Ordered one of the last Cup172s, since production has now finished I ended up
getting a mondial blue one as the last silver ones destined for the UK had been
sold. Went to pick it up on Friday, car looked fantastic in blue and I was
generally impressed. I read and inwardly digested the owners manual and noted
the running-in instructions; its tough keeping below the 3500 rev limit/80 mph
max but hey, I can take a bit of discipline and it was nice cruising about
knowing how much is in reserve once those initial 1000kms have been completed.
Now for the sad news; at 211 miles I noticed a horrendous noise coming from the
steering. Any amount of lock induced a groan and at idle with the steering
pointing straight-ahead it sounded like a boiling noise/chattering.(!) no
warning light. So...I immediately pulled over and checked under the bonnet. No
power steering fluid in the reservoir - looked underneath and the car has pumped
it out all over the underside. I called the AA - no record of the car (yet) but
theyd send someone out anyway. All credit to them, the guy arrived within 10
minutes and I got a text message to confirm his imminent arrival. He diagnosed
that the union between the fluid reservoir pipe and the pump had *NEVER BEEN
TIGHTENED UP AT THE FACTORY*, it took approx three full turns to nip up tight
and is fairly awkward to get to. The reservoir was then re-filled with fluid and
I was on my way again.
Now this has lowered my confidence in the car for obvious reasons and in the
quality control methods used by Renault. Does anyone have an opinion on this
sorry tale and how the hell this could happen? Later on today Im going back to
the dealers and at the least Im going to be demanding a ground up inspection of
the car(isnt this supposed to happen at least twice before I take it on the
road??) The second reason Im posting this is that Im concerned that this loss
of fluid will have caused damage to the pump or rack or contamination of other
parts of the car (especially brakes). Any thoughts on this?
Finally, there is a sensor right near the union that leaked...what does this do?
Shouldnt I have got some warning *before the audible one* that the fluid had
disappeared?
Thanks in advance for any input, as you can probably imagine Im impressed and
disappointed in fairly equal measure right now.
...good luck with Renault.
