clio willy. steering and suspensions

[crono33]

Hi all, im the owner of 2 clio willy, one for me and one for the GF. great little car.

i have tested many clio before buying these (where both 2nd handers) and verified that most if not all of them suffered from a chronic slack in the steering. VERY annoying at high speed.
went thru a new steering rack before finding out there is a damn rubber damper fitted to the steering column. the damper wears out pretty quick and introduces a very annoying slop. also, steering feels spongy and nowhere nearly as responsive as in my delta evo, even with a new steering column (which costs 300 euro BTW, and requires dismantling all the dash for fitting, damper is not sold alone))

does anyone know anything about this issue? solutions? i cant believe people race the clio witzh such crappy steering.
i have fitted a bolt thru the damper and slop is gone. steering is MUCH better now, a entirely different car. but im thinking about a permanent solution, probably weld up the joint.

my willy goes for 200k km now so im going to refurbish the front end. i was thinking about a set of bilsteins. anyone experience with those? or stock ones are good nough? i am NOT going to lower the car.
also considering powerflex bushes. is it a complicated job to fit them? can it be DIYed, given a decent set of spanners is available?

thanks to all

gm

 

[riplash]

search for posts by king.stromba he is trying to solve his at the moment

 

[lofty]

weld it mate, problem solved and it can be done without removing the column,

if it was me id replace the shocks with new OE renault items. There will have been alot of R&D done into the suspension and this car it is one of the few cars on the road that has a without compromise suspension set ups so stick OE if you want my opionion.

other problem areas with steering through wear are (in no order)

Track rod ends
Bottom ball joints
Track rod inner ball joints
Rack mount bushes (Racks themselves dont wear in real terms)

track rod ends and bottom ball joints are a cheap and easy replacment, and the guy who did 200k in his williams 3 reckons he was changing every 40k (miles not KM)

Hope this helps

 

[king.stromba]

Agree with 16v - 2.0. Replacing the OE parts with others can be counter productive on the Williams. Stick with originals. Renault did alot of develpoment work on the suspension and braking so you have to trust what they have done.

As for the column, i have come to the same conclusion as you. I used a liquid metal to mend the joint in the column. I will get it welded when i can find someone whou will do it in situ.

Can i ask what happened to the handling with a new steering column? Is it worth a new column over just welding the old one in your opinion?

I am fitting polysport polyurethane bushes next week, ill let you know how it goes.

I would also replace the track rod ends, bottom ball joints, track rod inner joints as mentioned above and look for damaged springs, which are also very common. The rubbers holding the rack have also been suggested to be easy wear parts so might be worth replacing them (source of information Nick Hill). They are cheap but hard to fit.

I had a wobbly wheel on my williams when i got it. Each time i have replaced a suspension part the wobble has reduced. Nothing was causing the wobble on its own. The wobble is now very small. Just goes to show, on the Williams it is usually a combination of factors causing a handling problems.

I would get a strut brace when all the other suspension parts are sorted. Make sure its a three part brace with proper attachement to the struts. Some easy fit strut braces arnt effective because the are too easily fitted by weak mechanism and therefore fail to prevent body role. It should be very strongly attached usually under the top mount bolts.