt cash improving it, purely as it can become a money pit overnight with very little gains in the morning!
However I found the clio more than deserving, and decided due to plummeting car prices I would stick with him for the long run, possibly becoming an all out track toy in the distant future.... A direction for the car was formed: too make it faster, sharper, harder without loosing refinement and comfort, so with James’ guidance & never ending patience the process began. At this stage I was lucky to be able to experience James’ 172 that had had all the work done to it before with a proven RR figure. I found it extremely sharp and interactive, even raw at times. The changes made throughout his car made my car feel decidedly soft & mellow in comparison and I wanted to capture a bit of the character distilled in his 172 and implant it into my 182.
The first early steps where to sort the breathability of the engine at both ends. Out went the viper, in went the standard box/ITG and had a silenced decat made up for the catback system for which I saw I reasonable improvement in performance and a nice sound without being too loud.
Unfortunately I also caught/was distracted by the cleaning bug, however PCing was not something I was willing to try on my own car, so I got an excellent price from Driven’shine in surrey for the full works Link for DW project
before:
after:
The clio had probably been washed by an army of poles ever since it left the factory as the paint work was in a terrible nick, however the price was well worth the results and bought the paint work up wonderfully, ready for proper washing techniques.
So now I found myself with a totally mint 182, both mechanically & appearance speaking. more Staines meets came and went and in January 2009 I decided to start making the real upgrades I had always intended too.
The first change, and one of the best ones to date were the seats. I toyed with the idea of getting Trophy recaros, but simply could not swallow the silly asking price! I also considered fixed buckets but decided they were a little hardcore for me and removed what shades of occasional practicality I had with the rear seats being accessible. After much umming and ahhing a fellow member, now an ex-clio owner but a legend non the less made it know to me that you can pick up Recaros much cheaper in other forums, so I bided my time until I pair of mint evo8 MR Recaros came up for sale for a very good price so I snapped them up. My seats thread
With a bit of tinkering I got them in the car and was overt the moon with the results, they made a massive difference to the feel of the car whilst retaining the element of practicality I would have lost with fixed buckets.
Another month flew by in which the car was treated to a 6,000 mile oil change and a wheels off clean up, my spotless license also took a kick in the nads with a SP40 one day when I was late for work, I put it down to being inevitable with the miles I do
February saw the camberly rolling road meet and a sense of nervousness as my car was put on the rollers, as the RR in surrey is renowned for blunt accuracy as they do not aim to please with there own product range.
With so many local CS members attending and with my inherent competitiveness it was a big moment for the car and he did well at 180.2 bhp ATF calculated (with the respectable ATW dyno graph shown), a good result in my books as there were some distinctly underpowered cars already causing some head scratching that day with various VVT problems.
Although obtaining a good peak power the dyno graphs were showing a sharp drop in output quite early in the rev range, causing my optimum shift point to be surprisingly low in the 5.5k region. After checking the map and the base software version on the car Mr Stone updated both the software & the map with the newest fastchip 98Ron map, and boy what a difference, the map applied previously was around a year and half old and made beyond 6k a long old slog; something that only became apparent with the new map that took the power right up to the limiter. For a number of weeks after that I would find myself hitting the limiter every so often without being ready for it as I was totally unused to it surging all the way to the line!
February flew by and I found myself cursing my dirty black car, never clean for more than a day, but when cleaned it was all worth it.
With more meets under the cars belt and having been in other cars I made the decision that suspension was next on the wish list. Again JamesStone was a great help as he had been in cars with Eibach springs, owned Aphex springs and ran FK collies. I was able to grasp the pros and cons of the options and decided to tread the collie path at a later date instead of going half way with springs and sacrificing the fine balance between comfort and performance.
The next stage was a bit unexpected but circumstances arouse and I had the chance too obtain all my long term plans for the car in a single swoop!
These came in the form of AST coil-overs, Original Trophy Turinis and brembo max discs, all were in absolute mint condition so represented a real bargain second hand. The replacement parts could not have been better timed as two of my standard shocks were leaking anyway and would require attention shortly regardless & my standard discs were nearly done for.
Mr Stone and I fitted the coillies in a couple of hours one evening and left the setup as they came. It sat VERY low, the tops of tyres were hidden and some, so had the inevitable problems of light scrubbing and a very bouncy ride as the shock stroke was so short, but even with this initial setup I found the change in handling astonishing. I left it like this for a couple of days biding my time until an afternoon free showed itself and then set about winding the height up and tinkering with the once piece damping/rebound adjustment. After adjusting the rears disaster struck one of the front shocks when the threaded ring split after possibly being molested in a previous life!
This grounded the car until the next day as the shock was unfit to bear weight, so a 5 hour journey to powerstation and a shock rebuild in the kitchen later and we were back in business.
I am lucky to have a little experience with suspension settings from DH mtb racing where a well setup shock can make a winning time. The ASTs with their one piece front and rear coils & easily adjusted damping are basically identical to mtb shocks, just scaled up. So the processes of adjusting the settings and what to look for response wise were very easy to carry out.
This combined with James knowledge of coilover adjustment and a bit of testing on a range of road surfaces and corner types has left me with a good stance, excellent comfort day to day and plenty of shock stroke and rebound to deal with the rougher roads/corners, preventing the sideways movement of a car on over-stiff suspension as the tyre looses contact with the ground. On top of all of this I can get over speed bumps!
So until last week thats about it, the story of my RS clio ownership so far!
Here he is as he currently stands, I’d like to think (nearly) the finished article:
The plan now takes two routes, the first is driver training and track days, these being something that I have always wanted to get into. With the car as it is now it is extremely forgiving and should be able to handle anything I can throw at it so will be a great training tool with the proper instruction.
The second is JMS tuning which has now become a reality as a partnership between JamesStone and I, brains and beauty as they say
Take a look here for more info JMS TUNING
Thanks for taking the time to have a little read :approve:
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