3 years old and 74,000 miles of ritual abuse...shocking!!! 56k **** off

[Tighten My Nuts]

It's 3 years old! In 74,000 miles I've spent;

• Fuel £9,000
• Car tax £495
• Insurance £1,250
• Brakes (consumables and upgrades) £600
• Servicing £1,800
• Modifications (exhaust, decat, ITG panel, R-sport ECU) £630
• Road tyres £500
• Track tyres £350
• Replacement OE dampers £160
• Spare track wheels £250
• Depreciation £5,000

Total spent £20,035 or 27 pence per mile...and I've smiled for each and every one of them

Numerous trackdays, airfield days, breakfast runs, and, erm, sprited drives and I've probably got the sh*tiest Clio (cosmetically) in the club LOL

Mike (Rentech) has caressed it personally every 6,000 miles from brand new and I swear that's why it runs so well. Apart from leaving the cambelt until 69k, if it's ever needed something, I've had it done...mechanically it is 100% A1 and drives accordingly. It's had a couple of spins (search on YouTube), and connected with a tyre wall only once

Apart from some electrical warranty problems in the first year it has been totally reliable, and still gives me the good side of 40mpg if I want it, or 11mpg if I dont.

I've got one more year in it, then it'll get retired from daily use...that's when the real fun will start :evil:

Breakfast run casualty

Post breakfast run

Airfield

Goodwood

Bedford Autodrome

Brands

Castle Combe

Here comes the painful bit for all you clean car detailing nuts

From the tyre wall at Haynes

How it normally looks

My lovely wheels - admire the almost total lack of kerbing

And finally, the lovely Renault high quality leather steering wheel

 

[Leeshez]

Very nice

 

[R20 CWH]

christ i thought my steering wheel was bad.

you should send a few pics to newcardiscount to show them how happy you are with the beast, you must have bought around the same time as me, im on YB53 and 43k

 

[fizzy_drink]

Touch wood Mark, you obviously have a good machine.


I'm almost at 60k in the 182 (23 months), and I've not had such good luck but it's not been that bad actually.


It's cost me:

£9800 in monthly payments
£8000 in fuel
£2k in maintenance (tyres, brakes, servicing etc).
£1400 in insurance

£21,200 in total.

Approx 36 pence per mile once I'm done with her.

Thankfully, my car allowance has covered most of that. So has my fuel allowance.


Still, for a modern car to need the following before it's even reached 60k??!!

Pre-maturely wearing parts:

A full set of dampers
New rear bearings (which meant the discs had to be done too)
A new coil pack
12 new spark plugs

Only the coil pack was done under warranty (with difficulty).


Common production faults:

There was the usual temperature sensor problem, which was sorted with a cable-tie (after 2-3 sensors, I can't remember).

My ECU bracket snapped at around 8k, which was never repaired under warranty.

The usual little leak under the rear seats.

3k rattle (although it's quietened down more recently).


Current concerns:

The power steering has died on me for a few seconds, on two occasions recently.

My gearbox has got quite loose, and crunches a lot more often than it used to.

Peeling laquer on the driver's door.


Despite all the miles, she's a minter! Thanks to two recent accidents + some vandalism, nearly the whole car was resprayed.

 

[Dubai182]

Well looked after cosmectically then Mark??

Looks like its given you a lot of fun!

 

[Ian_182]

Good post.Its nice to know the real cost of motoring

ian

 

[John D]

How do you know how much you've spent on fuel? Just taken an average over a couple of months and multiplied? (I hope you ain't kept reciepts!)

What milage were the dampers replaced?

Cool post :approve:

 

[Neil G]

Cool pics.....obvously driven & treated like it should be.

Good to see someone not being completey anal about the apperance of their car

 

[Tighten My Nuts]

Pre-maturely wearing parts:

A full set of dampers
New rear bearings (which meant the discs had to be done too)

That's all I've needed pretty much too Oms...one rear bearing went recently needing new rear discs...but I'm still on the original factory fitted rear brake pads.

Original front wheel bearings too which is remarkable considering the amount of times it's clattered over apex kerbs while wearing sticky rubber.

Clutch is still going strong with no signs of slippage either.

I had one rear damper leak at about 60K so replaced the rears only, then when Mike had it for its cambelt I thought it'd be wise to replace the fronts too before they went. I've just bought a full set of 12,000 mile 172 Cup springs for £20 off another member so they'll be going on soon, and when Mike's got it up on the ramps I'm going to have all the gear-linkage bushes replaced to tighten up the shift too.

How did I work out the fuel? 74,000 miles at 34mpg average and 90p per litre.

 

[Rich]

Scary amounts of fuel when totalled up!

 

[Tighten My Nuts]

And check out the back of the drivers seat...

"My seat is squeaking" I said.

"We'll sort it out for you sir" said the Renault monkeys when Mike had a day off.

So they took the cover off and threw grease at the springs...and the grease has been working its way back out ever since.

 

[christurbo]

Good stuff Mark..... I respect a man who uses his car properly - whilst also has the right attitude 'money no object' to maintaining it.

Top Marks

 

[DebV6]

It's scary when you actually think about how much money you spend on a car! But great fun and worth it, car looks stunning!

 

[Jay]

That's how a cup should look like!

 

[John D]

It's scary when you actually think about how much money you spend on a car! But great fun and worth it, car looks stunning!

No it looks well used

 

[fizzy_drink]

And check out the back of the drivers seat...

"My seat is squeaking" I said.

"We'll sort it out for you sir" said the Renault monkeys when Mike had a day off.

So they took the cover off and threw grease at the springs...and the grease has been working its way back out ever since.

I did notice stains in the photo, however, didn't want to mention them!

As for my fuel calculations: I have calcaulted the pence per mile for each and every tank of fuel I've ever ever filled-up with (apart from those abroad). It works out to be between 13 and 14 pence per mile.

 

[Maz]

Wicked .. lol Mark your a leg-end

 

[DebV6]

It's scary when you actually think about how much money you spend on a car! But great fun and worth it, car looks stunning!

No it looks well used

It looks good well used!

 

[Dubai182]

Still great value 29p a mile for all the fun he's had. I might just be sad enough and work out my pennies to the mile...should be around 6/7p

 

[John D]

No it looks well used

It looks good well used!

I'm not disputing that lol

 

[Ali]

LOL! Fcuked! But it's been driven how it should be driven!! Top job!

 

[Tighten My Nuts]

LOL! Fcuked!

Harsh

It does clean up OK, it's just that, well...I never (hardly ever) clean it.

I can count on one hand how many times it's been through a carwash in the last 12 months.

There are far more important/pressing things for me to do on a Sunday than spend 3hrs shivvering my tits off!

 

[Paul J]

Very impressed with the lack of parts failure given the use it has and the mileage.

Mines just tipped 40k and bar cat failure and stone chips on front, it is near mint.

ds2500 pads and APracing fluid have been used and ive had 3 sets of front tyres now (2 rears).

Serviced on schedule with Renault by Renault (pains me but company policy) Oil changed between services with Silkolene Pro S.

Get 40 then 25pence/mile and an extra car payment every month so the car almost costs nothing

 

[Jonaldinho]

The marks of a true war veteran there! Good stuff.

 

[rob172cup]

fook my steering wheel is as good as new and its on a 53 plate ive heard they go but didnt know it could be that bad i must have soft skin??

 

[Dave S2K]

Nice roundup, well done.

 

[Ollie82.]

And to think i've just replaced my steering wheel cos it was starting to go a little rough on the edges.....that one has just been truly abused!

Sign of a well driven but hard driven car no doubt!

 

[Tighten My Nuts]

Actually, I barely grip the wheel at all normally, I use a very light finger-tip touch - feedback is far less diluted.

It's gone where my hands rest, but it's definitely not down to it being gripped too hard. It's purely because what Renault refer to as leather, is actually not leather (or if it is it's from some very strange breed of bovine). Mine seems to be made from two layers, with the top layer able to almost be peeled away...you can see where it's rolled back in the pic.

It had actually started to go well before the end of the 2nd year and I could have tried to get it changed under warranty, but leave it in the hands of the Renault dealer for even 1 second after Mike left the dealership and set-up Rentech? LMFAO - I'd rather have a crap steering wheel.

I'll have a suede one fitted this year anyway :evil:

 

[Ollie82.]

Mine did the same kinda thing, obviously alot less dramatic as that, but you could actually pick away the peel where it was gathering up.
I also don't find myself holding the wheel with white knuckles either but it was barely 3 years old before it had gone nasty...and it was owned by a 60 yr old bloke who only did 8000 miles in it before me, so not down to an abusive 1st owner either....then again it could have been Jackie Stewart.

Was thinking of retrimming mine in suede and keeping it as a spare now the new one is on

 

[Christopher]

great post.

driven as was intended. :approve:

 

[Mwindow]

40 mpg!!!! How'd you manage that?

 

[Tighten My Nuts]

40 mpg!!!! How'd you manage that?

http://www.iam.org.uk/aboutus/advancedtest/

Smoothness and anticipation are the key to it.

That's why things like my brakes and wheel bearings have lasted so long as well.

 

[Giles]

very nice