Clio 172
Hello
New here with a wee Clio 172 project that fell into my lap by chance. Nice and straight and with about 60k on the clock.
I have always liked small French hatchbacks and my first car and main car project so far was a Citroen AX:
I sold it to move onto bigger and faster things, and a car that I had always wanted:
Changed jobs and was offered a company car, so sold the Alfa and currently drive this:
Company car scheme has changed so next year when the BMW goes back I had planned on getting something more exciting for my personal use.
Friend of mine bought this Clio about a year ago and had spent about £1000 on it tyres/brakes/suspension/servicing, it's a clean and tidy example. Unfortunately taking the sellers word rather than a receipt for a cambelt change proved to be a mistake!
Having been quoted £1200+ to repair I made a cheeky offer to buy the car off him as was and a deal was done.
The car at my friends house awaiting collection:
My friend had asked his mechanic to take a look at the car (hence the quote), and the top of the engine had been partially dismantled to expose the cambelt etc. So I had alittle bit of work to do firstly figuring out the bag of bolts and components I'd been left with and how to bolt back up the engine mount ready for tow-age.
Got it all sorted and recovered to the parents house where all my tools live.
Ultimate aim for this project was to rebuild the engine to a working state, replace anything worn/dodgy encountered on the way, plus the predictable cheapish upgrades than improve the car without going mental.
Every forum loves pictures so here is a load.
In the 'service area'
How the engine looked when it came to me
Engine was taken apart further
Looks like a Cambelt pulley disintegrated – the belt didn't actually snap though...
All the inlet valves were bent
But the pistons appeared undamaged
This was the state of the cambelt which must have been the original
Later during the rebuild (after I had it started in fact) I spotted this:
So I am thinking that perhaps it was the alternator tensioner that failed causing the problem?
I managed to find someone local selling a complete engine, but he was going to be unavailable for a week. So I got to work with some other smaller jobs.
Started with a clean and tidy, spotted the first unexpected issue, wet spare wheel well!
Problem traced to the rather pointless plastic bung things, sorted with a blob of silicone
Started cleaning up the arches a bit, all the bolts and components are very rusty, not sure how anal I want to get with all this though.... it's a slippery slope.
Read a thread on here about LEDs, got more for the interior etc to fit also
Matey wanted his Sony stereo back so got a wee cheapo with DAB which I can't live without:
The following weekend with the help of my Dad and his custom twin engined Honda FRV beast we got the donor engine back to the garage
The seller had said that the cambelt had been done 18 months ago and to be fair it was a Gates belt that was on it. I'm still a bit of a Clio noob but I am pretty sure this is what a seized tensioner looks like? The aux belt had almost rubbed through.
Kind of worried about the lack of maintenance and hoping I hadn't bought a dud the plot thickened abit:
Certainly looks to me like the head has been off before?
Anyway the donor engine was still cleaner internally than the original engine plus all cam bearings etc looked good so I pressed on.
Won a genuine headgasket set on ebay for £25 which I though was pretty decent, measured the headbolts which were ok for re-use, obtained all the correct tools for setting the timing and bought a timing belt kit and aux belt kit.
Good head
Cylinder head placed and tightened up
Cams placed
Cam cover lubed up
Fitted and torqued up, oil seperater thing also
Cam timing tool fitted
Crank locking pin fitted
Cam pulleys and belt fitted
Tensioner set with use of an inspection mirror to see the thingies line up
Pulley locking tool fitted and bolts cranked up
Rotated the engine several times, refitted all the locking tools with ease and checked the tension still lined up and all was well!
Next onto the aux belt, this pic shows the level of access I needed just to get in, not to mention the number of times the engine was jacked up and lowered down etc, what a mare!
Got the tensioner and alternator back on the belt positioned etc, used a 3/8 sump plug key on my long torque wrench to release the tensioner, had to loosen the alternator bolt to get the belt slipped over, didn’t take many pics of this bit as excitement was building!
Dropped the old (filthy) oil and put on a new filter, pretty amazed at the low level of spillage!
You can see in this pic that the alternator cable is damaged, I also had to get a new ring terminal and crimp it on.
Actually remembered to put these on!
Nearly back together
At this point I left the coilpack plug off and cranked the engine over for 10 seconds at a time a few times until the battery died. This was to get the oil spread around the engine, fill up the filter and dephaser etc.
Went to Halfords for some bits and bobs whilst the battery was on charge, came back and started the engine. It started first time! Pretty amazed really, and delighted. Poor Dad pressed the camera record button twice so missed the moment but here is another video of it running. I promise it doesn't sound as terrible as this in real life!
http://s4.photobucket.com/user/hansthebear/media/Video01-12-2013134933_zpsb20a514c.mp4.html
So thats where it is now, still lots to do to get it back on the road including new bumper clips and bolts etc. Also going to flush the coolant again and give it a damn good clean before it hits the road.
I will keep this thread updated, hopefully everyone has enjoyed reading this as much as I have enjoyed your project threads.
Cheers!
New here with a wee Clio 172 project that fell into my lap by chance. Nice and straight and with about 60k on the clock.
I have always liked small French hatchbacks and my first car and main car project so far was a Citroen AX:
I sold it to move onto bigger and faster things, and a car that I had always wanted:
Changed jobs and was offered a company car, so sold the Alfa and currently drive this:
Company car scheme has changed so next year when the BMW goes back I had planned on getting something more exciting for my personal use.
Friend of mine bought this Clio about a year ago and had spent about £1000 on it tyres/brakes/suspension/servicing, it's a clean and tidy example. Unfortunately taking the sellers word rather than a receipt for a cambelt change proved to be a mistake!
Having been quoted £1200+ to repair I made a cheeky offer to buy the car off him as was and a deal was done.
The car at my friends house awaiting collection:
My friend had asked his mechanic to take a look at the car (hence the quote), and the top of the engine had been partially dismantled to expose the cambelt etc. So I had alittle bit of work to do firstly figuring out the bag of bolts and components I'd been left with and how to bolt back up the engine mount ready for tow-age.
Got it all sorted and recovered to the parents house where all my tools live.
Ultimate aim for this project was to rebuild the engine to a working state, replace anything worn/dodgy encountered on the way, plus the predictable cheapish upgrades than improve the car without going mental.
Every forum loves pictures so here is a load.
In the 'service area'
How the engine looked when it came to me
Engine was taken apart further
Looks like a Cambelt pulley disintegrated – the belt didn't actually snap though...
All the inlet valves were bent
But the pistons appeared undamaged
This was the state of the cambelt which must have been the original
Later during the rebuild (after I had it started in fact) I spotted this:
So I am thinking that perhaps it was the alternator tensioner that failed causing the problem?
I managed to find someone local selling a complete engine, but he was going to be unavailable for a week. So I got to work with some other smaller jobs.
Started with a clean and tidy, spotted the first unexpected issue, wet spare wheel well!
Problem traced to the rather pointless plastic bung things, sorted with a blob of silicone
Started cleaning up the arches a bit, all the bolts and components are very rusty, not sure how anal I want to get with all this though.... it's a slippery slope.
Read a thread on here about LEDs, got more for the interior etc to fit also
Matey wanted his Sony stereo back so got a wee cheapo with DAB which I can't live without:
The following weekend with the help of my Dad and his custom twin engined Honda FRV beast we got the donor engine back to the garage
The seller had said that the cambelt had been done 18 months ago and to be fair it was a Gates belt that was on it. I'm still a bit of a Clio noob but I am pretty sure this is what a seized tensioner looks like? The aux belt had almost rubbed through.
Kind of worried about the lack of maintenance and hoping I hadn't bought a dud the plot thickened abit:
Certainly looks to me like the head has been off before?
Anyway the donor engine was still cleaner internally than the original engine plus all cam bearings etc looked good so I pressed on.
Won a genuine headgasket set on ebay for £25 which I though was pretty decent, measured the headbolts which were ok for re-use, obtained all the correct tools for setting the timing and bought a timing belt kit and aux belt kit.
Good head
Cylinder head placed and tightened up
Cams placed
Cam cover lubed up
Fitted and torqued up, oil seperater thing also
Cam timing tool fitted
Crank locking pin fitted
Cam pulleys and belt fitted
Tensioner set with use of an inspection mirror to see the thingies line up
Pulley locking tool fitted and bolts cranked up
Rotated the engine several times, refitted all the locking tools with ease and checked the tension still lined up and all was well!
Next onto the aux belt, this pic shows the level of access I needed just to get in, not to mention the number of times the engine was jacked up and lowered down etc, what a mare!
Got the tensioner and alternator back on the belt positioned etc, used a 3/8 sump plug key on my long torque wrench to release the tensioner, had to loosen the alternator bolt to get the belt slipped over, didn’t take many pics of this bit as excitement was building!
Dropped the old (filthy) oil and put on a new filter, pretty amazed at the low level of spillage!
You can see in this pic that the alternator cable is damaged, I also had to get a new ring terminal and crimp it on.
Actually remembered to put these on!
Nearly back together
At this point I left the coilpack plug off and cranked the engine over for 10 seconds at a time a few times until the battery died. This was to get the oil spread around the engine, fill up the filter and dephaser etc.
Went to Halfords for some bits and bobs whilst the battery was on charge, came back and started the engine. It started first time! Pretty amazed really, and delighted. Poor Dad pressed the camera record button twice so missed the moment but here is another video of it running. I promise it doesn't sound as terrible as this in real life!
http://s4.photobucket.com/user/hansthebear/media/Video01-12-2013134933_zpsb20a514c.mp4.html
So thats where it is now, still lots to do to get it back on the road including new bumper clips and bolts etc. Also going to flush the coolant again and give it a damn good clean before it hits the road.
I will keep this thread updated, hopefully everyone has enjoyed reading this as much as I have enjoyed your project threads.
Cheers!
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